E-Commerce

Restaurant owners, dentists, doctors, graphic designers, realtors and everyday people are all doing it: bartering. Though it's an old concept, it's getting a new twist in the world of e-commerce. "This is the new method for an old practice, with e-commerce," said Paul Bocheck, CEO of BarterQuest. Wh...

Google has become the subject of a series of withering articles calling it out for violating its own advertising policies. The company reportedly has run sponsored marketing ads for its Chrome browser using techniques that last year's Panda algorithm change was designed to prohibit. The paid sponsor...

Amazon shares fell to their lowest point since late March after Goldman Sachs released a research note Thursday citing comScore data suggesting its holiday sales grew roughly 38 percent -- 2 percent off analyst expectations of 40 percent. The numbers imply fourth-quarter revenue of $17.87 billion, b...

After seven years of a neck-and-neck race for first place in customer satisfaction, Amazon has pulled decisively ahead of Netflix, according to ForeSee's annual Holiday E-Retail Satisfaction Index. Amazon moved ahead 2 points to reach the top spot with 88 on the index's 100-point scale. Netflix slid...

GoDaddy, the Internet's largest registrar of domains, would like the world to forget it ever supported the much-maligned Stop Online Piracy Act now before Congress. Namecheap, the second largest registrar, wants to make sure the world never forgets it. In recent days, the domain registering titans h...

Traditionally, online advertising was viewed primarily as a direct-response vehicle. However, the growing use of data to define and deliver audience targeting means it now can have an impact on all levels of the purchasing funnel -- from fostering awareness to reaching consumers at the ideal interse...

Google and Mozilla have reupped their search revenue agreement. Under the new three-year plan, Google Search will continue to be the default search provider for Firefox users. Given Google's clear desire to push Chrome into the top ranks of the browser market, it would seem counterintuitive for it...

In May 2011, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada released a report based on a consultation process for online tracking, profiling and targeting of advertisers, and cloud computing. The goal was to engage the public on recent technological advancements and privacy complications in behavioral advertisi...

Kindles have caught fire this holiday season. The e-readers and tablets are the top-selling products on Amazon, according to numbers released by by the e-commerce giant this week. Consumers have purchased more than a million Kindles in each of the past three weeks, the company said. The new Kindle F...

Ask just about any research company that tracks online spending about this holiday season and you will get bombarded with cheer: "good," "strong," "robust," and "surprisingly strong" are among the adjectives used to describe online shopping activity this month and last. The latest indicator is a rep...

Best Buy's fiscal third-quarter profit fell 29 percent, surprising analysts and retail observers who had been expecting stronger results. For the quarter ended Nov. 26, the electronics retailer posted a profit of $154 million, or 42 cents a share. In the same period a year earlier, it reported a pro...

Stephanie Allen started making and freezing meals for her own family 16 years ago, developing a collection of recipes that worked especially well. The mother of two knew how important it was to plan and make meals ahead. That experience led Allen to cofound Dream Dinners, now a nationwide company th...

Netflix shares began perking up Monday after a report from DealReporter suggested that Verizon is looking into acquiring the DVD and streaming service to kick-start a video offering of its own. News from Bloomberg on Tuesday morning further intensified the rumor, which arose less than week after Reu...

With mixed emotions, Rick Singer, CEO of GreatApps.com, recently bought his first .XXX domain name. He was happy that his small business had progressed to the point where its brand needed to be protected. At the same time, GreatApps is, as the name suggests, a software company, not an adult entertai...

A backlash is growing against an app designed to help consumers scope out products at local stores, compare them to similar goods on Amazon -- and then leave the stores empty-handed to make their actual purchases online. Critics of the app, called "Amazon Price Check," include brick-and-mortar retai...