Spotlight Features

Compared to solar and wind, geothermal energy is still a small fraction of the renewable energy market. It's holding its own, however, and it's likely to become a much bigger player in the not-so-distant future. "The resource is enormous," said Karl Gawell, executive director of the Geothermal Energ...

Like other renewable energy resources, wind energy is taking off. The second quarter of 2011 saw more than 1,003 megawatts of wind power capacity installed, and the wind industry has contributed upwards of 35 percent of all new generating capacity during the past four years, second only to natural g...

Solar is no longer on the back burner; it's right there at the front of the stove, demanding that economists and job seekers alike take notice. "It's a tough environment, but I think it will continue to grow," said Gerald Kelly, communications director for Third Sun Solar. "As we move forward as a...

Victims bilked of their money by fake online ads are not the only ones hurt. "Blatant fraud, like the fake-news diet promotions and other online scams that have sprouted in recent years, only serves to undermine consumer confidence and eventually marketers and business as a whole," said attorney Bil...

3D marketing is powerful -- and even more so, when it's delivered to the palm of your hand. Mobile 3D is becoming an increasingly common way of grabbing, holding, and entertaining consumers. From using current mobile technologies to create a sense of 3D, to creating actual images that seem to pop of...

You've seen the ad a thousand times on the Internet: "1 Tip for a Tiny Belly" says the hand-lettered headline above the crudely drawn swelling-and-shrinking belly. "Cut down a bit of your belly everyday following this one weird tip," it goes on to say. If starvation caused by having funds continuous...

You might not care about your friend's innumerable Foursquare updates detailing his stops at a bank, a bookstore, and finally a local Italian restaurant, where he's having spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. You can bet, however, that marketers do. After all, the more businesses know about where th...

You might have seen them without knowing what they are: little black and white boxes with squiggles and lines in the corner of a magazine advertisement, on a band's poster in a coffeeshop, or even on a T-shirt. Those things, called "QR codes," or "quick response codes," are part of a whole new way ...

Thanks to a variety of mobile payment systems, buying and selling goods and services has never been easier. Increasingly, mobile devices are becoming both credit-card readers and stand-ins for the cards themselves. It might not mean the end of cash just yet, but we're moving in that direction. "Ten ...

Consumers are savvier than ever. They're also much less likely to be swayed by traditional, in-your-face advertising and commercials. They want, instead, to be entertained and engaged by marketers. In short, consumers just want to have fun. Marketers and e-commerce retailers are, therefore, looking ...

For thousands of years, auctions remained largely unchanged -- until 1995, when a computer programmer posted a single item online. The result: A broken laser pointer found a home, and Pierre Omidyar founded eBay. Unlike its slow-to-change offline predecessor, the online auction has gone through som...

It just makes sense that consumers tend to trust the opinions and recommendations of friends before they trust those of advertisers, promoters and retailers. Social shopping sites, which combine features of social networking with online sales, seek to capitalize on the sharing and trust that exist b...

Visual product configuration software is increasingly allowing consumers to design their own products, from shoes to tattoos, before purchasing them. The ability to design-before-you-buy gives consumers a sense of power and independence -- and it's also just a lot of fun. "People enjoy the build pro...

Shopping has traditionally involved an element of seeing, touching and feeling a product before buying. Shopping online, however, hasn't ever quite replicated that experience. That is, until now. With the advent of 3D technologies, online shopping is on the verge of a radical transformation. One ne...

Let's face it, texting is ubiquitous. A constant stream of information comes and goes through our phones. Harnessing the power of this medium to reach customers is the goal of a whole new breed of mobile marketers. "If you want to reach everyone, text messaging is the only way to do that," said Josh...