Internet Marketing News
While it is still very early, anecdotal evidence suggests the BlackBerry Z10 is selling well in the United Kingdom since hitting the shelves the last week of January.
Investors seem impressed, boosting. The BlackBerry company's shares (TSX:BB) more than 15 per cent on Feb. 4, moving ahead $1.98 to close at $14.99 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
According to news stories, lineups were forming at U.K. stores with widespread sell outs of the white Z10 and limited stock of the black Z10.
The BlackBerry company (formerly known as Research In Motion) is scrambling to recover lost ground in the smart phone market. So far, it has enjoyed a large number of positive reviews for the Z10, its new touchscreen phone. A keypad version is expected to launch in April.
The Canadian launch was on Feb. 5 and will enter U.S. stores in March. Victoria smartphone retailers appear enthusiastic about the arrival of the Z10 with many reporting strong pre-launch interest from Victoria business people and recreational users alike.
Victoria businesses involved in the business-to-business, search marketing sphere should look out for a new retail channel being rolled out by Google this spring. Google is entering the B2B shopping sector with Google Shopping for Suppliers.
The Google Shopping for Suppliers beta was launched in mid-January in the U.S. and is currently open to the electronics industries.
The beta can be tested here
Google Shopping for Suppliers was built to accommodate the unique aspects of B2B selling. These include utilities to allow negotiations on shipping costs and volume discounts. As well, Google Shopping policies on pricing and payments, shipping, taxes and returns and refunds have been modified.
According to reports, North American businesses will pay a one-time verification fee of $1,000 and will receive Google Verified Supplier certification. This will mean a badge on company listings and having products moved ahead of unverified suppliers.
For Victoria companies selling to other business online, Google Shopping for Suppliers should be a key consideration in future web development and web marketing strategies. While Google is already a primary search source for buyers and sellers in the B2B sector, the ability to refine those verticals and relationships in a B2Bdedicated space can really streamline the purchase and fulfillment process as the understandings and expectations between parties is refined.
Depressed? It may be due to your use of social media and in particular, Facebook. Scientists at Humboldt University in Berlin and Darmstadt's Technical University recently reported that many Facebook users develop a sense of inferiority, becoming envious of the their family, friends' and associates' trips, family and exploits.
According to the study released January 2013, 36.9% of people who participated came away with negative feelings while 30% of respondents said they felt envious of their friends after visiting Facebook.
Meanwhile, almost 20% of respondents felt their postings and updates were being ignored, reporting feelings of isolation and loneliness.
The report's findings were depressing, concluding that envy feelings can cause significant damage to users' well-being and impact their life satisfaction.
This is bad news for social media marketers, Facebook advertisers and paid search.
If the trends indicated within this report continue, more people will start turning away from Facebook and other social media sites and applications.
Victoria is a beautiful tourist destination. The ocean, mountains and forests are key selling features. Now Victoria business websites can better leverage local scenery and images with Google€™s new and greatly improved Google Image search function.
Previously, people looking for images on Google browsed through hundreds of images, looking both at the images and their attached metadata (information about the images).
The new Google Images, which is rolling out the last weeks of January, provides a much better search experience that better showcases images. Instead of a contact sheet of thumbnail images, image results are displayed in an inline panel. This makes it much quicker to review images, quality, dimensions and content.
Give it a try by visiting http://images.google.com/
There are numerous new features, some readily apparent, others, less so:
Drag and drop - Drag and drop an image from the web or your computer into the search box on images.google.com .
Upload an image - On images.google.com , click the camera icon, then select €œUpload an image.€ Select the image you want to use to start your search.
Copy and paste the URL for an image - Found an image on the web you€™re curious about? Right-click the image to copy the URL. On images.google.com , click the camera icon, and €œPaste image URL€Â.
Right-click an image on the web - To search by image even faster, download the Chrome extension or the Firefox extension. With the extension installed, simply right-click an image on the web to search Google with that image.
Detailed image information - detailed information about the image (the metadata) is displayed right underneath the image in the search results, instead of sending users to a separate landing page.
Detail on location of the image - information is displayed next to the image includes the title of the page hosting the image, the domain name it comes from, and the image size. As well, the domain name is now clickable so it is quick and easy to visit the page the image is hosted on. The image iframe overlay is also gone €“ users go right to the page so web metrics accurately record visits and their origins.
Google Image is a great tool tourist destinations such as Victoria B.C. should be using. Resorts, hotels, travel companies must ensure their Victoria website uses the correct metadata on their websites to feed into Google Image. Accurate indexing must start at the web development level.