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Web analytics firm StatCounter reports that mobile internet usage is doubling year on yea

2012-02-06T10:35:00.001-08:00

Nokia global leader
Apple king in US and UK

Boston, USA and Dublin, Ireland; Monday, 6th February, 2012: Global internet usage through mobile devices, not including tablets*, has almost doubled to 8.5% in January 2012 from 4.3% last year according to free web analytics company StatCounter. The firm's research arm StatCounter Global Stats highlights the increasing use of mobile devices to access the internet with market share doubling year on year since 2009 (Table A below).

"While global internet usage through mobiles is still under 10%, the pace of growth is remarkable," commented Aodhan Cullen, CEO, StatCounter.

StatCounter has also announced that new stats regarding mobile vendorsare now available on its Global Stats website. The firm has been compiling and refining these stats for some time and has now made the beta project public. Based on initial research covering all traffic to the StatCounter network, Nokia leads worldwide, most probably driven by its dominance in India. Apple is second globally but leads the US and UK markets. In the UK RIM is second only to Apple.

"Following repeated requests, we've decided to make our new mobile vendor stats publicly available," commented Aodhan Cullen, StatCounter. "As the mobile space is constantly evolving, we keep our detection under constant review." Anyone wishing to contribute to the detection project can submit feedback using the detect tool: http://gs.statcounter.com/detect

StatCounter (http://statcounter.com/) provides free website traffic analysis. This allows website owners, developers and bloggers to capture website intelligence in real time e.g. number of visitors, visitors by country/region, search terms, popular pages, download stats, exit links and other data.

--------------------------------------------------
Table A:
Global use of mobile devices to access internet
(excludes tablets*)

Jan 2009: 0.7%
Jan 2010: 1.6%
Jan 2011: 4.3%
Jan 2012: 8.5%
Source: StatCounter Global Stats
-----------------------------------------------------

Digital River Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2011 Financial Results

2012-02-03T08:20:00.001-08:00

MINNEAPOLIS, Feb 02, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Digital River, Inc. DRIV +9.08% , the revenue growth experts in global cloud commerce, reports its fourth quarter and full year 2011 financial results.

Fourth Quarter and Full Year Ended Dec. 31, 2011, Financial Results GAAP Results Fourth quarter 2011 revenue totaled $112.0 million, exceeding management's guidance of $103 to $105 million. In the fourth quarter of 2010, revenue was $97.7 million.

For the full year 2011, revenue was $398.1 million, exceeding management's guidance of $389 to $391 million. In 2010, revenue was $363.2 million.

Fourth quarter GAAP net income was $4.3 million, or $0.12 per diluted share, which compared to GAAP net income of $5.4 million, or $0.14 per diluted share, in the fourth quarter of 2010. These results were below management's fourth quarter guidance for net income of $0.18 to $0.21 per diluted share driven by $9.4 million of one-time non-cash impairments recorded in the quarter. These impairments primarily related to the reduction in the book carrying values of intangibles, including certain customer relationship, trade name and non-compete agreements.

For the full year 2011, GAAP net income was $17.2 million, or $0.46 per diluted share, and compared to GAAP net income of $15.7 million, or $0.41 per diluted share, during the same period in 2010. These results were below management's full year 2011 guidance of $0.52 to $0.55 per diluted share, due to the aforementioned impairment charge.

Non-GAAP Results Fourth quarter 2011 non-GAAP net income was $17.7 million, or $0.45 per diluted share. This compared to non-GAAP net income of $12.7 million, or $0.32 per diluted share, in the fourth quarter of 2010. These results exceeded management's fourth quarter earnings guidance of $0.32 to $0.35 per diluted share.

For the full year 2011, non-GAAP net income was $45.6 million, or $1.15 per diluted share, and compared to non-GAAP net income of $36.7 million, or $0.95 per diluted share, during the same period in 2010. These results exceeded management's full year 2011 guidance of $1.03 to $1.06 per diluted share.

"I am pleased to report that we ended 2011 on a high note, delivering the highest quarterly revenue in the history of the company and beating our fourth quarter non-GAAP earnings guidance," said Joel Ronning, Digital River's CEO. "This year, innovation and product development will be major themes inside Digital River. We have several solutions we intend to deliver in 2012, including an expanded cloud-based subscriptions offering. Our company and clients' goals are clearly aligned -- we are both focused on growing online revenue."

On Sept. 7, 2011, management announced a $100 million share repurchase program. During the fourth quarter, the company repurchased $29.7 million of common stock, or 1.9 million shares at an average price of $15.41 per share. For the year, the company repurchased $79.8 million of common stock, or 4.3 million shares at an average price of $18.70 per share.

First Quarter 2012 Guidance

-- Revenue in the range of $99 to $101 million;

-- GAAP diluted earnings per share in the range of $0.09 to $0.13;

-- Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share in the range of $0.27 to $0.30; and

-- A tax rate of 21 percent for both GAAP and non-GAAP earnings.

Full Year 2012 Guidance

-- Revenue in the range of $402 to $409 million;

-- GAAP diluted earnings per share in the range of $0.54 to $0.64;

-- Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share in the range of $1.20 to $1.28; and

-- A tax rate of 21 percent for both GAAP and non-GAAP earnings.

A detailed table providing a reconciliation of the company's GAAP and non-GAAP earnings guidance estimates can be found accompanying this press release.

Digital River will hold a conference call today at 4:45 p.m. EST to discuss fourth quarter and full year financial results. A live webcast of Digital River's earnings conference call can be accessed on the Investor Relations section of its corporate website. Alternatively, a live broadcast of the call may be heard by using conference ID #38649790 and dialing (877) 303-3145 inside the United States or Canada, or by calling +1 (408) 427-3861 from international locations. A webcast replay of the call will be archived on Digital River's corporate website.

About Digital River, Inc. Digital River, Inc., the revenue growth experts in global cloud commerce, builds and manages online businesses for software and game publishers, consumer electronics manufacturers, distributors, online retailers and affiliates. Its multi-channel commerce solution, which supports both direct and indirect sales, is designed to help companies of all sizes maximize online revenues as well as reduce the costs and risks of running a global commerce operation. The company's comprehensive platform offers site development and hosting, order management, fraud management, export controls, tax management, physical and digital product fulfillment, multi-lingual customer service, advanced reporting and strategic marketing services.

Founded in 1994, Digital River is headquartered in Minneapolis with offices across the U.S., Asia, Europe and South America. For more details about Digital River, visit the corporate website, call +1 952-253-1234, or follow the company on Twitter.

Non-GAAP Net Income Calculation Digital River's non-GAAP net income is computed by adjusting GAAP pre-tax income as reported on the company's statement of operations by adding back amortization of acquisition-related intangibles, stock-based compensation expense, intangible impairments, unrealized investment gain or loss and restructuring costs, net of a 21 percent tax rate. Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share is calculated using the "if-converted" method with respect to the issuance of the company's 2004 and 2010 convertible notes, which includes shares reserved upon conversion of 199,828 and 7,022,027, respectively. In computing non-GAAP diluted earnings per share, adjust non-GAAP net income to add back debt interest and issuance cost amortization expenses, net of the tax benefit, and then divide this amount by fully diluted shares outstanding. This amount, representing the fully diluted earnings computation, is selected to represent non-GAAP diluted earnings per share for each period presented. To provide further clarity, a detailed reconciliation on the comparability of the GAAP and non-GAAP data has been provided in table form following the financial statements accompanying this release.

Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding the company's anticipated future growth, including future financial performance, as well as statements containing the words "anticipates," "believes," "plans," "will," "expects," or "guidance" and similar words. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the company, or industry results, to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include, among others: the company's operating history and variability of operating results; competition in the commerce market; challenges associated with international expansion; the variability of foreign exchange rates; any breach or compromise of the company's security systems; our ability to successfully manage our business while undertaking significant internal investments; our ability to execute upon our payments strategy and expand our business in this sector; our ability to achieve favorable tax rates in our international operations; and other risk factors referenced in the company's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended Dec. 31, 2010. The financial information contained in this release should be read in conjunction with the consolidated financial statements and notes thereto included in Digital River's most recent reports on Form 10-K and Form 10-Q, each as it may be amended from time-to-time.

The forward-looking statements for the remainder of fiscal 2012 reflect management's expectations as of Feb. 2, 2012. Results may be materially affected by many factors, such as changes in global conditions in the financial services markets and consumer spending, fluctuations in foreign currency rates, the rate of growth of online commerce and the Internet, progress with key partners and other factors. The guidance assumes, among other things, that there are no changes to stock-based compensation expense and anticipated tax rates. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which reflect management's analysis only as of the date hereof. The company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date hereof.

Digital River is a registered trademark of Digital River, Inc. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners.

Digital River, Inc.
        Fourth Quarter Results
        (Unaudited, in thousands)
        Subject to reclassification
        Consolidated Balance Sheets
                                                                                   December 31,          December 31,
                                                                               --------------------  --------------------
                                                                                       2011                  2010
                                                                               --------------------  --------------------
        Assets
        --------------------------------------------------------------------
          Current assets
            Cash and cash equivalents                                            $    497,193          $    565,086
            Short-term investments                                                    223,349               163,029
            Accounts receivable, net of allowance of $4,613 and $4,902                 64,811                50,922
            Deferred tax assets                                                         8,532                10,628
            Prepaid expenses and other                                                 35,719                30,375
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
               Total current assets                                                   829,604               820,040
          Property and equipment, net                                                  51,537                49,599
          Goodwill                                                                    281,858               283,940
          Intangible assets, net of accumulated amortization of $85,542 and            18,324                37,911
          $80,106
          Long-term investments                                                        99,047               110,736
          Deferred income taxes                                                        21,433                17,721
          Other assets                                                                  8,973                13,820
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
          Total assets                                                           $  1,310,776          $  1,333,767
                                                                               ==== =========        ==== =========
        Liabilities and stockholders' equity
        --------------------------------------------------------------------
          Current liabilities
            Accounts payable                                                     $    243,410          $    188,915
            Accrued payroll                                                            17,523                21,117
            Deferred revenue                                                            8,633                10,446
            Accrued acquisition liabilities                                                 -                 1,615
            Other accrued liabilities                                                  42,577                58,083
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
               Total current liabilities                                              312,143               280,176
          Non-current liabilities
            Convertible senior notes                                                  353,805               353,805
            Other liabilities                                                          12,556                16,038
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
               Total non-current liabilities                                          366,361               369,843
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
          Total liabilities                                                           678,504               650,019
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
          Stockholders' equity
            Preferred Stock, $.01 par value; 5,000,000 shares authorized; no                -                     -
            shares issued or outstanding
            Common Stock, $.01 par value; 120,000,000 shares authorized;                  472                   463
            47,248,165 and 46,323,799 shares issued
            Treasury stock at cost; 11,741,310 and 7,297,174 shares                  (340,946)            (255,196)
            Additional paid-in capital                                                708,941               683,307
            Retained earnings                                                         271,769               254,602
            Accumulated other comprehensive income (loss)                              (7,964)                 572
                                                                                    --------- ----        ---------
            Stockholders' equity                                                      632,272               683,748
                                                                                    ---------             ---------
          Total liabilities and stockholders' equity                             $  1,310,776          $  1,333,767
                                                                               ==== =========        ==== =========

Digital River, Inc.
        Fourth Quarter Results
        (Unaudited, in thousands, except per share amounts)
        Subject to reclassification
        Consolidated Statements of Operations
                                                                  Three months ended              Twelve months ended
                                                                     December 31,                    December 31,
                                                             -----------------------------  ------------------------------
                                                                  2011           2010            2011            2010
                                                             --------------  -------------  --------------  --------------
        Revenue                                               $ 112,024       $ 97,681       $ 398,140       $ 363,226
        Costs and expenses (exclusive of depreciation and
         amortization expense shown separately below):
           Direct cost of services                                3,809          4,248          15,491          17,789
           Network and infrastructure                            12,327         12,213          49,433          46,909
           Sales and marketing                                   44,831         39,274         162,564         150,041
           Product research and development                      16,355         14,916          66,862          60,844
           General and administrative                            11,729         10,832          43,093          43,392
           Depreciation and amortization                          5,550          5,751          22,207          23,413
           Amortization of acquisition-related intangibles       11,529          2,564          18,040           7,845
                                                                -------         ------         -------         -------
        Total costs and expenses                                106,130         89,798         377,690         350,233
                                                                -------         ------         -------         -------
             Income from operations                               5,894          7,883          20,450          12,993
                                                                -------         ------         -------         -------
        Interest income                                           1,307          1,003           6,100           3,035
        Interest expense                                         (2,254)       (1,535)        (9,018)        (1,688)
        Other income (expense), net                              (1,948)           40          (1,921)        (1,067)
                                                                ------- --      ------         ------- --      ------- --
             Income before income taxes                           2,999          7,391          15,611          13,273
        Income tax expense (benefit)                             (1,340)        2,004          (1,556)        (2,462)
                                                                ------- --      ------         ------- --      ------- --
             Net income                                       $   4,339       $  5,387       $  17,167       $  15,735
                                                             == =======      == ======      == =======      == =======
        Net income per share - basic                          $    0.12       $   0.14       $    0.47       $    0.42
                                                             == =======      == ======      == =======      == =======
        Net income per share - diluted                        $    0.12       $   0.14       $    0.46       $    0.41
                                                             == =======      == ======      == =======      == =======
        Shares used in per share calculation - basic             34,757         37,194          36,778          37,518
        Shares used in per share calculation - diluted           35,185         38,430          37,510          38,339
        Calculation of GAAP Diluted Net Income Per Share
                                                                  Three months ended              Twelve months ended
                                                                     December 31,                    December 31,
                                                             -----------------------------  ------------------------------
                                                                  2011           2010            2011            2010
                                                             --------------  -------------  --------------  --------------
        GAAP net income                                       $   4,339       $  5,387       $  17,167       $  15,735
           Add back debt interest expense and issuance
            cost amortization, net of tax benefit                    19             15              78              79
                                                                -------         ------         -------         -------
           Adjusted net income for GAAP EPS calculation       $   4,358       $  5,402       $  17,245       $  15,814
                                                             == =======      == ======      == =======      == =======
        Net income per share - diluted                        $    0.12       $   0.14       $    0.46       $    0.41
                                                             == =======      == ======      == =======      == =======
        Shares used in per share calculation - diluted           35,185         38,430          37,510          38,339

Digital River, Inc.
        Fourth Quarter Results
        (Unaudited, in thousands)
        Subject to reclassification
        Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows
                                                                                        Twelve months ended December 31,
                                                                                    ----------------------------------------
                                                                                           2011                 2010
                                                                                    -------------------  -------------------
        Operating Activities:
        -------------------------------------------------------------------------
         Net income                                                                   $    17,167          $    15,735
            Adjustments to reconcile net income to net cash provided by (used
            in) operating activities:
               Amortization of acquisition-related intangibles                              8,689                7,845
               Provision for doubtful accounts                                              1,317                2,666
               Depreciation and amortization                                               22,207               23,413
               Impairment of intangibles                                                    9,351                    -
               Debt issuance cost amortization                                              1,986                  318
               Stock-based compensation expense                                            22,114               20,773
               Excess tax benefits from stock-based compensation                           (1,985)             (2,474)
               Deferred and other income taxes                                             (2,649)             (2,841)
               Impairment of equity investment                                              2,198                2,188
               Change in operating assets and liabilities (net of acquisitions):
                   Accounts receivable                                                    (15,292)                180
                   Prepaid and other assets                                                 2,635               (6,540)
                   Accounts payable                                                        57,162              (11,554)
                   Deferred revenue                                                        (1,782)             (2,749)
                   Income tax payable                                                      (4,061)             (1,491)
                   Other accrued liabilities                                              (24,289)             12,331
                                                                                         -------- ----        --------
                      Net cash provided by operating activities                            94,768               57,800
                                                                                         --------             --------
        Investing Activities:
        -------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Purchases of investments                                                    (254,536)           (198,673)
             Sales of investments                                                         213,302               53,299
             Cash paid for cost method investments                                         (9,490)                  -
             Funding of restricted cash                                                         -               (2,156)
             Cash paid for acquisitions, net of cash received                                   -              (14,585)
             Purchases of equipment and capitalized software                              (23,860)            (18,579)
                                                                                         -------- ----        -------- ----
                      Net cash used in investing activities                               (74,584)           (180,694)
                                                                                         -------- ----        -------- ----
        Financing Activities:
        -------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Cash received (paid) for convertible senior notes                                  -              345,000
             Debt issuance costs                                                             (342)             (9,529)
             Exercise of stock options                                                        364                5,004
             Sales of common stock under employee stock purchase plan                       2,466                2,374
             Repurchase of common stock                                                   (79,758)            (34,999)
             Repurchase of restricted stock to satisfy tax withholding obligation          (5,992)             (3,317)
             Excess tax benefits from stock-based compensation                              1,985                2,474
                                                                                         --------             --------
                     Net cash provided by (used in) financing activities                  (81,277)            307,007
                                                                                         -------- ----        --------
        Effect of exchange rate changes on cash                                            (6,800)            (11,731)
                                                                                         -------- ----        -------- ----
        Net increase (decrease) in cash and cash equivalents                              (67,893)            172,382
        Cash and cash equivalents, beginning of period                                    565,086              392,704
        Cash and cash equivalents, end of period                                      $   497,193          $   565,086
                                                                                    ==== ========        ==== ========
        Cash paid for interest on convertible senior notes                            $     7,010          $       110
                                                                                    ==== ========        ==== ========
        Cash paid for income taxes                                                    $     5,085          $     5,883
                                                                                    ==== ========        ==== ========

Digital River, Inc.
        GAAP to non-GAAP Reconciliations
        (Unaudited, in thousands, except per share amounts)
        UTILIZING 21% EFFECTIVE INCOME TAX RATE
        -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                                                                 Twelve months
                                                                                                      Three months ended                             ended
                                                                                --------------------------------------------------------------  --------------
                                                                                  March 31,     June 30,       September 30,     December 31,    December 31,
                                                                                    2010          2010             2010              2010            2010
                                                                                ------------  -------------  -----------------  --------------  --------------
        GAAP pre-tax income (loss)                                                 $  9,676    $ (4,887)       $  1,093             $  7,391        $ 13,273
           Add back amortization of acquisition-related intangibles                   1,481       1,612            2,188                2,564           7,845
           Add back stock-based compensation expense                                  4,476       5,522            5,280                5,495          20,773
           Add back unrealized investment gain/loss                                       -           -            1,562                  626           2,188
           Add back restructuring related costs                                           -       1,870              443                    -           2,313
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Non-GAAP pre-tax income                                                      15,633       4,117           10,566               16,076          46,392
        Income tax expense @ 21%                                                      3,283         865            2,218                3,376           9,742
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Non-GAAP net income                                                          12,350       3,252            8,348               12,700          36,650
                                                                                     ======      ======           ======               ======          ======
           Add back debt interest expense and issuance cost amortization, net            21          21               21                  937           1,000
           of tax benefit
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Adjusted net income for non-GAAP EPS calculation                           $ 12,371    $  3,273         $  8,369             $ 13,637        $ 37,650
                                                                                ==== ======   == ======      ==== ======        ====== ======   ====== ======
        Non-GAAP net income per share - diluted                                    $   0.32    $   0.09         $   0.22             $   0.32        $   0.95
                                                                                ==== ======   == ======      ==== ======        ====== ======   ====== ======
        Shares used in per share calculation - diluted                               38,220      38,351           38,504               43,085          39,512
                                                                                                                                                 Twelve months
                                                                                                      Three months ended                             ended
                                                                                --------------------------------------------------------------  --------------
                                                                                  March 31,     June 30,       September 30,     December 31,    December 31,
                                                                                    2011          2011             2011              2011            2011
                                                                                ------------  -------------  -----------------  --------------  --------------
        GAAP pre-tax income                                                        $  8,885    $    140         $  3,587             $  2,999        $ 15,611
           Add back amortization of acquisition-related intangibles                   2,122       2,205            2,184               11,529          18,040
           Add back stock-based compensation expense                                  4,955       5,731            5,549                5,879          22,114
           Add back unrealized investment gain/loss                                       -           -                -                1,995           1,995
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
                 Subtotal                                                            15,962       8,076           11,320               22,402          57,760
        Income tax expense @ 21%                                                      3,352       1,696            2,377                4,705          12,130
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Non-GAAP net income                                                          12,610       6,380            8,943               17,697          45,630
                                                                                     ======      ======           ======               ======          ======
           Add back debt interest expense and issuance cost amortization, net         1,420          20            1,413                1,413           5,659
           of tax benefit
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Adjusted net income for non-GAAP EPS calculation                           $ 14,030    $  6,400         $ 10,356             $ 19,110        $ 51,289
                                                                                ==== ======   == ======      ==== ======        ====== ======   ====== ======
        Non-GAAP net income per share - diluted                                    $   0.31    $   0.17         $   0.23             $   0.45        $   1.15
                                                                                ==== ======   == ======      ==== ======        ====== ======   ====== ======
        Shares used in per share calculation - diluted                               45,276      38,181           44,821               42,207          44,532
        Breakdown of stock-based compensation expense
                                                                                                                                                 Twelve months
                                                                                                      Three months ended                             ended
                                                                                --------------------------------------------------------------  --------------
                                                                                  March 31,     June 30,       September 30,     December 31,    December 31,
                                                                                    2011          2011             2011              2011            2011
                                                                                ------------  -------------  -----------------  --------------  --------------
          Direct cost of services                                                  $    115    $    118         $    (16)           $     52        $    269
          Network and infrastructure                                                    247         345              345                  373           1,310
          Sales and marketing                                                         1,760       2,116            2,265                1,974           8,115
          Product research and development                                              710         781              698                  910           3,099
          General and administrative                                                  2,123       2,371            2,257                2,570           9,321
                                                                                     ------      ------           ------               ------          ------
        Total                                                                      $  4,955    $  5,731         $  5,549             $  5,879        $ 22,114
                                                                                ==== ======   == ======      ==== ======        ====== ======   ====== ======

Digital River, Inc.
        Guidance
        (Unaudited, in millions except per share amounts)
        Revenue Guidance Table
                                                                                                                  2011 Actual
                                                                            --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                                                                     Twelve Months
                                                                                                      Three months ended                                 Ended
                                                                            ----------------------------------------------------------------------  --------------
                                                                                March 31,         June 30,        September 30,     December 31,     December 31,
                                                                                  2011              2011              2011              2011             2011
                                                                            ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  --------------
        Commerce                                                              $   74.6          $   70.1          $   72.5          $   89.6           $    306.8
        Support Business                                                          23.6              22.4              22.9              22.4                 91.3
                                                                                 -----             -----             -----             -----               ------
        Total Revenue                                                         $   98.2          $   92.5          $   95.4          $  112.0           $    398.1
                                                                            ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====        ====== ======
                                                                                                         2012 Guidance
                                                                            ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                          Q1 2012                         Full Year 2012
                                                                            ----------------------------------  ----------------------------------
                                                                              Low Guidance      High Guidance     Low Guidance      High Guidance
                                                                            ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------
        Commerce                                                              $   79.5          $   80.3          $  325.5          $  329.1
        Support Business                                                          19.5              20.7              76.5              79.9
                                                                                 -----             -----             -----             -----
        Total Expected Revenue                                                $   99.0          $  101.0          $  402.0          $  409.0
                                                                            ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====
        Non-GAAP Guidance Reconciliation
                                                                                          Q1 2012                         Full Year 2012
                                                                            ----------------------------------  ----------------------------------
                                                                              Low Guidance      High Guidance     Low Guidance      High Guidance
                                                                            ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------
        Expected GAAP net income per share - diluted                          $   0.09          $   0.13          $   0.54          $   0.64
           Add back amortization of acquisition-related costs, net of tax         0.04              0.04              0.16              0.16
           Add back stock-based compensation expense, net of tax                  0.14              0.14              0.58              0.58
           Convertible debt dilution impact, net of tax                          (0.01)           (0.02)           (0.09)           (0.11)
           Other                                                                  0.01              0.01              0.01              0.01
                                                                                 -----             -----             -----             -----
        Expected non-GAAP diluted net income per share                        $   0.27          $   0.30          $   1.20          $   1.28
                                                                            ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====        ==== =====
        Projected Shares Used in Per Share Calculation
                                                                                          Q1 2012                         Full Year 2012
                                                                            ----------------------------------  ----------------------------------
                                                                              Low Guidance      High Guidance     Low Guidance      High Guidance
                                                                            ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------
        Shares used in per share calculation - GAAP diluted                       33.8              34.0              34.2              34.2
        Shares used in per share calculation - non-GAAP diluted                   41.1              41.1              41.2              41.2

SOURCE: Digital River, Inc.

Mobile banking app usage grows 74 percent in a year: comScore

2012-02-03T08:15:00.000-08:00

Mobile bankers are highly engaged

The use of mobile banking apps is growing quickly as consumers look for ways to easily access their financial information while on the go, according to a new report from comScore.

While the 2011 State of Online and Mobile Banking report shows that app usage among mobile bankers is up 74 percent from nearly a year ago, it also indicates there is still significant room for usage to grow. The report also shows that mobile bankers are highly engaged customers.

“A significant percentage of mobile bankers are extremely engaged, with nearly three-quarters indicating that they interact with a bank from their mobile device at least once a week,” said Nathan Frederiksen, director of marketing solutions for the financial services vertical at comScore, Reston, VA. “This level of engagement closely mirrors usage frequencies that we see with account servicing via a desktop or laptop computer.

“While there’s strong awareness of mobile banking offerings/functionality, traction in terms of usage continues to lag,” he said. “This may be a function of continued concerns around security.”

Browser usage dominates
In the second quarter of 2011, there were 36.7 million mobile financial users, or 16 percent of the total mobile universe, who accessed banking, credit card, insurance or brokerage information from a mobile device.

By financial segment, 32.5 million accessed banking information from a mobile device, more than any other group within the mobile financial sector and having grown 30 percent compared with the previous year.

The banking activities conducted most often from a mobile device are checking balances and viewing transactions.

An infusion of mobile apps that allow access to both banking and credit card accounts associated with a single financial institution helped drive up the number of mobile users who accessed credit card information to 18.4 million.

Additionally, 7.2 million accessed insurance information and 9.6 million accessed brokerage information.

App usage among mobile bankers is growing quickly, up 74 percent from the previous year. App usage among mobile credit card users also increased considerably, up 58 percent.

A total of 13.7 million mobile consumers access mobile banking information via an app and 6.3 million access credit card information via an app.

However, browser usage continues to dominate with 17.6 million mobile users accessing mobile banking information via a mobile browser and 10.4 million mobile users accessing credit card information via a mobile browser.

Refine and communicate
Mobile bankers are also highly engaged, with nearly three-quarters indicating that they interact with a bank from their mobile device at least once a week.

Those who utilize a mobile device for banking tend to be younger and more affluent, with 3 out of every 5 mobile bankers between the ages of 18-34. This is more than double the percentage of those who do not take advantage of mobile banking offerings represented by this demographic.

Mobile bankers are also twice as likely to have a household income of $100K or more than non-users.

As client servicing via the mobile channel becomes a regular mode of contact for mobile users, banks must provide a user-friendly mobile experience that meets customer needs.

“Banks need to refine and communicate a compelling enough value proposition that leverages unique mobile capabilities and functionality to encourage customers to modify their behaviors from the more traditional methods of banking,” Mr. Frederiksen said.

“There still seems to be a lot of room for banks to refine their strategies and increase their capabilities around mobile transfer and payment capabilities, to compete with other payment options,” he said.

Adobe Teams With asknet to Deliver Software to Students

2012-01-31T15:34:00.000-08:00

Adobe has selected Karlsruhe-based company asknet AGas the service provider to supply and distribute downloadsto students and university staff. The partnership will allow them to quickly download Adobe software from a university’s online shop at a reduced rate. Following Adobe’s great success with this sales model in the United States, the U.S. software company is expanding this sales channel internationally by partnering with asknet AG as its technology and fulfillment partner for the German-speaking region.

Using the download depot developed by asknet, Adobe enables research and teaching institutions to offer attractive download versions of its software to their students and university staff, which can be purchased directly from a university’s branded online shop. The ordering process is very simple for authorized users: They log on to the shop using their digital identity – ensuring that only people who have been approved can access Adobe offerings at the most competitive price. Once logged on, the user can order the software in the corresponding online shop, download, and then activate it. The licenses are provided by and billed via the university’s trading partner.

To date, students have only been able to purchase the popular Adobe tools in a box. As the digital fulfillment service provider, asknet makes it possible to deliver the Adobe products in a downloadable format. In addition to executing the delivery, asknet is also responsible for managing and distributing license keys from Adobe. asknet has developed a standard interface that directly ties the asknet download depot to an institution’s shop to make this capability available. asknet also validates digital identities and proofs of enrollment for external portals as required.

“We are pleased that we can now offer students cost-effective downloads of our creative software,” said Rainer Siebert, Adobe’s Sales Manager Education Central Europe. “asknet’s technology delivers exactly what we have been looking for: a way of distributing downloads via university online portals in cooperation with our trading partners. asknet has proven to be a reliable and competent partner in this field.”

Dr. Dietmar Waudig, Co-CEO of asknet AG, is pleased about the partnership with Adobe: “Adobe asking us to be their digital fulfillment service provider confirms our position as a leading electronic software distributor. The download depot enables Adobe to explore new and innovative sales channels. At the same time, we are ensuring that Adobe’s authorization concept is being implemented and only approved customers can purchase discounted Adobe licenses.”
The implementation of the download depot on university portals will be effective immediately, beginning with universities in Berlin, Würzburg, and Zurich. Other universities in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland will follow in the coming months.

About Adobe Systems Incorporated
Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences. For more information, visit http://www.adobe.com.

About asknet
asknet offers its clients customized outsourcing solutions for global software sales via the Internet. Founded in 1995 as a spin-off of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT, formerly the University of Karlsruhe), the company has become a leading independent global provider for electronic software distribution. In addition to its fully integrated shop solutions for software publishers, the company develops and maintains portals for software distribution such as softwarehouse.de, one of Europe's largest platform for downloads of standard software. In 2010, asknet posted sales of approximately EUR 72.7 million. asknet’s clients include numerous providers of specialty software such as F-Secure, IS3, Nero, NetObjects, Norman, and Panda Security. The company also supplies software products to around eighty percent of German universities. For more information, visit http://www.asknet.com.

Browsers Beat Out Apps for M-Commerce

2012-01-25T12:20:00.000-08:00

Apps aren’t always the answer to engaging with consumers on mobile devices—especially when it comes to m-commerce. According to research from rich media company Zmags, very few Americans prefer to use mobile apps for shopping activities. Instead, consumers strongly prefer purchasing through web and mobile browsers.

When Zmags surveyed US consumers who owned a PC or laptop computer about their shopping methods, 87% said they preferred using websites and mobile sites, compared to 14% who most liked shopping from websites via smartphone and just 4% who preferred to shop using mobile or tablet apps.

Although smartphone and tablet owners display a preference for browser-based mobile purchases, a significant number of US retailers have created mobile apps that enable commerce activities. Survey data from mobile-shopping company AisleBuyer showed in December 2011 that 19% of US retailers had a mobile app to connects consumers to their ecommerce site.

Retail apps may be of greater value to smartphone users, for whom the browsing experience is more limited in nature. There’s also opportunity for tablet commerce apps to provide a more catalog-style approach, giving users more interactive features.

Meanwhile, the tablet commerce category as a whole is growing significantly. According to Zmags, during the 2011 holiday shopping season, 87% of tablet owners used their device for shopping. Not only do users report better buying experiences than with smartphones, but tablet owners are using their devices frequently for m-commerce. According to Zmags, half of tablet owners are using tablets for shopping on at least a weekly basis.

eMarketer projects that m-commerce sales will grow more than fourfold over the next few years, from $6.7 billion in 2011 to $31 billion in 2015. If consumers continue to prefer browsers over mobile apps for shopping, retailers should consider investing more in mobile-optimized ecommerce sites. Moreover, marketers should consider designing engaging, tablet-specific ecommerce experiences for tablet users.

AVG Technologies Files For $125 Million Initial Offer

2012-01-13T14:47:00.001-08:00

AVG Technologies, an Amsterdam-based security software company, has filed with the SEC for a $125 million initial public offering.

The company reports that it has 106 million users for its software, which includes Internet security, PC performance optimization, online backup, mobile security, identity protection and family safety software.

For the 9 months ended September 30, the company had revenue of $198.1 million, up from $159.8 million in the comparable period a year ago. Net income available to ordinary shareholders was $66.8 million for the period, up from $31.8 million in the same period a year ago.

The largest investors in the company include PEF V Information Technology 2, an affiliate of Polish Enterprise Fund, with a 33.8% stake; Grisoft Holdings, with 19.4%, Intel Capital with 15.4%; and an affiliate of TA Associates, with 31.8%.

Corel(R) Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Roxio(R) Business from Rovi Corporation

2012-01-13T09:29:00.001-08:00

CES, LAS VEGAS, Jan 12, 2012 (MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) -- Corel(R) today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Roxio(R) product line from Rovi Corporation. With this deal, Corel will expand its product portfolio to include Roxio's broad range of digital media and security solutions. The acquisition includes Roxio(R) Creator(R), the industry's most popular digital media suite and Roxio(R) Toast(R), the leading optical burning software on the Mac(R) platform. The deal is expected to close in February. Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.

There are both technology and business advantages to this acquisition. From a technology perspective, Corel will draw upon the complementary video, photo, audio, and disc burning technologies found in both Roxio and Corel software to deliver even more capabilities to users and further enhance the customer experience offered across Corel's product portfolio.

From a business perspective, Corel will take advantage of its well-established global infrastructure to dramatically broaden distribution of Roxio products into new international markets. Moreover, the company sees significant opportunities in combining the strengths of Corel's and Roxio's established retail and direct sales channels, OEM relationships, and large customer bases.

"We're excited about this deal for a number of reasons, most notably the fact that upon completion of the acquisition, we will be able to offer our customers a wider range of products, both in our digital media and WinZip product lines," said Shawn Cadeau, Senior Vice President, Global Marketing at Corel. "Roxio has a large install base, with over 350 million units sold worldwide, and our products are offered through similar channels spanning retail, direct, OEM and enterprise sales. On the digital media side, we will have a full blown multimedia suite and a new offering on the Mac platform. For WinZip, we will be able to further expand our suite of tools, with new data protection and security software."

Acquired Roxio Titles Further Expand Corel's Product Portfolio

Upon completion of the acquisition, Corel will own the Roxio product line, including the following well-known titles:

--  Roxio Creator - Software to enhance, preserve, capture and share your
            digital media
        --  Roxio Toast - The ultimate multi-media toolkit for your Mac
        --  Roxio(R) Game Capture - Software to record your PC and console game play
        --  Roxio(R) Easy VHS to DVD - Preserve irreplaceable memories by
            transferring them to DVD
        --  Roxio(R) CinePlayer(R) DVD Decoder - Watch your favorite DVDs on Windows
            Media Player
        --  Roxio(R) BackOnTrack(TM) Suite - Complete media protection solution that
            automatically keeps your memories safe and protects your PC from both
            hardware and software disasters
        --  Roxio(R) Secure - Powerful encryption for optical media and USB flash
            drives

Added Mr. Cadeau: "Roxio is a great fit for Corel. By combining the best of Corel's and Roxio's technologies, we can provide even more value to customers. In addition, by leveraging Corel's global sales and distribution platform, we will be able to put the Roxio product line into the hands of many more customers around the world. We are looking forward to welcoming Roxio's employees and customers to Corel as we continue to develop high-quality products that are recognized as leaders in the industry."

For more information on Corel, please visit www.corel.com . For more details on the Roxio product line, please visit www.roxio.com .

About Corel

Corel is one of the world's top software companies with more than 100 million active users in over 75 countries. We develop software that helps people express their ideas and share their stories in more exciting, creative and persuasive ways. Through the years, we've built a reputation for delivering innovative, trusted products that are easy to learn and use, helping people achieve new levels of productivity. The industry has responded with hundreds of awards for software innovation, design and value.

Our award winning product portfolio includes some of the world's most widely recognized and popular software brands, including CorelDRAW(R) Graphics Suite, Corel(R) Painter(TM), Corel(R) PaintShop(TM) Pro, Corel(R) VideoStudio(R), Corel(R) WinDVD(R), Corel(R) WordPerfect(R) Office and WinZip(R).

Copyright 2012 Corel Corporation. All rights reserved. Corel, the Corel logo, the Corel Balloon logo, CorelDRAW, Painter, PaintShop Photo, VideoStudio, WordPerfect, WinDVD and WinZip are trademarks or registered trademarks of Corel Corporation in Canada, the United States and other Countries. All other product names and any registered and unregistered trademarks mentioned are used for identification purposes only and remain the exclusive property of their respective owners.

Contacts:
        Press Contact:
        Corel
        Jessica Gould
        Sr. PR Manager
        613-728-0826 x 5405
        jessica.gould@corel.com

Mobile Video Provides Biggest Growth for Ad Support

2012-01-12T13:57:00.000-08:00

Ad-supported mobile content revenues will exceed $1 billion by 2015, eMarketer estimates, with the fastest growth coming from ad support for mobile video.

Last year, US mobile video revenues from advertising reached just $37.5 million, but by 2015, advertisers will spend $213.6 million on placements that support mobile video content. Despite such rapid growth, that figure will still be lower than the amounts spent on advertising against mobile games and mobile music, at $65.3 million and $181.4 million, respectively, in 2011 and rising to $269.1 million and $591.5 million, respectively, by 2015.

That year, eMarketer estimates, 29.9% of all mobile content revenues, or $1.07 billion, will come from advertising.

Ad support as a share of total mobile content revenues will grow for each of the three content types over the forecast period. Currently, mobile music has the greatest share of dollars coming from ads, and it will hold that position, with ad dollars making up 73.9% of the total in 2011 and 79.3% by 2015.

But the fast growth of mobile video ad revenues will mean much more substantial changes in revenue composition. While ad dollars made up just 5.4% of mobile video revenues in 2011, by 2015 that figure will more than triple, to 16.5%.

Mobile gaming ad revenues will also rise as a proportion of the total, albeit more slowly, from 13.8% in 2011 to 17.4% by 2015.

eMarketer forms its estimates of mobile content spending through a meta-analysis of data from dozens of research sources as well as overall trends and consumer behaviors around mobile gaming, music and video.

Facebook Gauging Interest in Action-Optimized Campaigns

2011-12-22T12:07:00.001-08:00

Some advertisers on Facebook are seeing a new pricing option called “action-optimized CPM” in the Marketplace dashboard.

According to Facebook, this is a way to determine the interest in optimizing campaigns for actions such as page Likes or app installs, not a true test of cost-per-action pricing. Advertisers who select “action-optimized CPM” are still being charged each time their ad is viewed.

This test could be an indicator that Facebook is considering a new cost-per-action model for its self-serve ad platform. It’s also possible the company is reevaluating its cost-per-impression offering. Unless advertisers are linking to an external website, most campaigns on Facebook aim to get users to Like a page, install an app, attend an event or take another similar action within the social network. Paying per impression does not seem to be ideal for most advertisers in these cases.

Across the industry, advertisers are moving away from CPM models that do not ensure that consumers are truly seeing their ads. Cost-per-conversion, action or engagement are much more desirable because companies do not have to pay unless an ad is effective. In fact, some third-party ad providers that use Facebook’s API, such as AdParlor, charge and optimize for cost-per-fan or cost-per-install as opposed to the CPM or CPC options in Marketplace.

Facebook could provide something similar in the future to emphasize its strength in getting users to connect with pages or engage with Sponsored Stories. However, Facebook will need to consider how this sort of change would affect developers working with the ads API, which was brought out of private beta in August. It is possible that third-parties who sell on cost-per-action models could lose that advantage over Marketplace, but it is likely their ability to run large-scale tests to optimize creative will still make third-party vendors an attractive option for some.

Image credit: All Facebook.com

Digital River introduces new B2B e-commerce offering

2011-12-21T11:13:00.000-08:00

Online merchants can customise the B2B shopping experience by offering authenticated portals, and segmented and tiered pricing

E-commerce offerings provider Digital River has introduced an enhanced business-to-business (B2B) offering that enables companies to create best-in-class online purchase experiences for their business buyers.

The enhanced cloud-based offering enables physical and digital goods merchants to sell directly to new or underserved groups of business buyers by designing their e-commerce services and using authenticated portals, segmented pricing, preferred payment methods, private reseller networks, and more.

Digital River's B2B offering is built on its Global Commerce enterprise system, which supports tens of thousands of online businesses around the world, including some of the Internet's biggest software publishing and consumer electronics brands.

With B2B offerings, online merchants can expand and enhance current online capabilities by integrating Digital River's commerce offerings with traditional business platforms and systems, including ERP, CRM or partner management systems and can achieve secure access to markets across the globe and reach underserved channels with flexible solutions and an international resource network of local tax professionals, payment specialists and regional marketing experts.

In addition, the online merchants can customise the B2B shopping experience by offering authenticated portals, and segmented and tiered pricing for specific channel partners or key accounts, can tailor the purchasing process to meet company requirements with multiple seller- and merchant-of-record model options and can drive reccurring revenue by maintaining access to valuable channel customer data and establishing direct customer relationships.

Digital River CEO Joel Ronning said the enhanced B2B offering leverages Digital River's more than 15 years of global e-commerce expertise in building business buying experiences along with a proven cloud-based e-commerce infrastructure.

"According to forecasts, the global e-commerce market is poised for tremendous growth - and we expect that B2B will be an important driving force behind it. By using our B2B e-commerce solution, companies can not only take advantage of this increasing revenue opportunity, but also deliver a world-class user experience that drives operational efficiencies and reduces conflict across their sales channels," said Ronning.

Planet Payment Launches Free Social Commerce Shopping Cart for Facebook Merchants

2011-12-19T11:21:00.001-08:00

LONG BEACH, N.Y. and DUBLIN, Ireland, Dec 19, 2011 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) -- Planet Payment, Inc.UK:PPT -2.94% UK:PPTR +11.81% (otcqx:PLPM), a leading provider of international and multi-currency payment processing services, and VendorShop, a leading provider of shopping cart applications for Facebook merchants, today announced the integration of VendorShop's Facebook shopping cart application with Planet Payment's iPAY multi-currency eCommerce gateway. This innovative Social Commerce solution ( www.facebook.com/PlanetPayment ) empowers merchants to sell to a global market of over 800 million Facebook subscribers, enabling retailers to convert their "static" Facebook presence into a new sales channel for their business. With this solution, Facebook merchants can now accept credit cards through any participating acquirer integrated into Planet Payment's international transaction platform.

VendorShop provides a solution for businesses to drive direct revenue from their Facebook presence -- enabling anyone with a Facebook page to add a free shop and to sell their products and services without customers having to leave the Facebook environment. "Most companies already have Facebook pages, but if a customer wants to buy an item they get referred back to the company website," stated Chris Small, CEO and Founder of VendorShop. "Facebook users already spend a huge amount of time on Facebook with more than 50% 'liking' a business page to find out about sales and promotions. So if I'm going to tell you about a product on my Facebook page, it makes sense to make it easy to buy right there. Redirecting customers off Facebook adds additional steps to the process and potentially increases the likelihood a merchant will lose the sale - so keeping the shopping experience contained solely within Facebook is very important."

For the merchant, VendorShop is simple to set-up and configure products and pricing and there are a number of tools to integrate with existing systems. There are also a number of social features such as 'fan pricing' and 'incentivized sharing' to enable businesses to enhance the Facebook experience, grow fans and drive sales. "Creating a unique shopping experience and rewarding your fans for being fans gives a real reason to buy, but also turns them into even more powerful advocates for your business. As a result you not only create a new Facebook sales channel, but you can enhance sales via a new viral consumer channel too," stated Small.

As a result of the partnership and integration with Planet Payment's iPAY Gateway, VendorShop customers now have access to Planet Payment's PCI compliant, end-to-end processing solutions for eCommerce, call center, mail-order and telephone order merchants. The VendorShop solution has also been enhanced to include support for Planet Payment's Multi-Currency Pricing functionality, providing Facebook merchants with the ability to more effectively target international markets by allowing their customers to ship, view pricing and pay in the in their home currencies, while continuing to receive payments and reporting in their own native currency.

Aviesta.com, an online private sale community serving members in the US and Latin America recently launched their social commerce site ( http://www.facebook.com/VivaAviesta ) on Facebook utilizing Planet Payment's solution. "We wanted tap into the Facebook phenomenon to help grow sales," said Brett Posten, Chief Creative Officer of Aviesta.com. "With more than 800 million users and over 50 percent of who log-on at least once per day, Facebook social commerce was a top priority for us. In addition, we needed a solution that would provide us with multi-currency options and one that would be easy to setup and maintain -- Planet Payment's solution fit the bill."

"Planet Payment provides value-added products/services to help merchants sell more and expand their business globally," stated Scott Goldthwaite, senior vice president of product management and marketing. "Social media enables businesses to make a deeper connection with their customers and Facebook has the potential to become the biggest marketplace in the world, representing a significant opportunity for businesses to create a new revenue stream by enabling their fans to buy products directly from their Facebook page. VendorShop's expertise in Social Commerce and shared commitment to helping businesses sell on Facebook has made this an ideal partnership."

About VendorShop

VendorShop enables businesses to launch virtual stores on Facebook simply and cost effectively. Customers can easily purchase products from their favorite stores without leaving Facebook. VendorShop already powers thousands of stores across Facebook covering a variety of sectors including fashion, food, ticketing, charity and arts and crafts.

VendorShop's development team also provide custom development services and have been responsible for developing one of the first mobile top-up stores on Facebook along with other customized solutions in the retail sector. VendorShop is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Visit www.vendorshopsocial.com or www.Facebook.com/vendorshop for more information.

About Planet Payment

Planet Payment is a leading provider of international payment processing and multi-currency processing services. We provide our services in 16 countries and territories across the Asia Pacific region, North America, the Middle East, Africa and Europe, primarily through our more than 45 acquiring bank and processor customers. Our point-of-sale and e-commerce services help merchants sell more goods and services to consumers, and are integrated within the payment card transaction flow enabling our acquiring customers to process and reconcile payment transactions in multiple currencies, geographies and channels.

Planet Payment is headquartered in New York and has offices in Atlanta, Beijing, Bermuda, Delaware, Dubai, London, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Singapore. Visit www.planetpayment.com for more information on the Company and its services. For up-to-date information follow Planet Payment on Twitter at @PlanetPayment or join Planet Payment's page on Facebook.

This news release was distributed by GlobeNewswire, www.globenewswire.com

SOURCE: Planet Payment

Computop Enters into Agreement with arvato Systems

2011-12-19T11:20:00.001-08:00

arvato Systems named Implementation Partner for Computop Paygate

Computop, a leading payment service provider (PSP), has announced that it has signed an agreement with arvato systems NA, Inc., a leading global provider of IT services and eCommerce solutions. With this relationship, arvato Systems becomes an implementation partner for Computop and its Paygate payment platform in the US.

“This collaboration between our two companies will enable us to further broaden our eCommerce offerings for clients,” said Frank Zimmermann, Vice President, North America for arvato Systems. “With Computop Paygate, retailers gain advantage from a best-of-breed payment platform that enables them to conduct business not only domestically but also on a global scale in a highly secure manner, benefitting the businesses and their customers.”

The Computop Paygate platform provides seamless, compliant and secure processing of any multi-channel payment transaction, and features built-in comprehensive fraud prevention and detection management. It makes it easy for retailers to manage payment transactions and drive positive customer experiences that boost revenue and brand recognition.

“We are excited to partner with arvato Systems in the US,” said Doris Linke, head of operations for Computop North America. “This will extend our Paygate solution to a wider audience, and we look forward to working closely with arvato Systems and its clients.”

About the Computop Paygate platform
Computop Paygate 4.0 is a multichannel payment platform that provides online retailers with secure payment solutions and efficient fraud prevention for international markets. With just one interface needed, Computop Paygate allows online retailers to get access to dozens of international payment systems, and includes fraud prevention for North America, Europe and Asia. Leading e-commerce solutions from the likes of Demandware, hybris, Magento and Oxid all support Computop Paygate as a preferred payment service solution for global payment processing. In addition, Computop Paygate has been integrated into SAP's Business ByDesign business software to provide secure global payment processing.

About Computop
Computop is a payment service provider (PSP) that was founded in 1997 and is headquartered in Bamberg, Germany. The company has global customers such as Fossil, C&A, Samsung and TUI and has offices located in North America and Europe. Computop’s Paygate PCI-compliant hosted payment solution supports all non customer present payments, including telephone, online and mobile. For further information please visit: www.computop.com.

About arvato Systems
For over 30 years arvato Systems has been building a solid reputation as a systems integrator. We not only implement standard software but also offer tailor made, industry specific and individually developed solutions. With 1,700 dedicated employees at 25 sites throughout the world, our company generated more than 230 million euros in sales in 2010. As a subsidiary of arvato Systems AG, the outsourcing service provider of Bertelsmann AG, we have the unique capability to create entire value chains and combine IT with arvato Systems AG’s services to an integrated service offer from one source. The strength of arvato Systems is in the intelligent combination of systems integration and planning, operation and support. Our customers appreciate the way we bring in-depth industry know-how, cross-platform expertise, a true partnership approach and genuine entrepreneurial spirit to the table. Our solutions pave the way to your success. www.arvato-systems.com

Survey: 80% of Consumers Want Alternative Payment Methods to Credit Cards Online

2011-12-13T13:05:00.001-08:00

When it comes to mobile payments, how much do you really trust a credit card attached to your smartphone? Is it secure? Are merchants going to sell your personal information or start sending you piles of junk mail? These are some of the concerns that a new report from Javelin Strategy and Research surfaced this fall during a survey of consumers' fears of mobile payments and online transactions.

The survey concludes that four out of five consumers would spend more money online if they considered credit cards safer and had payment alternatives. Javelin predicts that an additional $109.8 billion would be spent by offering a "no credit card required" way to pay online and at merchants.

It is important to note that Javelin's survey was commissioned by PaymentOne, a direct-to-carrier payments company. (PaymentOne would benefit directly from getting consumers' off credit cards and seeing them start paying through their cellphone or cable bills.) The survey was conducted in the fall of 2011 and polled more than 2,000 U.S. adults concerning payments preferences.

95% of respondents had mobile phones while only 36% had used that phone to pay for an item, be it an app, game, music or media streaming such as Netflix or Spotify. The top concerns around using credit cards online were privacy related concerning personal data falling into the hands of advertisers, marketers or malicious hackers.

There is a tenant in the payments industry that the more clicks that a user has to make, the less likely they are to make a purchase. These are often referred to as "pain point" or "friction." Think about why Apple or Amazon do so well. Consumers enter their credit card numbers once and after that it is one-click processing with a password. Both companies have done masterful jobs of taking the friction out of payments.

On the other hand, the results of this survey should definitely be viewed through the lenses of a direct-to-carrier billing company trying to drum up support for its business model and get more online and offline merchants to use carrier billing, especially for smaller purchases. "No one is going to buy a fridge through carrier billing," a PaymentOne executive said at CTIA in San Diego in October.

Users should think long and hard about storing credit card information on their smart devices. A report surfaced this morning that the Google Wallet leaves some information unencrypted if the device it is on is rooted. In the Android ecosystem there are also security concerns with malware-ridden apps that can theoretically gain root access and steal all information on a device. The Google Wallet sandboxes a lot of that data but as the Javelin survey points out, consumers have their fears regardless of the truth behind the technology.

What are your concerns with mobile payments? Is there a reason to fear using your credit card online or is the survey slanting its findings towards the benefit of its client? Let us know in the comments.

Security Veterans Launch Tegotech Software, Inc.

2011-12-07T10:35:00.000-08:00

Automated Technology to Package Applications for the Digital Marketplace

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif., Dec 07, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Joe Seebach, a data security pioneer, announced today the launch of Tegotech Software, Inc. Tegotech will provide new technology and services to rapidly package and protect digital applications for publishers, distributors and e-commerce platform providers.

"The ever-growing demand for downloadable applications has created the need for advanced digital packaging and sophisticated anti-piracy protection," said Joe Seebach, President of Tegotech. "Tegotech has developed a fully-automated solution that enables companies to rapidly package digital applications for online stores. This technology will help companies expand their markets through the use of trial software, rentals, and subscriptions while preventing unauthorized use."

Tegotech Digital Packaging enables rapid production, powerful security, and flexible license management options. The advanced technology allows integration within a company's production environment to package applications quickly. It also lets companies create in-app transactions, shopping carts, and custom advertising feeds. Tegotech can turn ordinary applications into high impact selling tools that drive incremental revenues for their customers.

"The world of digital content is changing every day and is growing very rapidly," said Simon Jones, Vice President at Plimus - a leading e-commerce platform provider. "One of the largest challenges companies face in growing online business is the ability to quickly bring new content online. Tegotech has developed a unique solution that will enable companies to quickly and easily expand their digital catalog and position themselves for rapid growth."

About Tegotech

Tegotech was founded to offer full service Digital Packaging for all types of content. Headquartered in San Luis Obispo, California, half-way between Los Angeles and San Francisco, Tegotech employs a team of veterans with decades of experience in developing data protection and software security solutions. The management team includes several industry pioneers who have numerous accreditations and experience working with the world's leading technology companies.

SOURCE: Tegotech Software, Inc.

Credit cards make a comeback

2011-11-30T13:28:00.000-08:00

The payment forms consumers use to make their online purchases will shift over the next five years as debit card use declines and more consumers pay with credit cards and online alternative payment services like PayPal and Bill Me Later, according to a new payments forecast from Javelin Strategy & Research.

“The Online Retail Payment Forecast 2011-2016” anticipates that the percentage of e-commerce transactions (including travel purchases) completed using debit cards will decline from 30% this year to 21% by 2016. Javelin says there are two primary reasons for the shift. First, the Durbin Amendment that went into effect this fall limits the amount the larger banks that issue most of the debit cards in use can collect in transaction fees. Debit card issuers, in turn, are changing their debit programs in ways that are likely to sway consumers away from using their debit card accounts to pay online, such as by increasing use fees and eliminating free checking, Javelin says.

Second, consumers responding to the slowly improving economy are putting away their debit cards in favor of credit cards, which Javelin says consumers view as safer than paying with debit because credit cards are not linked to a bank account. The report is based on survey data taken from a panel of more than 2,300 consumers in August and also an analysis of U.S. government data.

Consumers returning to credit cards could spell good news for e-retailers, as consumers spend more per transaction when paying with credit than debit. Javelin says consumers spend an average of $82.09 per purchase when paying with a credit card compared with $58.29 when paying with a debit card. Javelin forecasts consumers will use major credit cards for 45% of total online transactions in 2016, up from 40% today. The use of store-branded credit cards will increase from 5% today to 6% in 2016. The use of prepaid cards or gift cards will increase from 8% to 9% over the same period and the use of alternative online payment systems, like Google Checkout andPayPal, will increase from 17% to 19%. The rest of the transactions will be conducted with debit cards.

Javelin says 49% of consumers have used an alternative online payment system at least once in the last year, up from 46% in the 2010 survey. The research firm says such systems will account for $82.0 billion in payment volume in 2016. Consumers say the primary reasons they choose to use alternative payment services for e-commerce transactions are so they can buy from merchants that don’t accept credit or debit cards (43%), because the services offer greater protection from fraud or misuse of personal information (39%) and because they enable shoppers to keep their identities private (29%).

Javelin forecasts that the U.S. e-commerce market will grow 7.5% annually through 2016. It estimates that online retail and travel purchases will total $444 billion in 2016, up from $309 billion this year.  The growth, Javelin says, will come from an increase in the number of online shoppers and their frequency of purchase. It forecasts that 87% of consumers will buy online in 2016, up from 74% today. 

Avangate Included in Independent Research Firm Report on Key Solutions for Digital Commerce

2011-11-30T12:19:00.001-08:00

REDWOOD SHORES, Calif., Nov 30, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Avangate, the agile eCommerce solutions provider trusted by thousands of Software and SaaS companies to grow their business worldwide through any channel and any model, is featured in a new report from Forrester Research on the industry's leading digital commerce solutions. Recognizing a growing need among consumers for access to digital content, the report highlights tactics for selecting an ecommerce provider and looks at some of the key solutions available in the market today.

"In the past, online transactions for digital product purchases differed little from physical product purchases, with the exception of the delivery method," Market Overview: Digital Commerce Solutions 2011, Forrester Research, Inc., 11/7/11. "However, today's digitally connected consumer is eschewing the traditional ownership model of buy, download, install, and use. Consumers want access to digital content and services across their connected devices, anytime, anywhere."

Avangate's flexible solution for software and SaaS companies was noted for key capabilities, including a digital commerce solution that supports end consumers through the software buying, activation, and renewals process, and a channel management program that supports partner and reseller enablement, registration/key activation, and renewals management through indirect channels.

"eBusiness leaders charged with monetizing their firms' catalog of digital content, software, or online services must find digital commerce solutions that allow flexibility to trial alternative business models while supporting fulfillment across multiple consumer touchpoints," Market Overview: Digital Commerce Solutions 2011, Forrester Research, Inc., 11/7/11.

"This report reflects our ongoing dedication to helping our customers grow their revenue online through any channel, using any model," said Carl Theobald, CEO, Avangate. "We have long recognized software and SaaS vendors' critical need for deep commerce and subscriber management capabilities, flexibility to adopt various delivery and revenue models, and operational agility to keep up with the pace of change in the digital goods industry. We designed our commerce solution to do just that by ensuring our customers can actively manage their end-to-end customer lifecycles, whether direct or through their channels, to ultimately grow their online and offline sales."

For more information on "Market Overview: Digital Commerce Solutions 2011 Forrester Research, Inc., 11/7/11", interested parties can download a complimentary copy of the report on the Avangate website at: http://www.avangate.com/lp/report-solutions-digital-commerce-2011.html .

About Avangate

Avangate is the agile eCommerce solutions provider trusted by Software and SaaS companies to grow their business worldwide through any channel, any model. Specifically designed for software markets, Avangate's scalable and integrated solution includes a full-featured, modular and secure eCommerce platform, a partner order and revenue management system, as well as a constantly expanding worldwide affiliate network. Avangate's market-proven eCommerce solution enables software companies to rapidly embrace industry shifts, reach customers effectively, and adopt new business models with a view to optimizing profitable revenue across online and offline channels.

More information can be found avangate.com.

SOURCE: Avangate

Email Marketing: How to Prevent, Manage Dormant Lists

2011-11-30T12:18:00.001-08:00

Email marketing remains a critical marketing component for many ecommerce merchants. But for those merchants with established ecommerce sites — and older email lists — maintaining healthy email open rates and click-through rates can be a challenge.

We spoke recently with an email-marketing expert on how, exactly, to prevent a list from becoming dormant and, when it does, how to entice subscribers to reengage. He is Ross Kramer, co-founder and CEO of Listrak, the pioneering email service provider.

Practical eCommerce: Let's assume a retailer has a list of 20,000 customers that have opted in to its email list. Say 15,000 of those are over five years old and they hardly ever open an email anymore. In that scenario, what should a retailer do?

Ross Kramer

Ross Kramer: "Well, the first thing the retailer should do is a Google search on 'email acquisition strategies.' Because if its list is 20,000 strong and 15,000 of those are over five years old, then the retailer really needs a paddling because it has not focused on acquisition strategies.

"However, if they find themselves in this case where they've got a lot of old addresses, then they need to understand a couple of things. One, are these address causing me deliverability problems? That's the first thing to understand. Once you take a close look at that, it's important to say, 'Okay, of these 15,000 dormant addresses, where do these guys live?' Is it Yahoo!? Gmail? Hotmail? MSN Live? Comcast? Each ISP [Internet service provider] is going to treat your dormant addresses a bit differently. We're going to assume that all of these 15,000 addresses are deliverable and that they're not bouncing. If any of these are bouncing back, you want to remove them right away.

"I've got a very similar case study that we presented at the Etail show this year. One of our clients, Birkenstock Central, had 16,000 inactive subscribers — we had seen no orders and no opens for six months. We sent a series of three emails to all the inactives that essentially said, 'Hey, do you want to continue receiving email from BirkenstockCentral.com or do you no longer wish to receive email?' Of the people that clicked through — out of 16,000 we only got a few hundred clicks — 51 percent of those people said, 'No, take me off the list,' 37 percent said, 'Yes, keep me on the list,' and 12 percent actually clicked the link to go out to the website. So, we only got 211 subscribers to say "Yes, please keep me on the list,' which meant that 15,789 were removed.

"Overall, I think what each retailer has to ask is, 'How is my deliverability at each ISP?' If your deliverability is okay at each ISP, then you're probably not having deliverability problems. Many of the ISPs are looking at new metrics to determine inbox placement and they're now looking at recipient actions. In the early days, ISPs looked at content. They looked at words like 'Viagra' or 'mortgage' or something similar and if you used those words in the subject line, automatically the ISPs considered it to be spam. Then we moved into the email 2.0 version — and AOL was the first to do this — with the use of the 'This is Spam' button and then all the other ISPs followed suit. From that, the ISPs started to use two new metrics.

"First, they started to introduce the concept of 'reputation' by introducing the 'This is Spam' button. Second, they started to look at bounces. We're now in the 3.0 era where ISPs are now looking at inbox activity from the recipient side and looking at all the recipients clicking on your links. The ISPs analyze whether the recipients are adding your address to the address book, enabling images, and opening the message. So, these ISPs — specifically we're talking about Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, MSN — are starting to look at these engagement metrics and that's where inactives can really hurt you, but you need to be looking at your metrics by ISP specifically."

PEC: And those metrics aren't published anywhere, presumably?

Kramer: "Correct. But Chad White at Responsys — the email marketing firm — just released a new document, "Email Engagement and Deliverability Study" that could help clarify. Deliverability has always been part art, part science. But the science it involved is, if you're having deliverability issues at a particular ISP, you want to take into account email activity. One of the tactics that we recommend employing is to send best offers into those inactive subscribers. Before removing them, you want to send the best content to those subscribers.

"We did a discount ladder test for Birkenstock Central, where we actually segmented the Birkenstock Central list into about 11 different cohorts based on days since last purchased. The concept of the discount ladder test was to see what was the lowest offer, the lowest percentage offer we could send to each cohort in order for them to respond. We found that when you look at people that hadn't purchased in three years, you absolutely had to send those people a 20 percent off offer.

"So, my recommendation is if you've got some great offers, such as 20 percent off — we see some other retailers trying to engage their inactives with 30 percent off — send those best offers to those folks that are most disengaged to try to get them to be reengaged before making the decision to cut them out of your file."

PEC:: Following-up on the concept of the ISPs monitoring metrics — such as Gmail monitoring open rates, click-through rates, image downloads, that sort of thing — are you finding that, Gmail's case, leaving dormant subscribers on a list could affect the deliverability of those that are engaged?

Kramer: "It definitely could. What I don't want to do, in a leadership position in the email industry, is to say that it always does. If you are measuring your inbox placement at a place like Gmail, and Gmail is clearly an under-performer relative to other ISPs, then you probably can deduce that you got junked at Gmail, that your campaign hit the junk mailbox at Gmail. You want to be looking at this, and if you see that you've got a consistent pattern at Gmail, one of the things could be that your inactives aren't helping you there, among other things.

"The one thing that you definitely want to be looking at is how many bounces you are sending to Gmail. If you're sending any bounces, get rid of those bounces right away. Also — and this probably goes beyond the scope of today's podcast — Gmail has implemented something called a 'List-Unsubscribe' header that if anybody clicks the 'This is Spam' button and if you've got that 'List-Unsubscribe' header in place, it will trigger an unsubscribe versus just a report of spam. So, there are some things you can do there."

PEC: In other words, a retailer needs to be proactive on managing dormant subscribers. Don't get to the point in our crazy example of 15,000 out of 20,000 are dormant. Is that it?

Kramer: "Exactly. You said retailers use email as a way of driving revenue. Our typical Listrak customers are seeing email revenue account for 20 to 30 percent of their overall pie of revenue — using natural search, paid search, affiliates, maybe they've got some direct mail or things like that that they're using to drive traffic. If email is not driving at least 20 percent of your traffic, then you're not doing a good job of acquiring new email addresses.

"To acquire email addresses, we're seeing some great results running sweepstakes. A lot of smaller retailers get scared away from sweepstakes. There are legal ramifications, although once you look into it and you do a little bit of homework, you'll realize if you keep your prize less than 50 bucks and you borrow some standard language that's out there in terms of official rules and have your legal team run past it, it's something that you can absolutely add into your strategy of acquiring new addresses. If it didn't work so well, the big guys like Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdale's, Macy's, and Nordstrom would not run them everyday. Those guys run sweeps everyday and acquire thousands of new subscribers. If you're a small merchant, you should be doing the same thing.

"The other thing that we're seeing that's working really well is the implementation of a DHTML popup after a certain amount of time on site. If you want some examples, go toBirkenstockCentral.com or Swell.com — two Listrak clients — and check out what we're doing there. Essentially, we're waiting for a few seconds of inactivity, then we're popping the DHTML popup asking somebody to sign up. We're also dropping a cookie so that the thing doesn't constantly pop up and annoy people. For Birkenstock Central, we tripled the amount of new subscribers per day as a result of putting that popup in place and the revenue is following that rate.

"Generally, we see about 20 percent list atrophy each year, 20 percent of people unsubscribing. And I wish I had a better statistic for how many people go dormant each year. It's really going to depend on the brand. But your ESP should be able to tell you how many people are going dormant each quarter. You want to be implementing sweepstakes, popups, in-store email capture, mobile capture, texting to a short code to get mobile sign-ups, even implementing QR codes, to be really acquiring email addresses at every touch point.

"Make sure that you're adding new people to your list all the time. Those new people are going to be clicking through and they're going to be opening your emails and they're going to be enabling images at Gmail, all of which is going to point to positive reputation out at Gmail. By having a positive offensive strategy, Gmail is going to see, 'Hey, this retailer actually has a lot of engaged people. Sure, they've got some unengaged people, but they've got a lot of engaged people as well.' That's going to count positively towards your reputation and ensure that you've got inbox placement there."

PEC: Anything else for our readers, who are mainly smaller ecommerce merchants?

Kramer: "Yes. To reiterate one thing, understand and segment your list by inactivity. Beyond that, understand which discounts you have to give to those levels of inactivity for subscribers to become reengaged and continue to run those types of campaigns everyday. We've seen in some studies unengaged subscribers will receive different subject lines than engaged subscribers. So, unengaged subscribers could get subject lines with the words like 'We want you back' or 'We miss you,' things like that. That would be one piece of encouragement.

"Finally, for all the retailers that are in holiday mode, you are about to receive a windfall of new subscribers, and it's going to be important to understand how to market to those folks. We see large unsubscribe numbers coming back after the holiday because of the large amount of Christmas purchases or holiday purchases. Understand how you want to be messaging to those people post-holiday and start to think about your post-holiday campaigns."

Smartphone Health Applications Will Exceed $400 Million Annually by 2016, Says ABI Research

2011-11-30T09:08:00.001-08:00

LONDON, Nov 23, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- The sports and health mobile application market will grow to over $400 million in 2016 - up from just $120 million in 2010. Much of that growth will be spurred by the ability of mobile handsets to easily connect to wearable devices that in turn can deliver new functionality, accuracy, and appeal to sports and fitness applications.

As the mobile handset adds new ways to access and support healthcare applications, it will become increasingly important within the healthcare market, including home monitoring systems for aging users, personal emergency response services, and remote healthcare monitoring applications. However, sports and fitness will dominate the mobile health application market.

"Downloadable apps are moving the sports tracking device market from proprietary devices to mobile phones, but adoption has been limited by the data they can collect. However, with the connectivity that Bluetooth Smart will embed in mobile handsets, wearable devices will bring greater detail to mobile handsets," says Jonathan Collins, principal analyst.

Handset connectivity to wearable devices brings a new dynamic to the sports monitoring market. Athletic equipment players have already moved to support handset applications by either using proprietary or battery-draining traditional Bluetooth wireless. Meanwhile, traditional players such as Garmin, who recently launched its first handset application for this market, and Polar have delivered high-end specialist systems. Over the next five years, these players will increasingly have to compete directly with the mobile handset. They will also face a slew of start-ups and new entrants offering applications, online communities, and wearable devices offering a range of applications and services.

"As applications increasingly become part of a bundle that ships with wearable devices, revenues from mobile applications will lag behind the growth in app downloads. Mobile application downloads will actually grow at nearly twice the rate of revenues between 2010 and 2016, with more than a billion downloads annually by 2016," says Collins.

ABI Research's report, "Mobile Devices and mHealth," ( http://www.abiresearch.com/research/1007768 ) examines the issues driving mobile handset adoption in sports and healthcare applications. This includes forecasts for mobile application downloads, wearable devices, wireless connectivity, regulation, and regional adoption for the next five years.

It is part of the Wireless Healthcare ( http://www.abiresearch.com/products/service/Wireless_Healthcare_Research_Service ) research service and will also be discussed at length during ABI Research's "Wireless Healthcare: From mHealth to Telehealth" ( http://www.abiresearch.com/webinar/923600058 ) webinar.

ABI Research provides in-depth analysis and quantitative forecasting of trends in global connectivity and other emerging technologies. From offices in North America, Europe and Asia, ABI Research's worldwide team of experts advises thousands of decision makers through 40+ research and advisory services. Est. 1990. For more information visit www.abiresearch.com , or call +1.516.624.2500.

SOURCE: ABI Research

Retail Becomes Fastest-Growing Mobile Category

2011-11-29T11:14:00.001-08:00

As smartphones become more mainstream, mobile is becoming more pervasive in all aspects of consumers’ lives. And online shopping is quickly becoming a popular activity.

Mobile content tied to services like travel, dining and movies—more established mobile categories—is still on an uptick, but online retail experienced the largest increase vs. 2010, with 95% growth in the number of subscribers accessing this content year-over-year in September 2011, according to comScore. That works out to 21.2 million mobile users, 17% of whom accessed mobile retail sites almost daily. Twenty-eight percent did so at least once a week while 55% reported one to three times per month.

Among those surveyed by comScore, the leading mobile retail activity was finding a store location, performed by 33%. Twenty-one percent compared product prices and 20% looked for coupons or deals. Smartphone users in a Hipcricket survey followed a similar pattern, but with higher involvement. Nearly half had researched prices on a retailer’s mobile site and more than a third had looked for coupons and promotions.

Retailers should not only be prepared to provide the content that mobile searchers seek, but also on the platforms they use. According to comScore, smartphone users in general favored browsers over apps (48% vs. 26%) with iPhone users being the most likely to use apps; only 4 percentage points separated browsers (40%) from app users (36%) among iPhone owners. To reach the broadest shopping base, retailers would be wise to offer both modes of access.

2012 Trends: A Virtuous Circle of Technology and Content Adoption

2011-11-28T10:48:00.000-08:00

Surges in tablet, smartphone and ereader adoption have stoked demand for content consumed on these devices, including video, audio, social media, games, news, books and periodicals.

eMarketer estimates that the number of US tablet users will reach 89.5 million in 2014, up from 33.7 million in 2011. Tablet users will make up 35.6% of internet users in 2014, up from 14.5% this year.

The number of US adult ereader users will reach 53.9 million by 2014, up from 33.3 million in 2011. eMarketer also expects robust growth in smartphone users, even though that product category is more mature than tablets and ereaders. By 2015, there will be 148.6 million smartphone users in the US, up from 90.1 million in 2011. These users will represent 58% of mobile phone users in 2015, up from 38% this year.

These devices create demand for apps, streaming video and audio, games, ebooks and periodicals, social networking and other marketer-supported activities. Content availability has already skyrocketed to meet the demands of consumers with smart devices, and these confluent trends will help US online video advertising to more than triple over the next four years, eMarketer estimates.

The more consumers adopt new technologies, the more comfortable they become with accessing content on every available screen and expecting the experience to be seamless across devices and platforms. The companies that are best suited to meet these formidable consumer expectations are those that can deliver hardware, software, content and social integration. And the marketers that will get the most out of this new content ecosystem are those that understand how to deliver the best possible experience for each platform.

For more information on marketing developments expected next year, stay tuned for the forthcoming eMarketer report “Top Trends for 2012,” available to eMarketer corporate subscribers only.

Modern Warfare 3 Grosses $775M Worldwide In 5 Days

2011-11-17T13:56:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is now the best-selling video game launch of all time, grossing more than $775 million worldwide in its first five days on sale.

The game, developed by Activision's Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer Games, sold over 6.5 million units in North America and the UK alone in its first 24 hours on sale, with an estimated sell-through of $400 million in these regions on launch day.

It also claimed the title as the highest grossing opening week for any entertainment title ever in the UK.

Now Activision has revealed that the game has exceeded the worldwide sell-through record of $650 million set by Call of Duty: Black Ops last year.

The company also noted that the game has set two new records on Xbox Live. Microsoft recorded 3.3 million unique gamers playing Modern Warfare 3 on launch day, and 3.3 million concurrent players in-game.

Robert Kotick, CEO at Activision Blizzard, said, "With $775 million of sales of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 in its first five days, Call of Duty has become the first entertainment property in history to set five-day launch records for three consecutive years across all forms of entertainment."

"Life-to-date retail sales for the Call of Duty franchise have exceeded $6 billion worldwide, which makes Call of Duty one of the most valuable entertainment properties in the world."

GameStop digital sales increase 59 percent in third quarter

2011-11-17T13:32:00.001-08:00

Video game retailer GameStop said in its third quarter 2011 sales and earnings report today that digital sales have grown by 59 percent.

The company launched digital distribution, iDevice and gaming tablet businesses earlier this year and says they are significantly contributing to its gross margin expansion. Console digital sales rose 63 percent, while PC digital sales grew 51 percent. Investment in digital and emerging businesses is part of a long-term strategic plan the company has developed over the last three years and GameStop chief executive Paul Raines said during today’s earnings call it will supplement GameStop’s retail business this holiday season.

GameStop reports total sales for Q3 2011 were $1.95 billion, up 2.5 percent compared to $1.90 billion in the third quarter of 2010. However, lower than expected sales of new software, which Raines attributes to cash-strapped consumers, led to a 0.6 percent decrease in total company comparable store sales. The company expects comparable store sales to range from flat to 2.0 percent in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2011. Net earnings were also down for the third quarter, $53.9 million compared to $54.7 million during the same time period last year.

On a positive note, Raines says he is expecting a good start to the holiday season thanks to strong sell-through of new title releases in November like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which recently broke sales records by earning $775 million in five days for publisher Activision Blizzard.

PapayaMobile and Tapjoy to launch new targeted ad service for Android developers

2011-11-16T13:44:00.001-08:00

It seems like just about everyone is rolling out a social network for mobile games these days. PapayaMobile was one of the first on Android, and they’ve just announced a partnership with Tapjoy to put together a new "Social Marketplace" for Android app developers.

What makes the Social Marketplace different is that it's designed for developers' benefit: users will see recommendations for apps based on which titles their friends are playing. Basically, users will have more relevant and better-targeted ads sent their way, while developers (hopefully) see more follow through when it comes to people downloading their apps.

“Our entire business is built around delivering as much value to consumers as possible, and clearly there’s considerable value in helping them discover new games based on what their friends are playing,” said Mihir Shah, President and CEO of Tapjoy. “PapayaMobile’s social network has the scale and reach, particularly across the U.S. and China, to help make our ads further targeted and more engaging for users.”

The Social Marketplace is due to be available for developers to use by the end of the year. From the sound of this, it'll be pretty simple to utilize: All you have to do is integrate the Papaya Social SDK, as well as Tapjoy's Publisher SDK into your app.

At the moment, it sounds like PapayaMobile and Tapjoy are certainly some great groups to have helping you promote your games, since PapayaMobile has over 35 million users alone. If you’re interested in signing up, be sure to visit tapjoy.com and papayamobile.com for more information.

SONY PCL Expands Deployment of Interra's Baton(TM)Content Verification Software

2011-11-08T13:44:00.001-08:00

CUPERTINO, Calif., Nov 07, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Interra Systems, Inc., based in Cupertino, CA, and IT Access Co., Ltd., based in Yokohama, Japan, are pleased to announce that SONY PCL, Japan, has decided to use Interra's File-based QC or Automated Content Verification product Baton(TM) in its workflow.

"With the spread of content delivery service of recent years, transcoding and a QC solution which can process the large volume and a variety of content, has been required at SONY PCL. We decided to expand deployment of Interra's Baton software because the latest Baton, which can provide us more enhanced features, improved performance, and more formats supported, convinced us that Baton is a suitable component to streamline our verification workflow," said Yoshitsugu Kouchi of Network Engineering Sect., Digital Media Dept., Media Service Div., Business Operation Group at SONY PCL.

"We are very pleased to note that SONY PCL is expanding its usage of our Baton QC solution. Our Baton solution has been established as benchmark QC solution since SONY PCL adopted Baton for the first time. Today hundreds of broadcasters, post houses and new media companies use Baton globally. Our Baton(TM) solution is emerging as the preferred tool for ensuring content readiness in file based workflows that handle content for different types of playout. We hope our Baton solution will continue to address the evolving needs of file based QC adequately," commented Ashish Basu, Vice President of Sales and Business Development at Interra Systems, Inc.

"We are so delighted that SONY PCL, a media-industry leading company has decided to deploy additional Interra's Baton software. Collaborating with Interra Systems, we would like to continue to support SONY PCL to use Baton more efficiently and feel more satisfied with Baton's progressing QC abilities," commented Yosuke Kaburagi, President and CEO at IT Access, Co., Ltd.

Baton(TM) is a multi-platform, automated content verification system for file-based SD, HD, and mixed workflows. Supporting multiple codecs and media containers, Baton ensures quality control of media content at all stages of content lifecycle. Baton(TM) is highly flexible and can be quickly scaled for large facilities or high volume of content. As a hardware and O/S independent solution, Baton(TM) can be easily integrated in a facilities' existing infrastructure.

About SONY PCL

SONY PCL is a total service provider of event and video contents production such as event-planning, -production, and --operating, video content-planning, production, shooting, editing, distribution, showing and BD/DVD packaging. http://www.sonypcl.jp/

About Interra Systems

Interra Systems is a software products and services provider for Digital Media industry. Interra's Digital Media solutions are led by Baton, a File-based QC or Automated Verification System which ensures media Content Readiness, and by Vega, a family of Audio/Video analyzers for standards compliant media content creation and distribution. Interra is headquartered in Cupertino, CA. http://www.interrasystems.com/dms

About IT Access

IT Access Co., Ltd. is a distributor of Interra System's digital media products in Japan. IT Access, an integrator of embedded system technology, was established in April 2000 cooperatively by INNOTECH CORPORATION, a semiconductor trading company and ACCESS Co., Ltd., a developer of an embedded browser, "NetFront." IT Access mainly provides various embedded software including Access's browser and Wind River's real time OS, "VxWorks." IT Access is experienced in software-related engineering support for products development for digital appliance manufacturers in Japan. http://www.itaccess.co.jp

SOURCE: Interra Systems, Inc.

IVERSE MEDIA ANNOUNCES $4 MILLION PRIVATE EQUITY FUNDING

2011-11-08T13:43:00.001-08:00

iVerse Media, LLC, a leading digital content distributor, is proud to announce today a $4 Million commitment in Private Equity Funding to further expand its digital content business. The additional funding comes from PS&J Group, that is knowledgeable and experienced in the digital market.

iVerse intends to use the new funds to expand its digital content offerings, and increase awareness of its “Comics+” and “Comics+Kids” brands, through an aggressive marketing strategy, enhanced product offerings, and new platform distribution.

“2011 has been a great year for iVerse.” said PS&J Group chairman Pierre LeRoy. “Through digital comic sales, software licensing, and strategic partnerships, iVerse has been financially solvent for some time now. These additional funds will allow the company to really expand on what its started in some unique and compelling ways.”

The iVerse powered “Comics+” application is already the first major digital comics platform to support “PLUS” features such as streaming video content for digital comics on iOS. The company will expand these offerings in a variety of ways over the next several months.

“We love comics at iVerse,” said iVerse CEO, Michael Murphey, “and we’re very eager to not only enhance that experience, but to expand the market as well, and introduce the next generation of readers to their first comics. We have had a tremendous amount of success with that so far, and we have several new initiatives planned that we believe will take that to the next level.”

iVerse currently partners with 60+ publishers including Archie Comics, Peanuts Worldwide LLC, Ape Entertainment, Marvel Comics, IDW Publishing, Image Comics, BOOM! Studios, Dynamite Entertainment, and many more. iVerse is also uniquely partnered with Diamond Comics Distribution to bring an innovative and robust digital comics service to physical comic book stores, providing them with tools to sell digital comics in-store and online. iVerse powers many digital comic storefronts on iOS including Archie Comics, Sonic Comics, IDW Comics, Star Trek Comics, Transformers Comics, G.I. Joe Comics, and Pocket God Comics, among others.

Comics+ App Link: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/comics/id323397665?mt=8

Comics+Kids App Link: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/comics-kids/id384299229?mt=8

Comics+ News site: http://www.comicspl.us

About iVerse Media, LLC

iVerse Media (http://www.iversemedia.com) is a digital content distributor focused on the world of comics and popular culture. Founded in 2008, the company was one of the first to launch digital comics on Apple’s iOS platform. As of Oct 2011 over 5 Million products in the iOS App Store have been downloaded that are powered by iVerse, making the “iVerse Engine” one of the most popular and widely used platforms for reading digital comics in the world. The company is principally located in Waco, TX.

Games industry professionals believe that digital download sales figures will top boxed retail sales by the 2015, with many suggesting that 2013 will be the year.

2011-11-08T13:42:00.000-08:00

The digital download revolution is coming! At least, that’s according to various games industry professionals in a survey conducted by the London Games Conference this week.

A thousand games industry executives were asked which year they believed digital download sales would overtake boxed retail sales, and more than half agreed that 2015 would be the latest this would happen.

In fact, the year with the most votes was 2013, with 23 percent of those surveyed saying downloads will beat boxed retail in two years’ time.

“The results of our survey show that many think time is running out for the disc-based game,” commented MCV editor Michael French.

“And while the majority say that the digital sales of games will overtake physical in 2013, most agree the transition will be done by 2015.” French added that this was “proof that videogames are heading for an online tipping point.”

Digital download service Steam (pictured), from Valve Software, has led PC digital distribution since its launch in 2004. These days many videogame stores do not stock physical PC games, thanks to the prevalence of download services and its effect on retail. But there has been speculation that the next generation of games consoles will also be download-centric.

The London Games Conference takes place on 10th November.

via BeefJack

Mobile Advertising Goes Mainstream

2011-10-31T14:47:00.000-07:00

US mobile ad spending will grow 47% in 2012, reaching $1.8 billion, as marketers seek to capitalize on rising smart device and mobile web adoption. As on the desktop, search and display (banners, rich media and video) are emerging as the dominant mobile ad formats.

“Mobile advertising is no longer a question of ‘if’ but of ‘when,’” said Noah Elkin, principal analyst at eMarketer and author of the new report, “Mobile Advertising and Marketing: Moving to the Mainstream.” “A key factor pushing mobile advertising toward the mainstream is that mobile web access is fast becoming more the norm than the exception. This makes mobile a greater imperative than ever for marketers.”

Reflecting the continued advance of smartphones and rising tablet acquisition among US consumers, eMarketer’s latest forecast is sharply higher. Relative to the September 2010 forecast, mobile ad spending projections for 2011 through 2014 have been revised upward anywhere from 11% to 33% per year. Overseas markets are experiencing comparable momentum, driven by similar trends in device and mobile web adoption.

All mobile ad formats will see sizeable spending increases through 2015, but similar to the dynamics of online advertising, search and display are emerging as the dominant mobile ad formats. Mobile display ad spending (banners, rich media and video) will overtake messaging to become the largest overall format in 2012. Within the display category, rich media and video are growing the fastest as marketers seek to translate the desktop’s engaging brand experiences to smartphones and tablets.

Marketers are approaching mobile from a perspective of both less and more: less experimentation and more commitment, fewer test budgets and more real dollars, fewer one-off campaigns and more repeat buys. Most importantly, there is a growing sophistication in marketers’ efforts to integrate mobile into their broader digital campaigns to engage consumers. Mobile will continue to emerge as less of an afterthought and more of a permanent fixture in marketers’ digital strategies, the report finds.

“Consumers increasingly expect to communicate, network, browse and shop from a range of devices, and the growing sophistication of smart devices will only accelerate this trend,” said Elkin. “But whether consumers access the web from a PC or a mobile device will ultimately take a back seat to marketers’ ability to build campaigns that reach across channels and devices and focus on targeting specific actions.”

India E-commerce Overview [Infographic]

2011-10-26T15:50:00.001-07:00

Given that the e-commerce market in India has been getting a lot of attention from VCs, referralcandy wanted to see what the hype was all about. Here’s what they found. Enjoy!

ReferralCandy - Customer Referral Programs for Online Stores

Froomerce gives affiliates love through Facebook storefronts

2011-10-25T16:11:00.001-07:00

Froomerce, a startup that lets you take full advantage of marketing products through a Facebook storefront, launched at the DEMO conference today.

Froomerce is fairly simple to set up. The company has created a dashboard from which people can create a theme for their storefront, upload a logo, and choose a product topic as well as products to sell on their storefront. The products come from numerous affiliate networks Froomerce has partnered with. An affiliate network allows anyone to sell a product that isn’t theirs. For example, you can become an affiliate of Amazon and sell Kindles for a commission. When customers click a product in your Froomerce page to buy it, they are directed back to Amazon, with your affiliate code connected.

On the backend, Froomerce also provides widgets to help you place a storefront on your blog or social network, as well as widgets to place tag clouds on your page. Froomerce also provides an API so that developers can create new applications on top of its existing ones.

The product is not well suited to small retailers who don’t already have an online presence. Froomerce does not provide its own check out process, for example. Instead, it aims to help those with an e-commerce website to reach Facebook and mobile users as well as upsell.

“We went after the existing player that wanted to experiment with the new channels like Facebook,” Ali Naqi Shaheen, cheif executive of Froomerce parent company Coeus Solutions GmbH, told VentureBeat.

Existing online retailers often “want to know what their conversion rate is before we invest in something,” he said. Shaheen explained that Froomerce already has many affiliate networks signed up, so it can often provide a retailer with a numerical reason to engage and create a storefront.

Still Froomerce’s number one target isn’t retailers but publishers. Online publishers, such as the very blog you are reading, sell content directly from their site in addition to advertising. Many times in order to sell this content, you must manually discuss terms, prices, and expectations. Publications using Froomerce, however, can seek out a product they wish to promote, write a review and add a Froomerce link to the post. The publication then makes money off of the sales on that product.

Froomerce has partnered with affiliate program aggregators such as Linkshare, Commission Junction and others. Those using Froomerce are automatically approved to sell items from these networks and do not have to be approved by the individual affiliate networks. There are few cases where this isn’t true, such as eBay, which only allows you to sell through Froomerce if you’ve been pre-approved by them.

Froomerce is not alone, however. Companies such as Popshops allow those selling through affiliate networks to create online storefronts. Skimlinks allows you to link to products sold through affiliate networks as well.

Froomerce is owned by German parent company Coeus Solutions GmbH, headquartered in Berlin. Currently, Froomerce has been self funded and has raised $50,000.

Froomerce is one of 80 companies chosen by VentureBeat to launch at the DEMO Fall 2011 event taking place this week in Silicon Valley. After our selection, the companies pay a fee to present. Our coverage of them remains objective.

New Blue Jays logo

2011-10-25T15:19:00.001-07:00

Look above. You’ll see the new Toronto Blue Jays logo for 2012. As you’ll see below it pays homage to the Blue Jays logo of yesteryear. An updated version of their original logo from the 1970s, with a lettering font appropriated from the city of Toronto’s flag.

They also brought the Canadian flag to re-incorporate theirCanadian roots.

I really like this new look, I think it’s a great move away from the “Angry Birds” style of logo they’ve had in recent years.

Another Canadian team has updated/augmented their logo. Check out the Winnipeg Jets new look here

Mobile Ad Effectiveness Helps Drive Investment

2011-10-24T16:26:00.000-07:00

Whether or not the “year of mobile” ever comes—or has already passed—mobile ad spending is on the rise, largely due to the increasing smartphone and mobile web populations.

Mobile display ad effectiveness is another factor driving marketer investment. Studies from InsightExpress, MediaMind (formerly Eyeblaster), and, as of Q3 2011, Dynamic Logic, have all demonstrated mobile display advertising to be more effective than online display advertising.

In a press release, Dynamic Logic noted that mobile advertising’s effectiveness is driven in large part by its relative novelty. However, the digital insights and solutions firm pointed to three additional key factors:

The larger proportion of the mobile screen that is devoted to ads relative to online
Generally more focused messaging and content due to screen size and overall technology constraints
Better targeting than most other media

Still, with the wide discrepancy between the best- and worst-performing campaigns sampled, Dynamic Logic concluded that as the novelty of mobile display ads wears off, compelling creative and relevant messaging will become more important for continued ad effectiveness.

eMarketer expects mobile ad spending in the US to reach $1.23 billion this year, 65% more than in 2010. Growth rates will moderate as the medium matures.

Oracle Buys Cloud-based Customer Service Company RightNow For $1.5 Billion

2011-10-24T11:08:00.001-07:00

Oracle this morning announced that it has acquired RightNow – both companies are listed on NASDAQ – for $43 per share or roughly $1.5 billion net of RightNow’s cash and debt. With the acquisition, Oracle is adding a robust cloud-based customer service offering (see graph below) to its own Public Cloud solution – more info on that here. RightNow’s share price closed at $35.96 last week, so the deal represents a premium of roughly 20 percent on its closing price on Friday the 21st of October.

RightNow’s solutions help companies handle customer interactions across a multitude of channels, including call and contact centers, the Web and social networks.

Its products are used by nearly 2,000 organizations across the globe, the company says.

Founded in 1997, RightNow went public in 2004. The company boasted a market cap of $1.2 billion at market close last week.

The acquisition by Oracle is expected to close later this year or in early 2012. As usual, the transaction is subject to a number of things, including RightNow stockholder approval, regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions.

Oracle has closed 6 acquisitions this year. While its takeovers of RightNow and Endeca are pending, the company has completed the purchases of Datanomic, FatWire, Inquira, Ndevr, Ksplice and Pillar Data Systems in 2011 alone.

Android Market now has half a million genuine, bona fide, non-malware apps

2011-10-21T13:27:00.001-07:00

The Android Market now contains more than 500,000 apps — and that’s after the powers that be removed around 37 percent of published apps.

By contrast, Apple’s App Store for its iOS devices contains 600,000 apps; around 24 percent of applications don’t make it through the company’s rigorous submission process.

These stats are current as of the end of September; the actual number of apps in the Android Market is likely slightly higher by now.

According to data from mobile analysis firm research2guidance, more than 78 percent of the apps that were removed from the Android Market were free. Research2guidance speculates, “Publishers [may] put more effort into the applications they place with the pay-per-download business model, thus ensuring that it is kept longer in store.”

According to data published earlier this year, the Android Market is actually set to contain more apps than the App Store by mid-2012. Between August 2010 and February 2011, the Android Market grew 127 percent (in number of apps alone); for the same period of time, the Apple App Store grew around 44 percent.

Also, by next summer, Android users are expected to be downloading more apps collectively than do their Apple-lovin’ counterparts by summer 2012. Both should reach a monthly figure of 3.2 billion downloads per month by next June, and after that, Android Market downloads are expected to quickly eclipse App Store downloads.

But let’s not turn this into an app-measuring contest between Apple and Android. There’s more to a mobile ecosystem than apps, and both companies are releasing exciting innovations with their latest operating systems and hardware.

In the end, do a few thousand more stupid games involving avian projectiles really make that much of a difference in ecosystem quality?

Which ISPs Are the Biggest BitTorrent Throttlers ?

2011-10-21T13:26:00.000-07:00

Suspicious your Internet Service Provider is throttling your BitTorrent download of the latest Ubuntu release or some other free and legal bits? File-sharing blog TorrentFreak dug into the data to see the best and worst ISPs when it comes to BitTorrent throttling.

Data published by the Google-backed Measurement Lab gives a unique insight into the BitTorrent throttling practices of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) all over the world. It reveals, for example, that Comcast was slowing down nearly half of all BitTorrent traffic in the U.S. early 2008, but only 3% last year. In Canada, Rogers has the worst track record as it systematically throttles more than three-quarters of all BitTorrent traffic.

Hundreds of ISPs all over the world limit and restrict BitTorrent traffic on their networks. Unfortunately, most companies are not very open about their network management solutions.

Thanks to data collected by Measurement Lab (M-Lab) the public is now able to take a look at the frequency of these BitTorrent throttling practices. Among other tools, M-Lab runs theGlasnost application developed by the Max Planck Institute.

The interactive data set published yesterday spans a two-year period and this initial release covers the period between April 2008 and May 2010. It includes BitTorrent throttling percentages of ISPs in dozens of countries, divided into three-month periods. Below we discuss a few trends and notable findings.

United States

The BitTorrent throttling practices of Comcast, exposed by Robb Topolski and TorrentFreak in 2007, were in part what led to the Measurement Lab research. After an FCC investigation Comcast was ordered to stop slowing down BitTorrent on a large-scale, and the data shows that the company has kept its word.

Early 2008 Comcast limited nearly half (49%) of all BitTorrent traffic but this was reduced to 3 percent by the first quarter of last year. Cox, another heavy throttler, went from 51 percent to 3 percent in the same time period. The data further shows that in 2010, Clearwire was the only U.S. Internet provider that limited more than 10 percent of all BitTorrent traffic, 17 percent to be precise.

Worst: Clearwire (17%)
Best: Comcast and others (3%)

Canada

In Canada, all large ISPs have admitted to slowing down BitTorrent traffic, and some do so to a great extent. Since the start of the measurements Rogers has continuously throttled more than three-quarter of all BitTorrent traffic, and there are no signs that this will stop.

During the first quarter of 2010 the two other large Canadian ISPs, Bell and Shaw, were throttling 16 and 14 percent respectively. Videotron on the other hand has never slowed down more than 7 percent, and only 3 percent during the last measurement year.

Worst: Rogers (78%)
Best: Videotron (3%)

Great Britain

In Great Britain, TalkTalk used to limit a third of all BitTorrent traffic, but this was reduced significantly by the end of 2009. They now only slow down BitTorrent during peak hours which resulted in a 12 percent throttling rate early 2010. Tiscali and BT Group are exposed as the most heavy throttlers while Virgin Media, O2 and BSkyB have had relatively low percentages throughout the measurement period.

Worst: Tiscali and BT Group (27%)
Best: BSkyB (5%)

Other

A quick look at some other countries shows that in Australia none of the large ISPs were throttling BitTorrent traffic heavily in 2010, and the same can be said for Sweden and France. In The Netherlands UPC used to throttle heavily, but this was no longer the case early 2010.

In Germany, Kabel Deutschland seems to be the poorest choice for BitTorrent users (36%), and in Poland UPC has to be avoided as they limit 87 percent of all BitTorrent traffic.

Those who are interested in seeing how their own ISP performs can take a look at the full dataset at deeppacket.info. The researchers promise to release more recent data in the future, and it will be interesting to see how the various throttling habits of ISPs develop.

For those who have a choice, which us unfortunately not always the case, the data can definitely help to make an informed decision when signing up at a new Internet Provider. Photo byFeliciano Guimarães.

BitTorrent Throttling Internet Providers Exposed | Torrent Freak

Founder and Editor-in-Chief of TorrentFreak, Ernesto, started TorrentFreak because he'd like to share news and knowledge about filesharing, peer to peer technology, piracy, and BitTorrent.

Google Music Store coming soon and will “have a little twist”

2011-10-19T14:59:00.000-07:00

Google is “close” to launching its own MP3 music store, Android head Andy Rubin said today. The company has been in talks to offer a music store for some time, but Rubin shed a little more light on the upcoming service today at the AsiaD conference.

Google couldn’t launch a full-service music offering earlier, so it launched a music locker that lets users listen to their music from the cloud. The record labels weren’t happy with that move, but Google has been persistent in wanting its own MP3 music offering to challenge established players like Apple and Amazon and has been willing to do whatever it takes.

Rubin didn’t reveal much about the upcoming service, but he did indicate it would be a little different from Apple and Amazon by offering “a little twist – it will have a little Google in it. It won’t just be selling 99 cent tracks.”

Google is in an increasingly challenging position now that Apple has iCloud for music storage and will soon have iTunes Match, a $25-a-year service that lets people legally access almost any song in their iTunes library. And then there’s Amazon, which already has a strong MP3 sales catalog, its Amazon Cloud Drive for music storage and the upcoming Amazon Kindle Fire tablet that will emphasize media consumption.

While Google launched Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich last night, we’re not sure at this point if the major software update will help the music experience. And until the company completes deals with the major music labels, all we can do is wait and see.

Would you like to use a native Google MP3 store on your Android phone or tablet?

Are Music Listeners Ready to Move to the Cloud?

2011-10-17T10:42:00.001-07:00

New options for media consumption on the web as well as mobile and smart devices are continually emerging, and Spotify’s launch in the US is just one of the latest changes to shake things up. With Apple’s iCloud debuting in iOS 5, what do consumers think of storing and streaming their music from the cloud—and the concept of renting vs. owning it?

A September 2011 survey of US online music consumers conducted byInsight Research Group for digital music subscription service eMusicfound that more than half of respondents preferred to purchase music files online, the top way of consuming music. Even buying physical copies of CDs or vinyl edged out free online streaming options, though the three choices were grouped closely together. Only 13% of online music consumers preferred to pay for online streaming.

Overall, the survey found that ownership of music had strong positive connotations for music listeners: 91% said they preferred to own music so they could listen to it as they pleased, and nearly as many considered it more secure.

Many saw streaming, instead, as a “try before you buy” option—76% said they use online streaming to find new music before deciding to purchase.

This finding is supported by results of a December 2010 TargetSpotsurvey conducted by Parks Associates. Nearly seven in 10 US internet radio listeners said they preferred to purchase music after hearing a song on an online radio station.

The research suggests a mix of behaviors will continue. eMusic asked about future plans to listen to and purchase music, and most respondents believed they would continue to stream music for free but never give up on also owning it outright. About 40% would want to store their owned files in the cloud for convenience, but just 14% said they thought they would pay for streaming in the future.

For music listeners, streaming options have become key to discovering new artists or songs, but those options must be free of charge to the consumer to facilitate the music purchase process they prefer—a process marketers will be critical to enabling.

Mobile Coupons Pit Convenience Against Privacy for Some Consumers

2011-10-14T14:37:00.001-07:00

Mobile coupons are still a niche activity among mobile users, but usage is growing at a fast pace. eMarketer estimates 9.5% of US adult mobile users, or 19.8 million people, will use mobile coupons by the end of this year. By 2013, 35.6 million mobile owners will have redeemed a mobile coupon or code for either online or offline shopping. Among smartphone users, penetration is even higher, at 19% this year.

A September survey by Prosper Mobile Insights found an even higher rate of usage, at 42.2%, when it asked whether smartphone and tablet users had ever scanned a barcode from their screen or shown a promo code to a cashier.

But respondents were conflicted in their attitude toward mobile coupons with a location-based element. More than two-thirds of respondents said they at least somewhat agreed that they were very convenient and useful. But nearly half also worried about security issues and location tracking.

Mobile privacy and security are hot-button issues for consumers, who realize they carry a significant amount of sensitive information on their mobile devices. The value proposition for mobile location-based coupons is clear to them already: Such coupons would be a very helpful way to push money-saving offers when they’re relevant and useful. But marketers and carriers must work to assuage fears that location tracking is too much to trade off for such convenience.

So far, that trade-off is not too popular. Among survey respondents, just over one-quarter said they preferred to receive mobile coupons automatically when they were near a store. More than 51% would rather get them via email

The State of Product Feed Management

2011-10-13T13:53:00.000-07:00

The savviest Web merchants, those looking to expose more consumers to more of their products more often, rely heavily on a broad distribution of their product feeds.

So what is a data feed? Think of it as a virtual catalog of products. This compilation of product inventory information includes important details including product identifiers such as name, description, price, availability, paths to product images and pages, and comes in the form of files such as XML or CSV.

While certainly not a new promotional technique in any sense of the word, product feeds have become a mainstay of e-commerce marketing (and for affiliate marketers as well) and it looks to stay that way for the foreseeable future.

Distributing Product Feeds

For Internet retailers, the vendor landscape of comparison shopping engines (CSEs), those destinations where product feeds are distributed and managed, is by all accounts full but continues to grow, keeping pace with the ’Net’s evolution itself. Most merchants are likely familiar with the leading comparison shopping destinations including Google Product Search, NexTag, PriceGrabber, Bing Shopping, Shopping.com, Amazon Product Ads, Shopzilla, Become, Pronto and TheFind, but there are others. Many others, in fact.

For example, savvy merchants are utilizing some relatively obscure networks for added exposure including Buy.com, Sears.com, NewEgg Marketplace and Underbid, which all work on a cost-per-acquisition basis. Merchants with product feed management experience are also venturing into affiliate networks. Providers such as LinkShare, Commission Junction, ShareaSale, LinkConnecter, AffiliateFuture, AvantLink and ClixGalore, among others, all provide merchants with a way to distribute their feeds to qualified website affiliates and publishers who in turn promote products to consumers visiting their own sites.

The Demand for Better Feeds

With so many options for merchants, however, and with the many complexities surrounding the actual process of working with data feeds, venturing into this promotional type can be overwhelming in both cost and time spent on management — which can be immense. When coupled with continuing technological and industry advancements and improvements, it has kept many merchants at arm’s length. For many, it remains something that can not be ventured into casually.

For example, late August 2011 saw NexTag release brandlevel bidding functionality within its Merchant Dashboard bidding tool. Merchants cannot only manage their bids by category now but target specific brands as well. Perennial CSE leader Shopzilla added several new biddable categories in the past quarter, and Bing Shopping added several new search refinements, including vastly improved “sale” filters and shopping list functionality.

Google also announced several important changes to its product search feed specification which went into effect in late September 2011. If you’re an Internet retailer and use Google Product Search as a channel to promote products, these developments should be top of mind — primarily because of the sheer volume of the Google Product Search. The changes relate primarily to providing shoppers with more accurate and “fresher” information. Google is now requiring merchants to show the availability of products, include the appropriate Google product category, and is also making the image link mandatory as well. For retailers selling apparel, merchants will need to include information such as size and color as well as for whom the product is designed (age and gender).

As consumers look for the very best deals on the products they want, comparison shopping engines are retooling their interfaces and their services to provide users with an experience that aims toward and supports conversion.

Just Outsource It

When you bundle the many options merchants have at their disposal to promote feeds, with the constant rate of change of these services and the Web as a whole, it’s no wonder the most sophisticated and savvy merchants outsource their data feed management.

Merchants interested in distributing their product feeds must face a harsh reality — the work that goes into it can be cumbersome if not downright tedious. Merchants going it alone must be registered with each and every shopping engine they want their products to appear on, they must maintain their data feeds, reloading data daily or as necessary. They must also understand the various formats each shopping engine requires such as naming conventions and data-feed specifications. Keeping track of performance is another obligation most merchants don’t think about and likely where many fail.

Fortunately, there are many vendors which support merchants’ interest in distributing their product feeds. ChannelAdvisor and Mercent are used by many of the Web’s most successful merchants, but there are many others including GoDataFeed, FeedPerfect, FusePump and Channel Intelligence.

What these solutions providers offer to merchants is a simpler way to manage their product feed distribution. So what is it that they actually do? On the whole, the process includes feed normalization for different CSEs and affiliate networks, appropriate and optimal category selection, and support for the maintenance of other mandatory feed elements including SKU’s product descriptions, a variety of image sizes, stock availability, price, search terms and even currency, industry-specific product identifiers such as UPC or ISBN and the last time the feed was updated.

In the End, There Was Data

Internet retailers avoiding distribution of their product feeds are missing out on more website traffic, as well as more sales and revenue. With a solid understanding of the e-commerce market landscape, however, Web-based merchants can be on the fast track to greater exposure and profits.

Author: Peter Prestipino

Microsoft report finds large drop in spam emails

2011-10-13T13:52:00.000-07:00

There has been a sharp drop in the number of spam emails detected and blocked by Microsoft. (Microsoft image)

The number of spam emails blocked before reaching inboxes has dropped by two-thirds, according to Microsoft’s Security Intelligence Report.

The report (PDF, 168 pages), released today, finds that around 21.9 billion spam emails were blocked in May 2011 using Microsoft Online Protection for Exchange, down from 89.2 billion messages in July 2010.

The report credits the takedown of the Cutwail and Rustock botnets as having “a positive effect on improving the health of the email ecosystem.” In late September, Microsoft announced the Kelihos botnet was dismantled.

What’s the most popular type of blocked spam? That would be a category called “Pharmacy–Non-sexual” with 28 percent of emails. The next most prevalent forms of spam were non-pharmacy product ads, 419 (Nigerian) scams and financial services. Combined, these categories accounted for two-thirds of blocked emails.

Mobiles and tablets - the opportunities by Digital2Disc

2011-10-13T13:51:00.000-07:00

“There are more mobile devices in the world now than toothbrushes,” was the attention-grabbing opening remark from Matthew Schwartz of SAP in his introduction to the mobiles and tablets panel discussion at DCM (Digital Content Monetization) East in New York. A series of workshops discussions the day before the main conference opened focused on how to engage consumers and - ideally - monetize content through mobile delivery.

“Tablets are one of the fastest ever growing CE devices,” said David Sidebottom of Futuresource Consulting. “There have been 50 million shipped this year and we expect to see that grow to 400 million by 2015.” In addition, next year is set to see one billion smartphones shipped worldwide. These figures, Sidebottom stressed, point to a fantastic opportunity for those in the mobile delivery chain, particularly the content owners.

Engagement was a key word during the panel discussion and, panellists agreed, that was the key to monetization of content. Interestingly, it would seem that many forms of content delivery are still not, in themselves, generating revenue - rather, it is often the engagement of consumers and building on brands and customer loyalty that are key to enhanced revenue generation in more traditional means.