Archive for January, 2008

Omniture, Inc. (NASDAQ: OMTR), today announced it has been chosen by Casio, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of consumer electronics products and business equipment solutions, as a foundation for the company’s online operations and to help drive its expansion in the UK. Casio is using Omniture SiteCatalyst® for Web analytics on its http://www.casio.co.uk/ and www.casio-online.co.uk Web sites. It is also using Omniture SiteCatalyst on its digital watches product Web site, www.g-shock.co.uk, and its digital camera site, www.exilim.co.uk.
 
Casio considers its Web operation integral to its future growth in the UK. The company has a corporate and an e-commerce Web site, and will soon be launching an online community portal. In order to measure the effectiveness of its Web sites, Casio will use Omniture SiteCatalyst to measure customer behaviour online.
 
“In the last three or four years, Casio has invested a lot of resources in its online activities which have become increasingly important in terms of the company’s expansion,” said Tim Gould, UK marketing manager, Casio. “We want to offer our customers choice. The Casio corporate and product sites allow customers to find out more about our products and what outlets stock them; the e-commerce site allows them to buy from us direct; while the community site will allow us to interact with our customers on a more personal level.” 

UK site analysis influences product distribution

“Being able to track and measure customer buying patterns allows us to make informed business decisions,” says Gould. “SiteCatalyst data provides such a high level of insight into consumer trends and preferences that it will have a significant influence on what products we’ll choose to ship from Tokyo and distribute in the UK.”
 
Omniture SiteCatalyst has been chosen by Casio because it generates data that is not only very detailed, but also presented in a manner that is easy to understand. “We compared three or four leading Web analytics platforms and it was clear that SiteCatalyst provided the highest visibility,” said Gould. “We’ll be able to see exactly what is happening on our sites – how and where visitors arrive at the site; which are the most and least popular pages; exactly what part of the page users are clicking on; and where and why visitors drop off the site, for example. Essentially, whenever changes or trends emerge or change, we’ll be able to see them and respond immediately.”

The Google Blog reports that Google Finance UK is open to the public.  Some of the highlights from Google Finance UK include:

• Search with a preference for UK companies and mutual funds.
• Google News integration – With a preference for news from British sources. The news is organized in groups by news topic, rather than listed by date, so you won’t have to scroll through multiple headlines for the same news story.
• Interactive Charts – Map market data with corresponding news stories in a single interactive chart, so you can track news to stock performance. You can also click and drag on the charts to see different time periods, and zoom in for more detailed information.
• Front page market summary with FTSE indices and British pound exchange rates.
• Blogs – Incorporates blog postings for related company information from Google Blog Search.
• Discussion Groups – High quality discussion forums are part of the service. We have a team of folks dedicated to keeping the conversation experience free of spam and irrelevant posts.
• Portfolios – A fast and easy way for you to create and track portfolios of stocks and mutual funds in the currency of your choice.

Source: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/01/google-finance-uk-open-for-business.html

QDOS (pronounced like Quodos) is currently being beta tested in the UK. For those not familiar, QDOS is a new way to manage your digital status and manage how you look online. It’s designed to give you a starting point for managing and taking control of your online status. Be seen how you want to be seen. Welcome to QDOS. It can be a great tool for online reputation management. According to QDOS, “…Recent research has shown that more and more Brits are making decisions based on digital status*. Already 16% have chosen their new home based on how their prospective neighbours appear online. 1 in 5 (20%) have researched a prospective boss online before accepting a job and 32% have searched online to find out more about trades people and professionals, from plumbers to lawyers, before hiring them to do a job…”

The name QDOS was derived it from the word ‘kudos’, meaning ‘glory, fame or renown’. Your QDOS is calculated based on analysis of tens of millions of records as well as searching the web itself to calculate your QDOS. The more you point QDOS to your online information, the more accurate your QDOS score will become.

At the heart of QDOS is a powerful mathematical representation called an eigenvector which is used to calculate everyone’s score for each of four dimensions - popularity, impact, activity and individuality. QDOS is powered by Garlik.

Visit QDOS to check the status of popular footballers, actors and celebrities as well as yourself. Here’s a brief video to check out QDOS for yourself.

 comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR),  released its final study of the online shopping activity of U.K., French and German consumers during the 2007 Christmas season. This study tracked the number of visits to online retail sites each week for the complete period between October 29 and December 23, using data from the comScore World Metrix audience measurement service.

Online Shopping Activity Peaks in First Two Weeks of December

In the U.K. and France, online shopping activity built steadily throughout the season, peaking during the first half of December. The sixth week of the season (Dec. 3 – Dec. 9) recorded the highest level of online shopping activity, up 38 percent versus the base period (Sep. 3 – Oct. 28) in the U.K., and up 45 percent in France. Week 7 (Dec. 10 – Dec. 16) was the second busiest period of online shopping activity, up 35 percent in the U.K. and 39 percent in France.   Germany’s online shopping season built more slowly, achieving peak traffic that was only12 percent higher in the seventh week (Dec 10 – Dec 16) than in the base period. The high point occurred a week later in Germany than in the U.K. and France. The slow season in Germany appears to be the result of low consumer confidence and the rail strikes that brought the country to a stand still early in season.  
 

*Point index represents the percentage change in the number of visits to online retail sites compared to the pre-Christmas season base period average,  defined as the average weekly visits to online retail sites excluding auction sites for the period Sep 3 – Oct 28  **Total U.K.., French & German Internet Audiences, Age 15+, Home & Work Locations. Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs ***Defined as the average weekly visits to online retail sites excluding auction sites for the period Sep 3 – Oct 28   

U.K. Online Retail Traffic Leaders

Throughout the Christmas shopping season, visits in the U.K. to online retail sites were led by Amazon Sites, which attracted a 9-percent share of total online retail category visits for the period. Apple Inc., which also has high-street stores in the U.K., had a 6-percent share, while the Home Retail Group, owner of multi-channel retailers Argos and Homebase, had a 5-percent share. Supermarket chain Tesco and online pure-play retail property Play.com Sites rounded out the top five with 4 percent and 3 percent shares, respectively.  
 

*Average share of total visits to online retail sites (excluding auction sites)  by U.K. visitors for the period Oct 29 – Dec 23 ** Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs