Online Shopping Is Too Hard
June 10, 2015
Online shopping is supposed to drive physical stores out of business, but that might not be the case if online shopping is too difficult. The Ragtrader article, “Why They Abandon” explains that 45 percent of Australian consumers will not make an online purchase if they experience Web site difficulties. The consumers, instead, are returning to physical stores to make the purchase. The article mentions that 44 percent believe that traditional shopping is quicker if they know what to look for and 43 percent as prefer in-store service.
The research comes from a Rackspace survey to determine shopping habits in New Zealand and Australia. The survey also asked participants what other problems they experienced shopping online:
“42 percent said that there were too many pop-up advertisements, 34 percent said that online service is not the same as in-store and 28 percent said it was too time consuming to narrow down options available.”
These are understandable issues. People don’t want to be hounded to purchase other products when they have a specific item in mind and thousands of options are overwhelming to search through. Then a digital wall is often daunting if people prefer interpersonal relationships when they shop. The survey may pinpoint online shopping weaknesses, but it also helps online stores determine the best ways for improvement.
“ ‘This survey shows that not enough retailers are leveraging powerful and available site search and navigation solutions that give consumers a rewarding shopping experience.’ ”
People shop online for convenience, variety, lower prices, and deals. Search is vital for consumers to narrow down their needs, but if they can’t navigate a Web site then search proves as useless as an expired coupon.
Whitney Grace, June 10, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
SLI Systems Still Struggling
May 26, 2015
Early this year, we reported on the sudden personnel shift over at e-commerce search firm SLI Systems. Now, New Zealand’s National Business Review reports, “SLI Systems Says Second-Half Revenue Will Miss Expectations on Weaker American Sales.” It seems the staff shake-up led to disappointing sales, but the company is confident they will make up ground later this year, after the dust settles. They also cite a weak economy in Brazil as a limiting factor. Reporter Tina Morrison writes:
“Operating revenue will rise to $28 million in the year ending June 30, from $22 million a year earlier, the Christchurch-based company said in a statement. The forecast is lower than the $30.5 million expected by analysts in a Reuters poll. …
“The company is forgoing profits and dividends to fund growth in the expanding e-commerce market, particularly in the US, and says its software as a service is the second biggest after Oracle to provide online retailers with suggestive search engines. Analysts polled by Reuters before today’s announcement had expected the company’s annual loss to widen to $7 million this year, from $5.7 million last year. It expects to report its annual earnings in late August.”
Founded in 2001, SLI Systems now powers e-commerce on over 800 websites. The company is based in Christchurch, New Zealand, and maintains offices in San Jose, California; London; Melbourne; and Tokyo. Anyone who thinks they can help the company bounce back should note that (as of this writing) SLI is looking for new Sales Directors in Melbourne and San Jose.
Cynthia Murrell, May 26, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Yahoo Considers Options for Japanese Division
May 25, 2015
Despite a series of changes since former Googler Marissa Mayer took over at Yahoo, the search-and-entertainment company still struggles to find its footing in a tech landscape that shifted around it long ago. Bloomberg Business wonders whether the Yahoo’s next steps in Japan will set it on a sturdier path in, “Yahoo Weighs Options for Japan Stake; Sales Miss Estimates.” Writer Brian Womack reports that Mayer plans to make the most of her company’s Japanese assets. He posits:
“By telling investors she’s looking at options for Yahoo Japan, Mayer may be seeking to buy herself more time to jump-start growth at the company she’s been working to turn around for almost three years. Unless she can expand sales, investors may eventually lose patience with the strategy and question her leadership. Some analysts speculated earlier this year that Yahoo could become a takeover target for a larger Internet company after it spins off the Alibaba stake.
“Yahoo’s share of the U.S. online display ad market may slide to 3.5 percent in 2017 from 5.5 percent last year, according to EMarketer Inc. Quarterly revenue growth has come in at less than 4 percent or negative since the end of 2012.”
The success of China’s largest e-commerce firm, and Yahoo asset, Alibaba is responsible for much of the company’s recent growth, such as it is, but that boost will only last so long. Womack reports there has been investor pressure to spin off Yahoo’ Japanese division, but apparently Mayer prefers to consider a range of options. Will Yahoo find salvation in the land of the rising sun?
Cynthia Murrell, May 25, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
AI Technology Poised to Spread Far and Wide
April 3, 2015
Artificial intelligence is having a moment; the second half of last year saw about half a billion dollars invested in the AI industry. Wired asks and answers, “The AI Resurgence: Why Now?” Writer Babak Hodjat observes that advances in hardware and cloud services have allowed more contenders to afford to enter the arena. Open source tools like Hadoop also help. Then there’s public perception; with the proliferation of Siri and her ilk, people are more comfortable with the whole concept of AI (Steve Wozniak aside, apparently). It seems to help that these natural-language personal assistants have a sense of humor. Hodjat continues:
“But there’s more substance to this resurgence than the impression of intelligence that Siri’s jocularity gives its users. The recent advances in Machine Learning are truly groundbreaking. Artificial Neural Networks (deep learning computer systems that mimic the human brain) are now scaled to several tens of hidden layer nodes, increasing their abstraction power. They can be trained on tens of thousands of cores, speeding up the process of developing generalizing learning models. Other mainstream classification approaches, such as Random Forest classification, have been scaled to run on very large numbers of compute nodes, enabling the tackling of ever more ambitious problems on larger and larger data-sets (e.g., Wise.io).”
The investment boom has produced a surge of start-ups offering AI solutions to companies in a wide range of industries. Organizations in fields as diverse as medicine and oil production seem eager to incorporate these tools; it remains to be seen whether the tech is a good investment for every type of enterprise. For his part, Hodjat has high hopes for its use in fraud detection, medical diagnostics, and online commerce. And for ever-improving personal assistants, of course.
Cynthia Murrell, April 3, 2015
Stephen E Arnold, Publisher of CyberOSINT at www.xenky.com
Qwant Develops Qwant Junior, the Search Engine for Children
March 17, 2015
The article on Telecompaper titled Qwant Tests Child-Friendly Search Engine discusses the French companies work. Qwant is focused on targeting 3 to 13 year olds with Qwant Junior, in partnership with the Education Ministry. Twenty percent of the company is owned by digital publishing powerhouse Axel Springer. The child-friendly search engine will attempt to limit the access to inappropriate content while encouraging children to use the search engine to learn. The article explains,
“The new version blocks or lists very far down in search results websites that show violence and pornography, as well as e-commerce sites. The version features an education tab separately from the general web search that offers simplified access to educational programme, said co-founder Eric Leandri. Qwant Junior’s video tab offers child-appropriate videos from YouTube, Dailymotion and Vimeo. After tests with the ministry, the search engine will be tested by several hundred schools.”
Teaching youngsters the ways of the search engine is important in our present age. The concept of listing pornography “very far down” on the list of results might unsettle some parents of young teens smart enough to just keep scrolling, but it is France! Perhaps the expectation of blocking all unsavory material is simply untenable. Qwant is planning on a major launch by September, and is in talks with Brazil for a similar program.
Chelsea Kerwin, March 17, 2014
Stephen E Arnold, Publisher of CyberOSINT at www.xenky.com
Swiftype Raises More Money for Web Site Search
March 16, 2015
TechCrunch tells us that search startup “Swiftype Raises $13M More For Its Starter Site And App Search.” Swiftype’s mission is pretty straightforward: they want to create customizable search tools that do not suck (TechCrunch’s own language). You have to admit that it is a bold move, considering many out-of-the-box solutions do stink worse than dial-up from 1995 and open source (while it is free and awesome) requires a bit of developer experience. Swiftype takes the guesswork and makes a tailored solution without the hassle or developer experience.
While Swiftype originally started out for Web sites, they have moved into other areas:
“On the other hand, online publishers might not be the most lucrative customer base, so while co-founders Matt Riley and Quin Hoxie told me they still support publishers (and we still use Swiftype at TechCrunch), they’ve also expanded into other areas, particularly knowledge bases (basically, FAQs and customer support sites) and e-commerce.”
The search company will use the $13 million will probably invest the money to expand its already popular search tools. New Enterprise Associates led the Series B funding and they were used for the original Series A round. Swiftype used New Enterprise Associates to form a long-term partnership.
Whitney Grace, March 16, 2015
Stephen E Arnold, Publisher of CyberOSINT at www.xenky.com
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