June 8, 2011
By the ZippyCart Content Team

This all began in mid-April when a then-unknown group hacked into the Playstation Network and their ecommerce solution. Compromising as many as 100 million accounts worth of billing and personal information. Sony shut down the network in order to repair it and strengthen the security measures. As reported, Sony was hacked again, but this time at SonyPictures.com. Sony estimates damages at $1.65 million to $1.25 billion.  And no that is not a typo.

Sony’s ecommerce solution system was compromised by a simple SQL injection. According to the hackers it’s a very primitive way to access information. They came out and said this:

“Our goal here is not to come across as master hackers, hence what we’re about to reveal: SonyPictures.com was owned by a very simple SQL injection, one of the most primitive and common vulnerabilities, as we should all know by now.

“From a single injection, we accessed EVERYTHING. Why do you put such faith in a company that allows itself to become open to these simple attacks?”

The group has come out publicly with all the information on a downloadable .rar file. They call themselves “Lulz Security” or “Lulzsec” for short. The hacking group also overtook an FBI security division website called InfraGuard.

PBS’ website was also hacked and defaced by the same group about a week back. The homepage was changed to feature Lulzsec’s logo, and an article about how Tupac Shakur was found alive, roaming the streets of LA. The same group also hacked Nintendo, but stated they meant no harm, and only wanted to show Nintendo they had a gap in their system.

One has to wonder who their next ecommerce solution target is going to be. With two of the big three gaming companies down will Microsoft be next? Information about why the group took information from Sony and not Nintendo has been circling the rumor-mill for some time. Most believe it is because of the prosecution of George Hotz by Sony, the renowned PS3 unlocker.

Microsoft has not done anything of that sort to anger the hackers like Sony once did. In fact, Microsoft chose not to lock to Kinect device, inviting hackers to see what they can do with such incredible technology. This has brought together hackers from around the globe to make the Kinect much more than a motion sensing device.

There are so many ecommerce solutions out there with people’s sensitive information. Amazon for instance, has a huge retinue of customers and stores tons of personal and credit card information. If Amazon was compromised, a good amount of the online shopping population could possibly be affected.

Stay tuned to see how this debacle plays out.

March 1, 2011
By the ZippyCart Content Team

Forrester Research Inc., a Camridge, MA-based technology research firm, released its 2010-2015 analysis and projections for the US and Europe this week. No surprises: ecommerce is going up, up, up and brick and mortar stores may pay the price for the success of their online counterparts (or rivals).

The memory of a scorching 2010 holiday season for ecommerce retailers is still warm, and Forrester’s findings throw gasoline on those numbers, projecting that the US ecommerce market will continue to experience double digit growth for the next four years. It is expected to hit a total value of somewhere in the neighborhood of $279 billion by 2015. Across the Atlantic, Western Europeans will see immense growth in the coming years, culminating with an online valuation of about 134 billion Euros (about $185 billion).

The factors fueling this new ecommerce fire are the usual suspects: new users and new deal models. As broadband snaked its way into more communities across America, and computers continued spreading through Europe, more and more users have flocked to the internet to meet their retail needs.

Consumers’ needs were enhanced by their desire to save money. Many sites offer discounted merchandise and free shipping (including free shipping day) has increasingly become commonplace. On top of these money-saving options, new deal formats have also hit the ecommerce scene, coinciding with a challenging economy that has only reinforced consumer deal-seeking behavior.

Daily deal/hyperlocal/group-buying companies like Groupon and LivingSocial definitely thrived due to this surge in deal-seeking. They also spawned a host of niche copycats, including Jewpon and FabDeals, even a daily deal site for the cannibus-inclined.

Another element spurring consumer involvement in ecommerce is the increased web presence of recognizable brick-and-mortar brands. 2010 saw a marked increase in established offline companies creating viable, competitive online stores and embarking on social media campaigns. This is a double-edged sword, as shoppers migrating towards online outlets begin to neglect “real world” versions.

The increased proliferation of smartphones, while it has boosted mobile payments to record numbers (some of which goes to ecommerce and/or real world retailers) has also made shoppers more savvy and demanding. More and more frequently shoppers are using their smartphones to check product details and availability at a specific store before they go there. They can even use smartphones to compare prices between different stores and receive price-matching deals or other incentives, which can cost stores money.

February 23, 2011
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

According to Yankee Group research firm, the volume of mobile payments is expected to increase nearly sixfold in the next four years.

The firm’s researchers predict the worldwide transaction value of mobile payments will reach nearly $984 billion by 2014, a slight increase from last year’s $162 billion.

Mobile payments involve any sort of transaction made via a mobile device, be it completely within the device (online) or a mobile/external system combo. This includes mobile banking, international and domestic remittances, contactless cards, mobile coupons and near-field communications.

Though paying bills through a smart phone is undoubtedly easier and more convenient than writing a check and sending it through the mail, the concern around the safety of mobile payments is still significant.

Accenture, a management consulting firm, validated this concern as a worldwide stressor after conducting a survey that asked “tech forwards” (people over 18 who own at least four networked devices and use at leas four Internet services) in Asia, Europe and the US about their reservations toward mobile payments.

Along with security concerns, tech forwards in Europe and the US did not agree that the mobile phone is more convenient than other forms of of payment, with only 26-percent saying it was.

On the other end of the spectrum, 69-percent of tech forwards in Asia responded favorably toward the convenience of mobile payments. In fact, 64-percent of all Asian respondents say they “welcome the day” that mobile devices become the primary method for making payments.

There’s no doubt that the prevalence of mobile transactions will continue to increase as the technology for mobile devices becomes more sound. Of course there’s no escaping the fact that some risk does come with making any sort of transaction online, be it mobile or from a home desktop, but that won’t be the deal breaker to detain tech forwards from such activities. Space monkeys will.

February 16, 2011
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

The most recent rankings from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) are now out, and overall shopping at Internet retailers is still preferred over going to traditional brick and mortar stores, but there is still a lot of potential for improvement. All up the ACSI score for the ecommerce sector fell 2.6% to 79.3 out of 100, which happens to be the lowest level it has hit since 2004. Additionally there was a 3.6% drop for Internet retail to 80, which helped to drive down the larger ecommerce category. Ecommerce giants like Amazon and Netflix are still doing well in terms of customer satisfaction, with Amazon taking the top spot with a score of 87, just ahead of Netflix who is at 86. In general Amazon had the highest score for any retailer, regardless if that retailer was a traditional brick-and-mortar or an online store.

While it is great to see these companies shine, and help increase the visibility for online shopping, there is another piece of data in the findings which is a bit troubling. Online companies like Netflix and Amazon have the financial resources and the employees needed to ensure that they continually provide excellent customer service. Free shipping is easy for them to offer, and upset customers can get in touch with someone easily should anything go wrong with their order. In looking deeper at the ACSI scores, it appears that the overall drop was led by smaller Internet retailers, who are having a tough time keeping up with the bigger players in ecommerce. Offering the lowest price with free shipping is hard for small ecommerce sites, and therefore they have to rely on providing great customer service. Despite this, customers commonly call out price or lack of free shipping as things that make them dissatisfied. Therefore smaller ecommerce sites will have a bit of a battle to win over customers. Ultimately ecommerce shopping is still superior to driving to a brick-and-mortar store and likely receiving poor service, and hopefully these scores will improve over the next year.

January 12, 2011
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

Reports for a 2010 study, conducted by Mercent eCommerce Performance Index (MEPI), have confirmed that Americans took an extreme interest in November’s Cyber Monday, with 102 million consumers jumping online to purchase gifts and products. A majority of the consumers turned to ecommerce giants like Amazon and eBay for their shopping needs, and made product information inquires through search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. Since its inauguration, Cyber Monday has increased online sales by 30% each year, with Amazon showing the greatest surge in 2010 at 75%.

“We are confident growth this year continues to be driven by value-conscious consumer. However, this value-driven shopping trend is no longer a function of a soft economy, rather a permanent change in retail shopping behavior,” said Eric Best, Mercent CEO

Retailers are becoming more aware of the power and presence of social media trends, such as Facebook, Twitter, and customer ratings an review sites and have started, if not already implemented, these tools in their marketing schemes. Although, merchants should be cautioned that social shopping and group buying sites like Groupon and LivingSocial are not the first thing popping into their head when shopping online.

According to JPMorgan‘s “Nothing But Net 2011″ report, two in five online buyers surveyed did not know what social shopping sites were, and another 28% knew but  never used them.

Many merchants are actually going beyond the Facebook fan pages and Twitter updates by offering the use of social-sign on, a tool that allows consumers to simply log onto their Facebook account instead of registering on the ecommerce site, which then gives retailers access to a plethora of consumer information for better marketing tactics.

“Social networks like Facebook are a hub of information about people’s likes and interests, said Jeffrey Grau, eMarketer principal analyst. “When consumers give a retailer permission to access their personal data on Facebook, the merchant sees not only wht thoe people have written in their profiles but also the content they have ‘liked’ on other sites.”

Although, if not used sparingly, social sign-on can be a cause for marketing implosion. Because retailers would be privy to such information and able to deliver personalized recommendations and targeted ads, consumers could feel as if their online privacy has been invaded, which could cause torrential backlash.

But this shouldn’t deter someone from the social shopping experience, and hasn’t seemed to have done such a thing. The fact of the matter is that social networks are the new corner stores for consumers and a valuable tool to gauge future success of merchants, ecommerce and brick and mortar alike.

December 31, 2010
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

Remember the days when downloading free content online was common, no one was under a real threat from the federal government, and students and even house moms were not being fined millions of dollars for sharing music files to their peers? Those days are no more (or at least it seems that way) and for many of us that have been conditioned to download online content for free, we have to learn to pay for the content we want to download. Don’t get too cocky and think ‘it will never happen to me’ because it could, and has happened to people just like us. For first-time offenders, the criminal penalty can be as high as five years in prison and $250,000 in fines, even if the offender didn’t do it for monetary or financial commercial gain.

In a recent study from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & Life Project, they reached out to 1,000 adults in the U.S. and of those, 755 were Internet users. Out of the 755 users, 65 percent said they’ve paid for online content. The survey focused on 15 different kinds of online content to see what people purchased. The range of content that people were willing to pay for ran the gamut from software, to digital news articles, and even adult material but were limited to intangible content rather than physical items such as clothes and books.

We have highlighted a few interesting facts from this survey and for some, this could be that one new thing you learn today:

*Digital music and software were the most popular items with 33% wiling to pay for them online while mobile apps made a cool second place with 21%.

*College graduates, ages 18 to 49 with household incomes above $75,000 are more likely to purchase online content than others.

*Video games, TV shows, movies, ringtones and digital news articles were the most common purchases, sitting around the 15% to 19% range.

*The least purchased online content includes dating site services 5% and adult content 2% (although, that only accounts for those who are willing to admit they purchase adult content).

*65 and older are paying for adult content more than those aged 18 to 29 which leads us to two very simple conclusions:

1) the older generation doesn’t know where to find free adult content on the internet
2) seniors are getting freaky at the computer

According to this survey, two-thirds of Internet users are paying for their content, where do you sit among these percentages? Maybe it’s time we start jumping on this bandwagon called “paying for content” although, those words may be hard to even say. Everyone’s doing it, so it must be the “cool” thing to do these days.

November 16, 2010
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

Remind you of anyone?

People love shopping online. Why not? Deals at online retailers like eBay and Amazon.com frequently rival or even beat the deals offered in-person at big box stores like Walmart and Target, and shoppers can access these deals from the comfort of their own homes, rather than face down the elements and the thronging crowds that always accompany a too-good-to-be-true Black Friday deal at the mall. A new study by eBillme.com (a Rye Brook, NY-based online payment processing site) sheds more light on why people shop online, how they are expected behave this holiday season, and what safety and security concerns they have.

More than half of respondents reported that they would be shopping from home instead of fighting their way through Black Friday crowds. 70% of those surveyed also indicated that they would be adding gift cards to their holiday strategy in some way. This is good news for retailers, as gift card users frequently spend more than the value of their gift card when they finally cash it in. That’s if they cash it in to begin with, as gift cards frequently end up sitting unused for years, expiring, getting lost, or destroyed. Either way, they equal money in the retailer’s hand one way or another.

The largest number in the report has to be the percentage of users who expressed concern over the security of their online transactions. 80% of them were worried about the security of their billing information at checkout. EBillme, the organization which performed the survey, actually exists in part to address those security fears. When shoppers choose eBillme as their payment method, a bill is sent to their e-mail account. They can then pay the bill online with their online bank account, or by bringing the bill into one of over 75,000 brick and mortar payment locations.

Black Friday and its new cousin, Cyber Monday, offer shoppers unprecedented discount opportunities all from the convenience of their homes, but the risk of having their personal information compromised may be enough to scare some away from online retailers. With a few simple precautions, like making sure all transactions are taking place under “https,” and that the retailers are reputable, online shopping can be safe and save you money.

November 9, 2010
By the ZippyCart Shopping Cart Reviews Content Team

Forrester Research, headquartered in Cambridge, MA, has come out with some shocking revelations for the world of eReaders, eBooks, and publishing that will come as no surprise to the techno-savvy, but may shock the paper-and-ink crowd.

Bottom line: Get a Kindle.

Naturally it’s much more nuanced than that, but of the projected 15% or so of the population expected to have an eReader, about 40% of them will probably have a Kindle. Considering that 50% of the eBooks purchased by respondents in Forrester’s study were purchased through Amazon.com (regardless of what platform those eBooks were later read on). In an industry that’s expected to cap out at about three billion dollars by 2015 (up from just under one billion by the end of 2010), that’s a hefty chunk of change for Amazon.

That’s right: according to Forrester, eBook sales are expected to reach around three billion dollars by 2015. That’s an amazing prediction considering that only 7% of online adults reported being regular readers. All this eBook money can be generated by this minority because this same group reads the most and spends the most money on books and eBooks. Amazon’s grip on the eBook market can best be explained by two things: its preexisting connections with traditional publishers, which allows them to funnel new titles onto their digital reader, and the fact that the Kindle was the first eBook to hit the market in a big way, and Amazon threw the full (considerable) weight of their marketing and advertising might behind it. The combination of these elements and more has made it extremely popular.

Even so, the average eBook-reading consumer doesn’t even own an eReader! Even without one, they still manage to do 41% of their reading digitally. In fact, laptops are the preferred method for reading eBooks across the board, used by 35% of respondents. The Kindle follows up with 32%, then come iPhones, netbooks, Nooks, and finally the iPad, weighing in with a humble 9% (but that’s expected to change any time now with the advent of Apple’s most recent OS update).

What about the hold-outs from that bygone era of actual printed books? Well, you can still make your eReader look like an actual book if you want, though that’s probably small consolation. Forrester also suggests that smaller productions and “print on demand” options may move in to support the mainly digital publishing industry. Initiatives like Barnes and Noble’s Online Storytime may also be helping to shift the age of digital reading earlier and earlier, meaning that the current generation of “real” book readers may be the last one.

However, one last (small) threat that this group poses to the new digital world order is traditional booklending. While notoriously difficult on Nooks and Kindles this practice still thrives amongst heavy readers (about 50% of them having borrowed a book recently), who either trade with other like-minded luddites, or turn to archaic libraries, which future historians will some day report were giant structures in which the primitive humans of the early 2000′s stored paper books by the thousands. Their reports will only be available digitally, of course.