Website Magazine Consumer Corner

Translate Your Website in Seconds

2008-10-10T19:48:00Z

Want to reach consumers on a truly world-wide basis? Then you need to support their native tongue. ConveyThis.com has a free translation button (see right) for your website that will take the content of your Web page, run it through a free translation service, then display the translated content back on your page. It's all pretty seamless and a wonderful little tool that can help you connect with a wider customer base.

There's also a nice little analytics tool that comes with it, showing what languages your pages are translated into the most, and which of your pages are most often translated.

Just Tweet It: A New Twitter Directory

2008-10-10T14:10:00Z

If you're a Twitter user, check out Just Tweet It. It's essentially a directory of Twitter users, broken out by categories and industries. They range from PR/Marketing to Sports, Web Developers to Environmentalists. If you're new to Twitter, this isn't a bad way to explore other user profiles to see whom you might want to follow. If you're already a user, this is another place to find some interesting connections.

If you're looking to do a little promotion, submit your Twitter feed through the website. You'll be included in the directory and get a chance to be in their "Featured Tweeter" section.

Marketing With Niche Social Sites and Dedicated Audiences

2008-10-09T15:17:00Z

The Web has consumers socializing and connecting in ways unimaginable just a few years ago. And there are plenty of places to connect with like-minded people. Lets take a look beyond MySpace and Facebook and examine some niche social networking sites. While these sites' traffic may pale in comparison to the big networks, there's a good opportunity to connect to a dedicated audience who might be more open to learning a little more about your product, services or targeted offer. Like any social networking marketing, tread lightly but with purpose. If you provide real value to members, they will be much more willing to engage your brand.

ParentsConnect.com, a Nickelodeon product, has seen a massive spike in traffic starting in June 2008. Here, parents come together to share tips and advice and find resources to help out with family life. Click on the "Local" tab and you can find deals on products and services, not to mention add your own. Compared to most family and Mom-focused networking sites, ParentsConnect has a more affluent, educated audience (Quantcast.com).

Mom Bloggers Club, a network of 1,600 members "is a place where moms who blog converge to talk about the latest trends in blogging and support each other in their blogging endeavors. Moms can find everything here from discussions about RSS feeds and sidebar widgets to parenting advice and giveaways." There are forums, groups and judging by the number of comments in these areas, it's an active community. And what does every Mom need to do to keep her family running? Shop. Maybe you have something to offer this community. And since they are bloggers, chances are if you impress them, it will spread.

Also check out BabyCenter.com, GotKidsNetwork.com and CafeMom.com.

Social shopping is about as direct as it gets. People come to these sites to spend money and get advice on products and services. iliketotallyloveit.com takes a page from Digg by featuring products on the home page that have been voted up by the community, everything from furniture to coffee mugs. You can also submit products for inclusion, then try to get votes to get your stuff on the home page. iliketotallyloveIt.com's traffic is up 245% from last year (compete.com).

BirdPost.com is a networking site for bird watchers - niche indeed. You can connect with other members, follow birds and geo-tag their locations. On your profile page you can link your birding blog or website. So why would you be interested in something like this? Well, I imagine bird enthusiasts need everything from books and binoculars to camera equipment and hiking boots.

As you can see, there are social networks out there with active communities in various niches. The idea is to spend a little time investigating your industry - chances are there's a network out there where you can do a little promotion and hopefully brand your business with a dedicated audience. And if you can't find one, consider a product like Ning.com, where you can build your own.

Consumers Migrating to Share Important News

2008-10-09T13:35:00Z

Social networking, submission and bookmarking sites are nothing new. In fact, they are discussed ad nauseum all over the Internet. But, these sites remain a good place to find consumers. Pick an industry, even a product and you will find a discussion, related news stories, and sometimes even groups revolving around the topic.

This week we take a look at social submission and voting sites. Here, consumers are congregating, sharing and voting on topics of interest, with the rewards going to the originator/website of the submitted story once it becomes popular among users. So where are these consumers spending their time? The obvious answer is the leader in the industry, Digg.com. But, Digg has come under fire lately as top "Diggers" have been banned for influencing voting and the site has become known as a place where votes are bought and sold, removing the social "shine" of sorts. The biggest issue many have with Digg is that unless you have a vast network of influencers at your disposal, or are willing to pay for votes, it's difficult to gain a foothold on the site and garner any kind of substantial, reliable traffic. So, consumers are looking elsewhere.

Mixx.com: Mixx is celebrating its one-year anniversary by seeing an increase in traffic and users. The site works in much the same way as Digg with a few key differences. There are groups and communities that you can join to get in-depth about any particular topic. If you don't find a group you like, you can create one, become the moderator and enjoy an "expert" status of that topic.
Mixx users are known to be very active, dedicated and responsible users. They take this site seriously. In fact, many Digg refugees are setting up shop in Mixx, there are even groups dedicated to these folk. So, it seems that now would be a good time to get involved.

Propeller.com: Previously known as Netscape, Propeller's system is slightly different in that it uses a combination of "anchors," who are basically editors, and user votes to determine top stories. There are also power users called "scouts" who carry heavy influence and are primarily made up of power bloggers from the Weblogs, Inc. community. You can also join groups and create groups - one per account.

Reddit.com: Not overseen by editors, Reddit produces a more "free for all" style of community. It also features a comment voting system, where users can vote other users' comments up or down. Comments voted down enough times will eventually be taken down. The comment system seems to produce quite a bit of activity, and its not a bad way to gain a little exposure without needing to go through the submission process.

Take a look at the chart below from Compete.com, displaying recent traffic patterns at these three sites. As you can see, they are all moving up, supporting the idea that Web consumers are starting to look beyond Digg and carve out their own niches in the social voting scene.

YouTube Introduces Click-to-Buy

2008-10-08T14:47:00Z

Still looking for that one, killer way to monetize, YouTube has announced a click-to-buy feature on select videos. They are starting with the most logical place, music videos. Videos from select partners (EMI Music and Capitol Records are two) will include links from iTunes and Amazon (see image at right.) Click the link, purchase the song.

They will also include click-to-buy links for trailers of the upcoming Spore video game release on videos from Electronic Arts.

In the future, YouTube plans on selling everything from books to movie tickets from partner videos. The exciting part of all this? Get in good with YouTube, become a partner and start sharing revenue. Or, if you manufacture a product, when that product is featured on other videos, even user-generated content, have the ability for viewers to instantly buy your product. From the YouTube blog: "And those partners who use our content identification and management system can also enable these links on user-generated content, by using Content ID to claim videos and choose to leave them up on the site."

It's early, but this is a pretty exciting development - both for users and businesses of all sizes. Stay tuned.

View, Publish How-to Videos at MonkeySee.com

2008-10-08T13:45:00Z

Want to learn how to make a scarecrow? How about step-by-step guides to making and bottling your own wine? Could you use a little relationship advice? You can find all of these and much more at MonkeySee.com. This how-to video site provides tips and advice and detailed instructions to a variety of topics and tasks. And it's free.

For the business owner, there's opportunity here too. You can become an "expert" simply by uploading video. You get an account page where you can detail your qualifications - including some shameless self-promotion. In fact, MonkeySee recommends that you share your experience with the community, even in the videos themselves, as long as its for the purpose of establishing credibility. And since you own the rights to your video, you're free to upload it anywhere else across the Internet. In the end, it's another channel to get your business some exposure in the fast-growing online video market.

There are also options to become a Featured Expert, offering even higher visibility in exchange for top-quality videos.

StarReviews Provides Expert and Consumer Website Reviews

2008-10-07T13:28:00Z

StarReviews is aiming to be a Consumer Reports of Websites. The site incudes articles and reviews by their experts, along with user reviews, comments and suggestions through a network of user profiles. There are several categories to choose from including Education, Entertainment and Media, Travel, Software and more. When you click on a category, you see a list of related websites. For example, click "Bargain Shopping Website" and you'll see reviews for FatWallet, Dealnews, Spoofee and more, along with a star rating and user reviews.

With a free membership to StarReviews you can rate websites and participate in the forums. If you want to submit your website for review, use the Contact link and provide your contact information, general marketing information, a complimentary product (or 30-day pass to your website if it's paid content) and your affiliate program signup link.

StarReviews has a very clean and easy to navigate interface. Just like other sites like this one, the more users they can attract the more useful it will become. So far, it's a good start, although there are some obvious sites missing from the index - for example in the "Bargain Shopping Website" there's no Shopzilla, BizRate, PriceGrabber ...

Ask.com Undergoes Another Overhaul

2008-10-06T14:07:00Z

Ask.com (formerly Ask Jeeves) just doesn't want to quit. They have relaunched yet again, this time going back to their roots. Once again, the aim for Ask is to provide answers to questions, not just another way to display search results. Type in a question and, if it's easy enough, get an answer right there without the need to navigate to another page.

In a few limited tests, it works fairly well. There are, of course, a slew of sponsored results at the top of most pages, limiting the number of results you get. But the immediate answer feature is nice. Curiously, the source of the answer is hidden - you have to click-through to find out, if you want to make sure you're getting a reliable answer. Other results are of the SERP variety, and the source is clearly displayed.

There is also a Q&A tab (see image below), where Ask will return results from various sites like Yahoo! Answers and WikiAnswers. Unfortunately, this feature leaves plenty to be desired, although it is still in beta. There are some other nice search features under the "More" tab, including maps, recipes, TV listings and blogs. The Ask search bar also has a suggestion feature, which I found helpful. At any rate, Ask isn't dead yet and presents an interesting alternative to standard search results and could save a click or two when you have a specific question.

Secret Amazon Discount Finder

2008-10-03T13:25:00Z

Yesterday we looked at where consumers are comparision shopping. Following that theme, check out this new shopping tool from Deal Locker, Secret Amazon Discount Finder.

Here, enter your search by specific keyword or broad terms, choose your category and discount level (between 10-99%). You will be redirected to an Amazon page that shows those items matching your criteria. You can search Amazon US, UK, Canada, France and Germany at this time, Japan is coming soon.

So before you buy on Amazon, you might want to give this tool a try, it could mean significant savings.

eBay Browser Comparison Tool

2008-10-01T13:21:00Z

Browser Highlighter (from eBay) is an extension that will show you eBay listings with a click of your mouse for items that you are currently shopping for. By downloading the extension, the Highlighter automatically places a button on Web pages (at right) of certain shopping sites (Amazon, NextTag, Google, Yahoo). Click the button and you see eBay listings of that item, or similar items.

After briefly testing the tool, I find that it works best with very specific queries. For example, search "Chicago Cubs" on Amazon and you get books, t-shirts and the like. Click the eBay button and you get tickets for the upcoming playoff game. But if you search for a specific book title, you get more relevant results from the eBay button. Overall, it's not a bad way to see the current market value of a particular item or group of items.

Upcoming for the Browser Highlighter is a PayPal tool, where you can click a button to automatically fill in forms and pay for an item anywhere on the Web, a Skype tool for click-to-call functionality and a StumbleUpon tool that will show user reviews.

One-click Visual Access and Sharing of Your Favorite Sites

2008-09-30T14:04:00Z

I recently wrote about Apptism, a Firefox extension that presents a visual of thumbnails of your favorite websites to speed up your daily browsing habits. It follows on the heels of Chrome and it's popular feature of showing thumbnails of your most visited sites. There's a new player in the game in Tizmos. This site has much of the same functionality, displaying thumbnails of your chosen sites. But there is an interesting feature.

After signing up for an account, you can choose to make your page public. Then, if you share the link www.tizmos.com/yourusername, others will be able to see your collection of chosen sites. This might be an interesting way to keep your followers up-to-date about new and interesting sites you've found, or a link to include in a newsletter about some great new resources for your audience. After all, visual is almost always better.

Apprema Takes Virtual Gifts, Makes Them Reality

2008-09-29T19:09:00Z

One of the more popular features on social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook is the ability to send people a virtual gift - flowers, a drink, whatever. Apprema has a way to send real gifts to your friends throught social networks or email. They can be personalized, come with virtual "wrapping" (including designed packaging and your photo) and can range from music downloads to Starbucks gift certificates.

For example, you could send an iTunes gift card with your personal recommendation as to what to download. They don't have to take your suggestion and can download whatever they want but this way, it's a little more personal.

There are also group options. You can set up a gift for someone and ask others in your group to contribute. Apprema has a system that handles email reminders, payment tracking for each individual and so on, so you're not running people down looking for their five bucks.

In these days of social networking and the constant birthday reminders, etc., this isn't a bad way to take care of shopping for your friends. It's also a pretty good way to offer clients gifts in appreciation for their patronage, or even as a way to offer rewards for their loyalty to your networks. And for merchants, you can contact Apprema to make your gift cards or products available through Apprema - a good way to get your business active in the social networking world.

A Memory Game with Your Flickr Images

2008-09-29T15:05:00Z

What do consumers like? Games. And engaging them with a custom game is a great way to brand your business.

Flickr Memari (beta) is a nice little site that lets you create a memory game by mining your Flickr images. It's pretty simple, you provide your Flickr login info and the "set" name of your chosen public Flickr gallery (at least 18 images) and you get a quick matching memory game in return. Once you have the game, you can copy a URL, then send it out to your friends so they can play your game.

You could also use this to engage customers. Set up a public Flickr gallery with product images, people from your company and so on. Then your sudtomers will enjoy playing a quick game will your brand image is impressed upon them.

Unfortunately, the URL is long, but with a little tweaking you could create a custom link to the game. What would make this even more useful would be an embeddable widget for you blog, website or social profile. This site is still pretty new, so hopefully something of that nature is in the works. We'll keep checking.

Finding Personal Finance Help

2008-09-25T17:34:00Z

There are plenty of reasons to be concerned about your personal finances these days. The state of the economy is downright scary, fuel costs are high, food prices are swelling and the future of social security is less than certain. But there is a silver lining. The Internet has many resources to help put your mind at ease and grow your bank account - and many of them are completely free. Here are a few.

SavingAdvice.com: This site has everything from financial calculators to forums focusing on helping you get the most out of every dollar you earn. There are also feature articles covering a variety of topics from home inspections to the cost of raising children. This sight is community focused, with plenty of contributors. In fact, one of the neat sections of the site features blogs from many different authors, all with different financial goals and dreams.

FiLife.com: Created by The Dow Jones Company and IAC, FiLife's core is comparing or "stacking" your financial status with your peers and those in your area. You enter some of your information (income, home value, credit score, etc.) and then you can get comparisons via age groups, geographical location and so on. Based on your information, you will also appropriate bank offers, deals on credit cards and more. And in Web 2.0-style, you can also find reviews of financial products and services by other members, rated by other members. The FiLife blog contains plenty of valuable information, much of it from The Wall Street Journal.

Mint.com: This free Web-based service provides users with a full system to monitor personal finances. Enter usernames and passwords for financial accounts (e.g. checking account, mortgage, 401K) and Mint provides a real-time display of your overall financial picture. Mint also offers budgeting tools to help users identify where money is being spent and features suggestions on where you might be able to save or earn money with credit card providers offering lower rates or saving accounts with higher rates. Perhaps the most useful feature of Mint is that the platform can notify you if a balance is under a specific amount, if one of your accounts was hit with a penalty or even if it notices you have overspent based on the budget you defined.

Looking at Credit Card Search Behavior

2008-09-25T17:34:00Z

Times are tough for everyone these days, all across the country. This means consumers are going to tighten their belts but it doesn't necessarily mean they will stop spending online. And one way consumers will continue to shop without breaking the bank (for now) is by deferring payments through credit cards. So how does a website business take advantage of this environment? One answer may lie in weekly credit card search patterns. Read more ...