(Chicago Tribune) — Illinoisans can often dodge sales taxes by shopping online, but the state of Illinois is hoping to collect on those taxes next year by offering a sales tax amnesty. A new law allows people who didn’t pay sales tax on items bought online, through the mail or over the phone between June […]
(eSecurity Planet) — Security software vendor Panda Security is offering up some simple online shopping tips for consumers looking to dive into the holiday shopping season this week without losing either their identities or their hard-earned cash. The combination of the proliferation of mobile devices and the number of etailers offering Black Friday deals online, cybercrooks […]
(Wall Street Journal) — One of the most potentially intrusive technologies for profiling and targeting Internet users with ads is on the verge of a comeback, two years after an outcry by privacy advocates in the U.S. and Britain appeared to kill it. The technology, known as “deep packet inspection,” is capable of reading and […]
(Local Tech Wire) — Working “Black Friday” or “Cyber Monday” and still want to shop for bargains? Watch out, Scrooge may be monitoring you. Scot Wingo, chief executive officer at ChannelAdvisor, founded and now runs one of the world’s largest provider of ecommerce services for retailers such as eBay, shopping.com and Amazon.com. So one would expect […]
(Smart Money) — When Wal-Mart announced last week that it will offer free shipping on thousands of online items this holiday season, consumers looking for deals – and Walmart’s retail competitors – snapped to attention. But the move could change the way people shop online long after New Year’s: You may never have to pay for […]
(DailyFinance) — The latest consumer spending numbers for September may not have been as rosy as analysts expected, but consumers have been less shy about spending more in cyberspace. Online retail spending rose an impressive 9% year-over-year in the third quarter, according to a report from Internet marketing and research firm comScore (SCOR) today. Such […]
(Mashable) — Branded virtual goods are set to take off in the next five years — in a big way. A report by social gaming platform Viximo and virtual goods platform Virtual Greats predicts that branded virtual goods (BVGs) will generate $150 million in 2013 and reach an annual revenue of $318 million by 2015. Read More…
(Brandweek) — For the past month, MasterCard has been running an out-of-home campaign to promote its MarketPlace e-commerce site. The goal? To get consumers’ attention both online and offline. The credit card brand has put up storefront ads featuring black-and-white vinyl panels and taglines like: “A Smarter Way to Shop Online” and “Where Bargains Find You.” The […]
(Inc) — Global revenue from the sales of virtual goods will reach $6 billion by 2013, according to Minneapolis-based investment firm Piper Jaffray, which isn’t too shabby for a product that has been deemed by many to be “intangible” or “non-existent.” To the contrary, consumers have shelled out millions for clothing, housing and miscellaneous gifts made purely […]