guest lecturer

From the guest lecturer, I learn information about search engine marketing which deals with e-mail marketing, paid inclusion, and pay-per-click. The goals for having a good site is to be specific, measurable, attainable, and realistic. Good portal presence can/will increase traffic to a site. I learned that vertical search is better than horizontal search because vertical search provides better search results than horizontal search.

Useit.com: "100 Million Websites"

According to Netcraft's latest web survey, there are about 101,435,253 existing websites and 100M active websites online. The web is at the mature stage and still expanding. If the web remain at the mature stage, it will expect to reach 200M by the year 2010.

The implications of the article was about design and change. Web users want a website to meet their expectations in regards to finding information, solving problems, and always have updated websites.

I agree with the author because websites are growing and expanding in number based on new businesses and different industries such as music. The web is an everyday tool; it is a helpful guide to daily living.

Clickz.com

The article, "Amazon.com Launches Self-servie Ad Beta" is about launching the new pay-per-click advertising network as part of the Amazon website's marketing strategy. The advertising program will allow businesses to buy sponsored links on Amazon.com. As a result, the revenue from sponsored links would make Amazon lower the prices on their products. This network will be significant for businesses in travel, finance, entertainment, etc. The sponsored links will appear in the search results and detail pages. For example, the customer is searching for a dvd player. Above or aside the search results , the ad will show links to other sites that markets dvd players.

I chosen this article because it was interesting to know what Amazon is doing to improve their website and how they are connecting with business. Since Amazon is an e-commerce wesite, this launching of the advertising network will help sponsors generate more revenue as they post sponsored links that are related to the customer and business searchable product

MKTG 437 lecture from 10/26

What I learned from the lecture that the two marketing 437 professors gave was mainly reviewing the basics of marketing. What I didn’t know was that there are really seven marketing P’s instead of 4: Price, Promotion, Product, Place (distribution), People, Process, and Physical evidence.

I’ve also learned examples of online/offline product life cycle. For example, You Tube is an online product in the growth cycle; HDTV is a growth offline product. CD players are in the declining stage.

Last, I learned the advantages and disadvantages of Direct Mail. The advantages are: Targeting, Personalization, Optimization, and Accumulation. The only disadvantage is Cost, because you have to pay postage, printing, and mailing list.

Assignment #2: Zappos.com

Steve Madden Glamour shoe had five female customer reviews. I found out that the customers descibe the shoe as "sexy and cute." There was a size issue, but some recommend customers to buy a smaller size.

I will more likely buy these shoes. Although they are expensive, the shoes have good quality and last long. If customers read the reviews, they will have the advantage of becoming familiar about the shoe in terms of the fit and style. Zappos.com's advantage is to receive customer feedback and have a sense of knowing whether or not to still sell a certain shoe online. Kenneth Cole brand is to good to have customer recommendations online. They are a high quality, expensive brand.

I look at customer reviews, especially on music and shoes before I buy them. I do not want to end up spending money if I don't like them. Online sites should have customer reviews because other potential, buying customers want to know if the product is worth buying and more useful in the long-run.

Blogs are in style

BLOGS ARE IN STYLE

Many types of business fields such as entertainment, food, fashion, and sports use a blog to personally comment and discuss what occurs in today’s world of business. Businesses use web logs to make statements about a new trend or an existing project. They want to know their blog viewers opinion and what effect the project has on the consumers. Another use of blogs is to communicate with the customers and employees to share business knowledge. Nike’s blog website, www.gawker.com/artospeed shares customer’s opinions about certain shoes, and the suggestion of “better shoes means better brand.”

Blogs do look and feel like traditional marketing and advertising, because businesses promoting their product and receiving customer feedback is a form of marketing. Businesses use advertising in their blogs by introducing the product or service and explain the benefits for the customer. Consumers expect to feel a sense of marketing and advertising in blogs to become familiar with the product as they read the blog.

Blogs are not a fad; they are in style. Many business websites are starting to add blogs as part of their marketing tool to interact with their customers. All college business major departments, especially Information Systems should start a blog to inform potential students about businesses that are hiring I S majors and the familiarity of technological advances. Blogs are not going out of style anytime soon.

Assignment1-Why blog?

blogging is cool