toddtalks

worst e-commerce experience ever!

July 24, 2008 – 3:31 pm
Ahh, where do I start? First, a little background. I have been buying online for 10 years and have probably spent well over one million dollars online between personal and business purchases in that time. I have also worked for two large Internet companies that provide e-commerce (Digital River) and marketing services (ValueClick) and have worked with literally thousands of e-tailers including MacMall/PCMall (I actually sold them on CJ for their affiliate program) as well as companies like Ebay, Yahoo!, Buy.com, Best Buy and Symantec. So I feel qualified to critique online shopping experiences from both the customer's perspective as well as the retailer's perspective. Now on to my worst e-commerce experience ever! I needed to buy ten 2GB PC2 5300 677MHz RAM modules. I did a search on The Google and saw that MacMall had a very good price for what I needed. I added the items to my cart ...

Posted in blogging, online marketing, rants |

vacation calls

June 25, 2008 – 8:45 am
Cyberland, I will be offline for the most part over the next two weeks attending a friend's wedding in Austria (that's the country without kangaroos). I will not be posting anything here until I get back. I will also not be on email, twitter, IM, facebook, etc...well maybe a little update here and there and a peek or two at some emails. Miss me! XOXO Todd

Posted in blogging |

death of a platform

June 20, 2008 – 1:32 pm
This month the affiliate marketing industry had a death in the family. On June 15, 2008 the beFree platform known as BFAST was permanently turned off. Officially, the platform ceased tracking on May 15th but you could still log in and access reporting through June 15th. beFree was, along with LinkShare, one of the two leading affiliate technology providers in the late 1990's. By the time Commission Junction launched in November 1998, both beFree and LinkShare had relationships with all of the top e-retailers and were well on their way to success. Started in 1996 in Waltham, MA by the Gerace brothers Tom and Sam, beFree's strategy was to provide advertisers with the technology to create their own branded "in-house" type affiliate programs similar to what Amazon has today (and back then). Their first customer was Barnes and Noble. At the height of their success, they had some of the biggest online ...

Posted in blogging, online marketing |

featured watch 2

June 19, 2008 – 3:59 pm
Here's another favorite watch of mine. It is called a Sinn EZM1 and it is a self winding automatic chronograph. Sinn is a German watch company known for producing military type watches. This watch looks rather unassuming but has a lot of unique features that make is a must-have for me. This watch is no longer produced because The Swatch Group, that manufactures the movement, is no longer selling it to outside companies. I wear it often, so it is not in perfect condition and probably not as valuable as it would be if it were left in the box. But as I said in my first featured watch post, I do not buy watches to hold and resell at a profit. Key features: Titanium case and bracelet makes the watch much lighter than if it were steel which makes it very comfortable to wear all day. Left sided crown and pushers. When ...

Posted in blogging, featured watch |

redhatbluehat podcast 5

June 19, 2008 – 3:34 pm
Another interesting political podcast where we discuss the pros and cons of lifting the offshore oil drilling ban, what we should do with the detainees resulting from our war on terror and whether Michelle or Cindy is the hottest first-lady candidate. Definitely worth a listen.

Posted in blogging, politics |

affiliate marketing growing to 3.3B in 2012

June 17, 2008 – 11:31 am
I was excited to see that JupiterResearch published a report today that shows that the online affiliate marketing industry is continuing to grow and provide advertisers with a way to "reach and acquire customers". The most interesting part of the press release about the report was that advertising spending in 2008 was projected to be $2.1 Billion. I assume this includes both affiliate commissions and network service fees. JupiterResearch is also projecting that U.S. online affiliate marketing spending will reach $3.3 Billion by 2012. I have coincidentally been looking at U.S. online marketing spending trends and came up with slightly higher numbers than JupiterResearch predicted. My numbers were for 2009 and I estimated that over $5 Billion would be spent in the U.S. on online performance marketing deals. This would include traditional affiliate marketing as well as CPA type deals. I haven't read the actual report but if you are interested in ...

Posted in blogging |

featured watch 1

June 13, 2008 – 5:27 pm
If you know me, then you know I like to talk about watches. I also like to collect them and currently own nine different watches. One of the more unusual ones I own is a Swiss made digital watch from Ventura called the v-tec delta. Ventura went out of business recently, so I imagine my watch will go up in value since you can't buy it anymore. I do not buy watches to hold and sell, so even if it were worth 10X what I paid, I wouldn't part with it. This watch has a lot of features that really made me have to have it. Unlike most digital displays, this one has a unique font developed by the company and each numeric value is comprised of 13 elements (vs the more usual 7). It has a scroll wheel (Ventura calls it EasySkroll) that is used to navigate through the various ...

Posted in blogging, featured watch |

featured t-shirt 6

June 13, 2008 – 10:11 am
Black Sabbath

Posted in featured t-shirt |

new redhatbluehat podcast (4)

June 13, 2008 – 10:05 am
I was out last Thurdsay for some minor surgery but was back in the saddle for this week's podcast. Most of the discussion revolved around Obama and McCain, the war on terror, taxes and the budget this week. I also mentioned that I was rethinking my choice for president and possibly switching to McCain. You can listen to it below or click over to GeekCast. I hope you enjoy it.

Posted in blogging, politics |

featured t-shirt 5

June 9, 2008 – 5:05 pm
Megadeth