To buy or not to buy?

To buy or not to buy? Savvy shoppers increasingly seeking third party approval before buying online

New research from Quidco into the online purchasing decisions of 2,000 British consumers suggests retailers must embrace community sites to attract 'marketing resistant' shoppers and drive online sales.

According to the research, commissioned by Quidco and carried out by pollsters YouGov1, 62% of all shoppers consult online communities - such as cash-back, price comparison and review websites - before making a purchase. Just 27% of consumers go directly to the retailer.

When asked which factors encouraged them to use community sites, the top three answers from consumers were: they offer me unbiased facts about products and services (32%); they trusted the views of communities more than merchants (27%); and the communities help me find the best deal available (27%).

With online retail spend in the UK expected to hit £44.9bn by 2012, the implication is that third party community sites can't be ignored by retailers wanting a slice of these revenues.

Paul Nikkel, Co-Founder of Quidco, argues that a change in perception is needed: “In the past, some retailers may have perceived third party communities to be 'middlemen', but this research shows consumers clearly value them as trusted brands in their own right. Yes, they like the cost savings on offer, but actually they value the community elements and independence more highly. In the offline world, retailers are found in the places where consumers hang out en-masse - often strong shopping centre brands like Bluewater - and they need to do the same online.”

OneStopPhoneShop is going from strength to strength on the buy.at network!

Buy.at is pleased to announce an enormous increase in overall programme performance since January. The success of the growth period of OSPS is thanks to the hard work and dedication of all affiliates, as well as the great fresh and innovative offers that are available to access and link to whilst still hot off the press. Having such a fast moving brand and web offers being updated on an hourly basis, customers keep coming back for more.

With amazing free gifts such as the brand new Nintendo Wii available alongside extremely competitively priced mobile phones – offered at a time when traditional gaming retailers had the consoles on pre order -OSPS strive to achieve their “We will not be beaten’’ mantra on all occasions.

Commitment to offering the best deals makes the 650% growth in sales during the past six months quite justified and thoroughly deserved.

Exclusive handsets are a massive pull to customers, with something suited to everyone. Next day delivery keeps the brand exciting and extremely convenient – after all when you manage to get a bargain deal on a hot new mobile you don’t want to have to wait for it. Being a part of The Carphone Warehouse means handsets advertised on the OSPS site is always available, stock managed to perfection, and gives them great bargaining power to get the best deals for your customers!

The OSPS site is extremely affiliate friendly; there are no telephone numbers which could encourage leakage, ensuring affiliate conversion is always at its best. The site is very welcoming and easy from a customer perspective – quick, simple and secure. Average conversion on the programme stands at 1.97% which is extremely strong in a very competitive sector. A lot of time and research goes into the creation and maintenance of the offer specific GIF and Flash creative available in the buy.at management area – this is dynamically updated onto affiliate sites so brand representation is always fresh, vibrant and highly relevant.

To top this all off, commissions are very generous, with the chance to earn up to £37.50 per sale! Hard work is always rewarded - OSPS really appreciate the effort and enthusiasm affiliates put into advertising their brand and are happy to reward this with regular incentives for affiliates whether on an individual, group or programme wide basis.

Feedback is always welcome; as account manager I love hearing from affiliates – can I help to make campaigns convert better / give any advice / assist in any way? Please feel free to contact me on donna.mccrate@buy.at

OSPS really appreciate hearing from affiliates, existing or potential, to get their take on where they are, how they are doing and what they could be doing better. They believe there is no better way to improve than by following the ideas of the experts - the affiliates.

Nokia Corp is buying out Symbian Ltd

Nokia Corp is buying out other shareholders of handset software firm Symbian Ltd and will open the software for royalty-free use in a move seen as a response to new rivals such as Google.

Symbian's software is used in two-thirds of so-called smartphones with computer-like capabilities and 6 percent of all cellphones, but open-source platforms such as Google's Android as well as Apple's iPhone will challenge its dominance.

Currently, its closest rival is Microsoft's Windows Mobile operating system. "The move's a shrewd response to growing threats from other providers of mobile phone software," said Geoff Blaber of UK-based research firm CCS Insight, citing the open-source LiMo Foundation as well as Google and Apple.

Nokia will pay 264 million euros ($410 million) for the 52 percent of British-based Symbian it does not already own.

The Finnish company also said on Tuesday it and other top cellphone makers along with operators AT&T, NTT DoCoMo, Vodafone and chip makers Texas Instruments and STMicroelectronics had formed the Symbian Foundation to develop the software further.

Nokia will contribute Symbian and its S60 software assets to the foundation, while other members will put in their UIQ and MOAP software to create a new joint Symbian platform in 2009.

"It offers us an opportunity to innovate faster on a bigger, united, more widely accepted platform," Kai Oistamo, head of Nokia's devices business, told Reuters.

"It also enables us to deliver new products, we believe, faster to the market." Nokia said Sony Ericsson, Ericsson, Panasonic and Siemens had accepted the offer for their Symbian stakes, and it also expected Samsung Electronics to accept.

"The biggest surprise is that Nokia gets full ownership all at once, and at a good price," said Karri Rinta, analyst at Handelsbanken. "This was a logical move. There was pressure for Nokia to increase its holding, especially since there were owners such as Panasonic and Siemens who were there for historic reasons."

Nokia to acquire social-activity service provider Plazes

Connecting People just got easier with services that track place and time

Nokia and Plazes (www.plazes.com) today announced an agreement for Nokia to acquire substantially all assets of Plazes, a privately-owned start-up company of 13 people with its principal operations in Berlin. Plazes provides a context-aware social-activity service that people can use to plan, record, and share their social activities: why they are at a given location at a given time, whether in the past, present or future.

"This acquisition helps Nokia to accelerate its vision of bringing people and places closer together, in line with our broader services strategy," said Niklas Savander, Head of Nokia Services & Software. "In addition to the key assets, through this acquisition Nokia will bring on a visionary team with an advanced understanding of social-activity services, as well as the technical ability to further develop this area."

By acquiring Plazes, Nokia will be able to extend its context-based service offering with social presence and time-based activity planning features. Plazes adds the elements of "place" and "time" to social networking through features that allow people to alert friends of their activity and location; review their own and others' past activities; share their experiences and make plans with friends, who are then able to respond with comments and suggestions as well as their own location information.

"Nokia shares our vision of the social activity space and of how we can together develop the service that Plazes provides today," said Felix Petersen, co-founder of Plazes. "We feel proud of what the Plazes team has achieved so far with its pioneering work in context-aware services and we feel even more excited about what's to come next."

The agreement is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the third quarter 2008. After closing, Plazes will become part of Nokia's Services & Software unit.

About Nokia

Nokia is the world leader in mobility, driving the transformation and growth of the converging Internet and communications industries. We make a wide range of mobile devices with services and software that enable people to experience music, navigation, video, television, imaging, games, business mobility and more. Developing and growing our offering of consumer Internet services, as well as our enterprise solutions and software, is a key area of focus. We also provide equipment, solutions and services for communications networks through Nokia Siemens Networks.

About Plazes

Plazes AG is one of the pioneering web platforms for location sharing and publishing on the web today. Members of Plazes are able to update their location through their laptop or mobile phone, and update their online presence with their current, past and future whereabouts. That way Plazes provides location-based context and real-life value when coordinating with friends, family and business partners. Plazes AG is headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland with a development office in Berlin, Germany. For additional information, please visit www.plazes.com

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Dialogue And AEI Launch UK’s First Mobile Ticketing Solution Using PayforIT

The first mobile ticketing solution using UK mobile payment initiative payforIT has been launched today by interactive mobile specialists Dialogue Communications and AEI Mobile. Mobile ticketing will enable party-goers to purchase tickets to a London nightclub via their mobile phone using payforIT, and to receive the tickets via SMS.

PayforIT is the cross-operator payment initiative that allows consumers to purchase goods and services via their mobile phone up to the value of £10. Dialogue and AEI Mobile will be working together to provide a mobile ticketing solution for Drum & Bass Arena event taking place at Scala Club in London on 15th August and tickets are on sale today for £10.

Guiom Peersman, Dialogue’s UK managing director explains: “We believe this is the first time payforIT will be used to purchase event tickets. People wishing to buy a ticket can text “Scala” to short code 81330 and in return will receive a WAP link to Scala Club’s mobile internet site. From there tickets are available for purchase through the payforIT payment system and the ticket will be delivered directly to the buyer via SMS

Original post http://www.slashphone.com

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MIDI to RING TONE

Standard MIDI files provide a common file format used by most musical software, they contain song information including the title, track names, and most importantly what instruments to use and the sequence of musical events, such as notes and instrument control information needed to play back the song.

There are millions of MIDI files on the interent, the bad news is that you cannot import a midi file directly into your mobile phone as a ringtone, the good news is that you can convert a midi file to RTTL or Keypress format and then send the ringtone to your mobile.

To Convert Midi Files into RTTL or key press format, you will need to download Composer for Ringtone Software, select a midi file, convert the file to RTTL or Key Press format.

Here are more detailed instructions (you may wish to print out this page): Click here