Eastpoint Insights

MongoDB Cambridge - March Madness

2014-03-01T00:00:00Z

This month we have the pleasure of hosting MongoDB's March Madness event as Eastpoint's Cambridge office on March 20th.

Derick Rethans (of both php and mongodb fame) will be travelling up to join us from MongoDB's London office and will be discussing the difference between various NoSQL databases and also introducing CAP theorm to the group.

For more info, please visit the MongoDB Cambridge Meetup page.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Google to resolve keyword marketing pains: answer (not provided)?

2014-03-15T00:00:00Z

One of the great assests of digital marketing has been the ability to analyse the effectiveness of a marketing spend and to refine campaigns around that.

Online marketing an app is often a huge aspect of it's success, and therefore the ability to anaylse data about the marketing work being carried out is vital.

For two and a half years search marketers have been increasing restricted to information about the source of traffic - specifically the keywords used by users to reach your site.

In 2011, Google introduced secure searching for logged in users, and as a result, many users arriving at your web site or application no longer announce the keywords that were used to find you.

In fact, the number of (not provided) keyword sessions has been charted to have increased beyond 85% - making organic keyword anaylse very difficult.

However Google Senior VP annouced at SMX West things could be about to change as they are reviewing the situation and looking for a better solution.

While a complete u-turn is unlikely, it's great news that Google are looking at this issue, and we're all hopeful that the new solution will provide a reliable means to access that valuable data again.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

CTO and CEO in small tech companies

2014-04-01T00:00:00Z

Having been working running tech teams for around ten years now, I realise that I’m actually not really a developer anymore. I do develop, but I can’t do that as a full time activity too often however much I enjoy it.

However when I introduce myself to people to find it hard to describe my job as something other than “developer”.

But I’ve recently updated my LinkedIn profile to call myself CEO - this has always seemed a remarkably unnecessary term… does a company of under ten full time staff really have a CEO?

Previously I had CTO (Chief Technology Officer), but that also seemed a little grandiose such a small organisation.

A CEO (or Managing Director) or CTO in a small company always seemed to me to be akin to declaring a new nation in your own back garden and proclaiming yourself it's all-powerful king.

Strategy and direction

Every company, no matter the size requires strategy and direction - both at the business level and most with a technology specific strategy too.

We are a relatively small company consisting of four developers, a business analyst/test engineer, a project manager and a client account manager. Plus me.

I have the chance to get involved in projects in-depth for periods of time, and actually that’s happened a lot over the last 12 months. But really that’s not where the focus of the person ultimately responsibel for a business should be… that’s the job of the team of specialists.

I love working with technology, but working with people is what I enjoy most and I will be blogging here about my thoughts and experiences in carrying out the CEO/CTO role in a small team.

In the future, I hope to write more about my opinion on this topic, especially about managing the relationships that this role brings, but also about the technical challenges and decisions we make.

Building a strong team that is composed of motivated and skilled individuals can make the difference between success and failure - and with that in mind, I do think a CEO and CTO are essential roles in any tech company, even a very small one… and it’s not simply vanity title.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

MongoDB Cambridge Meetup: It's not ACID

2014-05-11T00:00:00Z

The next Eastpoing MongoDB meetup has been scheduled for the first Thursday in June.

We'll be discussing the consequences of non ACID compliance, what that means to application developers, and how we work around the issue.

Further info is available at the MongoDB Cambridge meetup page.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Government grant for website security appraisal

2014-09-06T00:00:00Z

A government scheme is offering £5,000 grants for a security analysis of your website and systems. Even websites that do not obviously hold sensitive information still need security.

There are lots of things to consider when thinking of cyber security: your website, databases on and off premises, wireless internet, users with access to download and install applications, to name a few.

All these and many others are routes for potential attacks or compromises in security. The cyber security funding, offered by Innovate UK, gives you £5k worth of funding for an advisor to analyse and provide recommendations and solutions to help protect against cyber threats.

Innovate UK are a strategy board aimed at helping business in the UK grow, in order to stimulate the economy. They started the scheme in order to raise awareness of cyber security in the UK.

Any website can benefit from a cyber security analysis. Even websites that do not obviously hold sensitive information still need to be considered - as are the costs associated with cleaning up after a security compromise.

We particularly advise anyone with an ecommerce website to look into security measures beyond the basic.

The team here at Eastpoint can support your application by advising you through the process and carrying out an analysis of your infrastructure and risks.

To find out more, please get in touch.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Free course to learn about online security

2014-10-01T00:00:00Z

I have already signed up to this course and will provide a review once I am done. My course starts mid-October and lasts eight weeks, with about three hours needed per week.

Apparently you don’t need any previous software or development knowledge to do it – which hopefully means it’s fairly jargon-free.

The website says the course assumes no prior knowledge of computer security, and is aimed at anyone who wants to keep their digital information safer.

Go to www.futurelearn.com/courses/introduction-to-cyber-security to read more and take part.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Tech and Mars in the Forbes 400 top 25

2014-10-03T00:00:00Z

But first, some “candy” themed facts from the top-25 list:

Apparently the Mars (chocolate bar) family are secretive

The Snickers bar was named after their horse

They invented the ‘Malt-flavoured nougat’ inside Snickers and Milky Way

Non-nougat based fact:

All the women in the top 25 have inherited their fortune, with no female ‘self-mades’

If you just wanted to see the top 10 richest people in technology (Feat. Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Dell, etc), click here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/katiasavchuk/2014/09/29/americas-10-richest-in-tech-2014-zuckerberg-passes-page-brin-bezos/

If you like reading about rich people, the America’s Richest Families List (http://www.forbes.com/families/list/#tab:overall) is also interesting (the Forbes 400 cannot always account for dispersed wealth). You know you’re reading a rich list when you look at the combined wealth and think ‘O, just a couple of billion for this poor sap’.

At number one are the Walton (Wal-Mart) family, way above everyone else at $152 billion.

A nice story – and one that explains why the name Carnegie of Carnegie Hall fame does not feature on the above list – is about how steel magnate Andrew Carnegie kindly dished out his fortune, (http://www.forbes.com/sites/chloesorvino/2014/07/08/whats-become-of-them-the-carnegie-family/), leaving his family a relatively modest inheritance.

He believed it was worthless to die rich, and hoped to encourage others to follow his lead. The philanthropist (who was born in Scotland) gave away the majority of his wealth to charities and foundations prior to his death (nearly $5 billion in today’s money).

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Review: Open University Cyber Security course

2014-10-27T00:00:00Z

I recently begun a free online course in cyber security, run in part by the Open University.

My overall feeling was that the course was beneficial and my time reading and contributing was well worth it. See my review below. I'm currently about to start my third instalment.

How does it work as an online course?

It’s split into sections and the first one was probably more of a basic introduction (I’m expecting more specifics and terminology as it progresses). As someone who works in a software company but is not technical myself, I felt it was easy to understand. Whether someone with no background in technology would grasp it, I’m not sure (but probably would not be interested in spending their free time doing the course anyway).

Each week is further split into sections – it is bite sized if you need to do other things in between topics.

Each section typically has either a video, a page of information, a link to further information, or a request to research and write a few paragraphs about any given subject.

These findings should then be added to the comments section (a bit like submitting an essay… if an essay was like a long Facebook comment…)

Is it interesting?

Yes. If you’re interested at all in online security, or concerned about your personal info swirling around the internet, I think you will enjoy the course and be interested in the information and case studies it provides.

Will it help me stay safe online?

It requires you to evaluate your own security (I am hesitant to share this information with them, although I’m sure there’s no harm in doing so), so I think it will make you more aware of threats, attacks, and things like phishing emails, as well as making you think about easy ways to improve personal cyber security.

This week I will be learning about malware and more phishing stuff, I think. I will provide a further review once I am done with the entire course.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

The types of mobile app development

2014-10-28T00:00:00Z

Our clients, and prospective clients, often ask about the benefits of developing an app in Android or iOS (iOS is also known as Apple or iPhone). Other options include Windows apps and Blackberry apps (although I would say less people enquire about those).

So those are some of the devices you can build apps for, and deciding which device type to target depends on your audience and your requirements.

If you’re finding it difficult to narrow it down, to start off with, think of it like this:

Do I want a native app or a hybrid app?

This means – do I want to build an app for a specific device (say, Android phones) or do I want to create an app that will run on several devices?

Native= built for one type of device

Hybrid = intermediary technologies used to create a single version across different types of devices

The basic pros and cons of each are as follows:

Native apps pro

Native apps are built specifically for one particular device, so all functions are designed to run , to a high standard.

Native apps con

Potentially you are missing out on other phone markets because those with an Android mobile cannot use your app. If you have the budget, this isn’t much of a con, since you would simply invest the money in a sister app that is designed to run on a different device. But if your funds are limited, investing it all in one app could limit opportunities.

Hybrid apps pro

Most likely money saved on rolling your app out across several devices, while still maintaining a very good, but maybe not optimum, standard.

Hybrid apps con

The app will potentially not work as well as if it had been made exclusively for that device, since it has been adapted to run across more than one device.

So that’s something to think about – native or hybrid. Next, you need to think about what device or devices it will run on.

Android mobile app development

In the UK, most people are using either an Android or an Apple phone, and most mobile apps would be made for either or both of these, if the objective was to make it available to as many people are possible.

iOS Mobile App Development

As mentioned above, this is one of the most used and most popular type of app, along with Android.

Windows Mobile App Development

After those two, Windows is probably the third most enquired about from our perspective. If building a Windows app, it will usually be for a specific reason that you are targeting Windows and not Android or iOS.

Some final thoughts: What's the difference between an app for a phone and an app for a tablet?

See my upcoming article!

Mobile app development, Cambridge

If you have any questions and are looking for mobile app development, please get in touch. Our tech team love building apps, and are keen to take on new projects. We are based in Cambridge and London, UK.

We work with big and small companies and also have experience as an outsourcing partner, if your company does not have the skills needed in-house.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Research online and buy in-store?

2014-12-08T00:00:00Z

ROPO is a trend in buying behaviour and a term that has been about for a while. It means “Research Online, Purchase Offline”. Often this behaviour is attributed to higher cost items, where you want to make sure you’re spending your money wisely.

Is this an actual thing?

If you haven’t heard this term before, or are new to ecommerce and keen to learn more about your customer’s shopping tendencies, it’s an interesting concept.

When I first heard this term, and the research behind it (ie, that it wasn’t just a laboured acronym, it was genuine consumer behaviour), I was a bit surprised.

I thought it was common for people to test-drive a product in-store and then go back online to compare prices (and possibly buy) online.

And indeed the term also works the other way round – Research Offline, Purchase Online.

In a Guardian article from October, they introduced ROPO as a “recognised trend” and that people will be going to shops to spend their money over Christmas, having researched online.

Data from Australian shoppers from earlier this year showed that they did both the ROPO variants, with 84% saying that they often or sometimes research online and bought in store, and 60% saying they often or sometimes looked in store but bought online.

Dr Evil has stolen my ROPO!

So where does that leave retailers? Well, for business with both an online and high street presence, this type of online/offline buying and advertising has a name: multi-channel marketing. Customers are directed to the brand and able to buy in whatever way they choose.

For businesses that are just offline (increasingly rare for retail) or more likely, just online, there are obvious pitfalls to someone consistently falling into one type of behaviour.

For ecommerce, to try to get the potential ROPO into a… let’s call it ROLOPO (research online, look offline, purchase online…yet, it’s tedious) you have to make sure your ecommerce platform is looking good, working well and, most importantly, your pricing is correct.

About Us

We’re Eastpoint Software, specialising in web, mobile and eCommerce app development.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

A year of web, mobile and eCommerce app development

2014-12-11T00:00:00Z

The winter holidays are nearly here... how did that happen? Why does time get absorbed as you near 30? I digress.

What happened at Eastpoint in 2014?

Mobile and tablet apps

As more people use their mobiles and iPad for apps, internet access and shopping, existing and new customers have invested in making their products and apps easy to navigate on mobile devices.

We are keen to continue building mobile and ecommerce apps next year.

Responsive websites

With more people using tablets and phones for shopping and browsing, there has been more demand for responsive websites, where the visual is suited to the size of the screen, rather than things looking odd or people having to scroll and zoom around madly on a humungous web page to find the info they need.

Website upgrades

Websites are just like anything else – they get tired, things change around them, and they need a spruce up. We’ve carried out many enhancements and additions.

Outsourcing to us

We often work with technology partners to deliver skills that they do not have in-house. This year we worked on several long-term web app development projects.

Emerging technologies

Our know-it-all developers are always learning new technologies and adapting how they work. This year, our favourite new technology was AngularJS. This year we used AngularJS on a cyber security app.

A further list of technologies we work with is on our technologies page.

Agile

There’s been more interest and understanding in agile working – which means completing a project in stages without having to decide on the entire project’s timeline and spec at the outset. This allows you to change the spec or scope as the software product is built and evolves, and often give you something you can use earlier on, should you wish to test the market at the earliest opportunity.

Testing and QA

This year a full-time QA lead joined our team. He’s fussy!

Working with us in 2015

If you are looking for web, mobile and eCommerce app and software development or outsourcing, get in touch and let us know your requirements.

If you’re looking for an estimate for an app, let us know the details you have and we can provide a no-obligation quote.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Mobile apps - should I pick iOS or Android?

2014-12-29T00:00:00Z

As we’ve discussed before, mobile phone apps can be created for Android, iOS (iPhones etc), or both, as well as for other (less used) devices.

When building an app this is a fundamental question, and a decision you will likely make early on in the project. Should I build my app for iPhone or Android?

What are the statistics – which is most used?

As we’ve discussed before, mobile phone apps can be created for Android, iPhone, or both, as well as for other (less used) devices.

In the UK, both Android and iOS are popular, but slightly more people are on Android. It is understood to have overtaken iOS devices in 2012.

So pick Android then?

Maybe, although there are other factors to consider. Android is used over a huge variety of devices and brands. So in theory, that’s a huge amount of devices to test. In reality, just like with iPhone, you can chose which devices you want to make your app available to.

It doesn’t mean it can’t be used on other devices, it just means you are not marketing your app as supported/tested on all phone, just specific ones.

Obviously, if you already know your target market closely, or perhaps have a customer that has already explained that the app will be used on iPads, your decision is made for you.

Are iPhone apps or Android apps cheaper to develop?

Let assume you’re picking between either a purely iPhone or Android app (ie, you’re doing one or the other only). Is one cheaper to develop than the other?

You would probably expect the app development to be roughly the same. However, resources needing for testing can be different. There are a finite iPhones and iPads to test on within the Apple brand.

Android is used over a huge variety of devices and brands. So in theory, that’s a huge amount of devices to test. In reality, just like with iPhone, you chose which devices you want to make your app available to. It doesn’t mean it can’t be used on other devices, it just means you are not marketing your app as supported/tested on all phone, just specific ones.

Is there a way to build one app and adapt it to suit both Android and iOS?

Yes, there is. The benefits are clear – reach more people for less money. The downside is that, since the app needs to work across two platforms, there will most likely be some compromise involved.

There more about this in our previous article about hybrid apps, plus some more on Android and iOS.

Other types of app

While iOS and Android are the most popular systems that apps are built for, others include Blackberry and Microsoft.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

John Lewis warning over 'Black Friday' online sales

2015-01-06T00:00:00Z

John Lewis has announced last year's sales figures and it was a bumper year for their 'Black Friday' sale, with the retailer recording it's biggest trading week on record. But they were also down on their Christmas week sales compared to last year.

Sales - YAY! Or maybe not...

The BBC reported that Andy Street, managing director of John Lewis, hoped that Black Friday had reached its peak and questioned how sensible it is to focus so much trade and discounting on that one day.

In essence, he is saying - we sold more on Black Friday, but we had to sell at a discount, and less was bought later on. So essentially they are selling the same amount of stuff overall, but more of it bought at a discount. While it evened itself out this year, logic suggests the trend could lead to a loss in profit.

And it seems that the huge amounts of sales in that weekend did hoover up potential later sales. The Guardian reported that John Lewis had a 14.7% decline for electrical goods in the last shopping week before Christmas, compared to last year. John Lewis were also down 1.4% overall compared to last year, for the week finishing December 27 (with the caveat that last year, the Christmas week sales had one fewer 'clearance sale' days).

However, if you cast the net wider, overall sales in the five weeks to December 27 rose 4.8% compared to last year.

Online shopping

Ecommerce faired well at John Lewis this year. Let's look at some stats:

Online shopping sales up 19%
Of those, 56% were via the click-and-collect service (an increase of 30% from last year)
Online sales were credited for a 7.8% overall sales boost for fashion and beauty

Is Black Friday a good idea?

Black Friday is of course an American idea that has become popular over here - did anyone else feel that this year, it was publicised and hyped more than previous years? Do you think next year will be even more full-on, or this will be a fad that we'll get tired of?

The worry for retailers is that consumers will opt for the discounted Black Friday deals and not buy the full-price items closer to Christmas. But are we really that organised? What do we all think?

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Waitrose ecommerce boost

2015-02-09T00:00:00Z

During the Christmas period. online food shopping was up 26.3% for grocer Waitrose (a nice tin of sardines from the retailer is shown above).

In March, they plan to open a new "ecommerce depot", which replaces their existing one and creates an additional 100 jobs. The depot will deal with online food orders and will be double the size of the current one.

"Omni-channel" approach

Waitrose director of development, Nigel Keen, said in a press release: "Our expansion story continues as we take the brand to more customers and invest in our omni-channel approach."

Clearly they see their ecommerce as complementary to their bricks and mortar stores, which mirrors how several of how clients have both ecommerce and high street shops to allow customers the choice.

New stores

Waitrose success is not just in ecommerce. This year they are also opening 14 new shops, from supermarkets to convenience stores.

According to this article on it in The Guardian, Waitrose outperformed the only big supermarkets during this period. As well as the 26.3% increase on their website, sales in store rose by 2.8%.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Ecommerce meets old-school print

2015-03-11T00:00:00Z

On the blog we often talk about bricks and mortar stores complementing online sales. Many of our clients have high street shops as well as online stores.

Porter is a magazine created by the people behind the fashion site Net-a-porter, which sells high end clothes, shoes and accessories.

Net-a-porter have had an online mag for years – it’s not particularly long, usually a handful of articles, mostly showcasing the fashion brands that they stock. Images are clickable to shop the items.

A shoppable magazine

Last year, they took this idea and converted it into a much longer, printed magazine similar to Vogue and Tatler. The tie-in with the website is that each article featuring clothes can be scanned via a free app, allowing the reader to be linked to the product to buy it. The tablet version of the mag has a direct link.

What was considered interesting when the magazine was released, at a time when less people are reading print products, Net-a-porter would invest in a magazine.

There was also concern that it would be too much of a sales push - clearly the aim is for people to buy their clothes, which could make it more of a catalogue than a magazine.

A year since the launch, and sales are good with a circulation of 152,000 (Vogue has 191.000 for comparison).

Do customers mind?

Sales would imply not - but that is a personal choice. Would you be happy to read a magazine with a clear sales strategy? As Net-a-porter stocks a huge variety of high-end designers, the magazine is not limited to one or only a couple of brands, which I think is essential to it not seeming like a catalogue (the magazine does feature non-competing products from other sources too).

When you consider that the designers at Net-a-porter are the ones being showcased in Vogue anyway, perhaps, from a consumer point of view, rather than feeling like a sale pitch, it's actually quite handy. You can see something you like, and then have an easy way to source and buy.

Personally I would probably want to shop around anyway, so for me I would be unlike to just click and buy, as I would want to compare to elsewhere. But we must also consider audience and availability - a lot of designers can't just be bought anywhere, so shopping around isn't an option. Also, if can afford to buy expensive clothes, perhaps spending time trying to snaffle out a couple of pounds saving elsewhere just isn't worth the hassle.

Investment in quality

This article in The Guardian praises the way Net-a-porter have approached the magazine, listing five keys areas that have been considered. It highlights how the technology (the apps) is used alongside the print to enhance the product.

It also points out how the magazine is, at its core, a quality product with A-list cover stars and professional content clearly targeted to its audience.

Other-way-round ecommerce

Net-a-Porter and the Porter magazine are opposite to what you might expect - online shopping first, traditional product second. This highlights the diversification available within both ecommerce and traditional shopping.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Google warnings over mobile usability

2015-03-19T00:00:00Z

Google have been emailing webmasters in the last couple of days with warnings about how their websites operate on mobile devices. The email details the usability errors are on your site and provides guidelines to adhere to (the guidelines are not specific to the website, just general).

What are the implications?

The implication, as outlined by Google, is that websites not seen as mobile friendly by Google Search will be ranked appropriately for smartphone users. This means that you are likely to slip in the rankings if you do not act on the email.

The fact that Google are sending out these notifications also suggests that a new mobile algorithm could be imminent. You may have heard about Google algorithms - it's what they use to rank websites, and it is subject to change.

What should I do next?

If your only source of reaching customers is through a website that Google has flagged as having usability issues for mobile users, this is a problem. It is worth considering building a mobile version, or responsive version, of your website.

From a non-tech point of view, it can be a bit overwhelming getting an email announcing multiple errors on your site for mobile users. If you have any questions, please ask in the comments below and we'll get back to you. You can also contact your programmer if you are unsure.

The importance of mobile users

That Google are putting such emphasis on mobile-friendly sites is not unexpected. More and more people are using their mobiles and tablets to search online (I use mine all the time).

This is a bit of a double-whammy - if your website has multiple usablity errors, not only are customers potentially having a hard time using your site, but you are also going to be penalised in the rankings, and they might not find it at all.

Now could be the time to invest in a mobile site. We've got lots of experience with this, get in touch for a chat about how your website can be mobile-friendly.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

What will ‘trigger’ visitors to stay on a website?

2015-05-06T00:00:00Z

The original article on three 'psychological triggers' is here and I thought it was a brief but interesting roundup. How often do we see these ‘triggers’ adhered to, and how worthwhile do we think they are?

The three triggers chosen for this article were:

Clean design
Reciprocity, aka freebies
Initial trust/ "foot in the door"

They also mentioned colour as another basic trigger, as expressed via an otherwise black and white image, with a red heart. Which reminded me of the use of red in Schindler’s List. I’m not sure that’s what they were going for, but I get that it impacts.

Anyway, for clean design, the article suggested a simple menu with minimal, or as minimal as possible, choice and cited a nice jam experiment, which made me think about jam, and I felt happy. Apparently when faced with lots of varieties of JAM!, our brains become all jammed up with the overwhelming jamminess and we end up not buying any! Sob.

But when faced with a small selection of half a dozen jams, we are happy for jam and make our selection (and that's why there is a picture of jam with this blog post). Particularly on mobile apps, you're looking for an easy route to purchase or find info, or eat jam.

For reciprocity, they suggest that offering free gifts/samples/coupons creates a dialogue with customers and they are more like to give back , ie buy from you in the future because of the effort you have gone to. I know I am a sucker for a free gift, and have bought product after receiving a free sample.

The final trigger is about getting small commitments from customers and building up and taking a softly-softly approach to marketing, in order to build trust with a potential customer before they may their purchase.

Of course there are many other ways to approach ecommerce and ensuring customer connections, but I felt these three were worth mentioning again. Clean design is probably the most basic of the so-called triggers, in that this is usually considered at the early stage of any ecommerce website or app, whereas the marketing side will be part of the longer term and overall plan.

What do you think of the triggers - and what other triggers do you think customers are drawn to?

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Vogue publisher to launch ecommerce website Style.com

2015-05-11T00:00:00Z

Style.com is a domain currently used for fashion news and content, but in the autumn it will be launched as a new ecommerce platform, selling luxury clothes and accessories.

It's a first for style.com owner Condé Nast, also the publisher of Vogue, GQ, Glamour and Vanity Fair, and will be rolled out in the UK before going global.

As well as fashion, the upcoming ecommerce site will also sell "upmarket" beauty, travel and technology brands, according to this report on vogue.co.uk.

Jonathan Newhouse, chairman and chief exec of Condé Nast International, points out that they already have an "active relationship" with an audience of more than 300 million and has an enormous advantage over its competitors. Which is rather honest of him.

More about the story

According to Page Six (New York Post gossip column) writers at style.com have been made redundant:

http://pagesix.com/2015/04/28/conde-nast-lays-off-staffers-amid-style-com-shut-down/

The Street say that Condé Nast will take a cut of sales, without owning the stock it sells. It also says that Condé Nast had previously invested in ecommerce start-ups:

http://www.thestreet.com/story/13127638/1/conde-nast-turning-to-e-commerce-as-new-revenue-channel.html

The difference between Style.com and Vogue

Style.com was always for Vogue, and when Vogue.com launched, there was similar content across both titles.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

How popular is social ecommerce?

2015-05-12T00:00:00Z

Social ecommerce* (or social commerce) refers to buying goods directly via a social platform. It has been a brewing trend for many years, and always seems to be the next big thing.

The Pinterest ‘buy’ button

Earlier this year, Pinterest removed affiliate/click-to-buy links from its website. This meant that bloggers or users who advertised items on Pinterest could no longer make a small fee via the click through.

It was thought the move was to precede the addition of a buy button, where Pinterest users could directly buy the item as part of Pinterest, staying on the site rather that linking to an external site.

Social commerce on mobile apps

My granddad taught me to always scope out the possibility for a bargain, so I’m perhaps less inclined than others to go for the ease of a buy button. I may scout out Google shopping and other online shops before making a purchase.

However, I think on a mobile ecommerce site, nice and tidy in its small little mobile screen, I may be less inclined to go sniffing elsewhere, as it's all a bit more of an effort on mobile than desktop or tablet. If I felt the price was fair, the ease of a buy button on a mobile site would be more attractive to me.

The future of buying on social media

Facebook already has the option to buy while staying on the Facebook site and they call it f-commerce or f-comm. It isn’t massively popular, but Facebook have been plugging away at their f-commerce for years (as well as a ‘donate’ button for charities), and it’s likely to become more popular.

Twitter have already trialled their buy button and it’s been popping up for ticket ads, among others. But on the whole, it seems to be that we’re waiting to see how it progresses.

* Social ecommerce/commerce is a phrase also attributed to the social aspects of buying online, for example, engaging with the customer, customers interacting with each other, articles, reviews and feedback.

There is also another phrase called, along the lines of, ‘onsite social commerce’ which is features within a website that promotes sharing and interactivity between customers on a site.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter

Mobiles overtake laptops for internet browsing

2015-08-07T00:00:00Z

Use of smart phones has overtaken the use of laptops for accessing the internet, according to Ofcom.

A new report on the Financial Times website shows how laptops as the "device of choice" has declined in the last three years, going from 46% of internet browsers preferring a laptop in 2013, to 40% in 2014 and 30% this year.

Desktop computer as the most important device has also taken a tumble, halving from 28% in 2013 to 14% in 2015.

Like smart phones, tablet use has also been going up and up, from 8% in 2013 to 19% in 2015.

These statistics show the importance of mobile, but also of choice. A lot of people still use laptops, desktop, and the medium sized screen of a tablet. Also, what you are accessing online plays a part. It has been previously reported that consumers prefer to see a larger screen when making a purchase.

In a statement on their findings, Ofcom referred to the UK as a "smart phone society".

According to Ofcom, two thirds of UK adults (66%) now own a smartphone, up from 39% in 2012, and use it for nearly two hours a day to browse, use social media, bank and shop. Ownership among 16 to 24 year olds is 90%, and among 55 to 64 year olds it has more than doubled since 2012, from 19% to 50%.

Follow Eastpoint on Twitter