Yesterday Apple announced the release of Ping, the new music-focused social media site. If you’ve ever purchased music on iTunes, ever purchased or registered an apple product or if you’ve ever downloaded an iPhone application, you have an Apple account. Sometimes you might even forget that this account exists, as I did until I signed up for Ping some few hours ago. I downloaded iTunes 10.0 and it was magically there. Ping is far from perfect, most notably because it hasn’t yet approved my profile picture and there’s not yet an easy way to add friends or contacts.

Apple’s business model has historically been providing computers at a higher-than-average price range that are reliable, easy to use, and attractive. Part of Apple’s competitive advantage was that having one of these products became a status symbol, something that millions of Apple fans are willing to pay a premium for. The iPod and iPhone have further reinforced the competitive advantage, with the business model shifting to provide attractive, higher-than-average priced, easy to use .mp3 players. The key factor that brings us to Ping, is that in order to use your iPod on your mac or pc, you need iTunes. ITunes understands some of your deepest and darkest desires such as when you listen to which music, what kinds of music you’re willing to pay for, what music you’ve purchased online and what music you’ll never listen to again. The Genius functionality in iTunes regularly sends Apple information on who and what you’re listening to (with your permission), and it both recommends new music based on your past purchases and it will also create a playlist based on a song.

If you’re in the mood to listen to a certain song, Genius will also scour through your music collection and pick out a selection of songs that will play seamlessly and that have the same beat and feeling. This Genius feature ensures that you’re listening mode doesn’t turn into “I can’t believe I own this music”.

With our increasing comfort with social networking, a social music system seems logical, reeking with MySpace influences. In the Apple keynote speech yesterday Jobs hinted in a slide that users would be able to integrate their Ping activity with Facebook. It apparently turns out that there will be no Facebook integration yet, and in the meanwhile users are left to find friends by name and/or e-mail (that’s so passé).

In terms of competitive advantage, Apple are strides ahead of the competition, integrating a music platform that everyone already uses with a logical place to interact with bands and musicians. In fact, it’s more logical a place than Facebook to interact with other fans and artists. Ping and iTunes are creating a unique environment by pulling more of people’s time into the Apple platforms, creating a stronger argument for them to be a primary host for all music and television content.

It will be interesting to see how the music platform evolves. Due to the fact that Apple’s revenue stream is derived from music and application sales unlike Facebook, whose revenue stream is advertising, there is a greater chance for fans and users to have a more organic and genuine experience. Being built into iTunes has its perks as well since users are already familiar with it and they already have it on their computers. Let’s also not forget that Apple reported having credit card information for over 124 million users in February of 2010, demonstrating the amount of trust and goodwill iTunes has already amassed.

If Apple and Facebook can agree on an integration deal allowing users to be connected to their Facebook friends in Ping, both will be further entrenched for success.

We visit and make purchases from websites regularly, but did you ever wonder why you ended up purchasing something from one site rather than another? Whether you made an impulse purchase or closed the browser just after adding items to your shopping cart, could it be that the design of the site subconsciously led you – or your customers, to make one decision over another?

A study published in a 2010 article called “Using Clickstream Data to Enhance B2B Web Site Performance” by R. Wilson in vol. 25 of the Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing, outlined the results from a study designed to examine some of the web design factors that contributed to customers’ purchase decisions as they clicked along the purchase process.

The study examined the behaviour of 900 site visitors who were divided into two groups. One group was not offered free shipping, while visitors from the other group were made aware of a free shipping offer.

Test group without free shipping offer:

92.7% of visitors visited product index

89.1% of visitors went to a product specification page

16.7% of visitors entered the shopping area

8.9% of visitors added items to their shopping card

5.1% of visitors completed a purchase (23 of 450 visitors made a purchase)

Test group with free shipping offer:

92.9% of visitors visited product index

88.4% of visitors went to a product specification page

20.9% of visitors entered the shopping area

12.2% of visitors added items to their shopping card

7.1% of visitors completed a purchase (32 of 450 visitors made a purchase)

In the study, the organisation found that although offering free shipping had greater costs, the ROI was greater with an increase in sales, as well as an increase in the average value of each customer purchase. This study resulted in a 7% conversion rate without free shipping, and an 11% conversion rate with free shipping. Although conversion rates vary by price point and industry, an increase in conversion rates of 4% was found in this instance to be well worth the cost of shipping. In a similar subsequent study, a site that had free shipping listed on the shopping page had a conversion rate of 8.8%, while a free shipping offer listed on a site’s main page had a conversion rate of 11.0%, with a 27.7% increase in the number of visitors completing an online purchase.

Although the information presented simply reflects one study performed, and recognising that each business or industry would have unique results, it does raise the question of whether a site is optimised for purchases. What % increase in sales would make it more financially beneficial to offer free shipping to your customers? What would your ROI be for offering such a service? Is a 4% increase in sales financially worth it for you?

What impact does the design of your site have to your brand and competitive advantage?

On this day that has been gripped by the passing of two stars, namely Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett, we are surrounded by a media explosion, mass public reaction – not to mention of course the loss that two families have to cope with.

But what we have to do is put all of this in perspective. Get a grip and learn from this – as so eloquently put in an e-newsletter today from the leading catering and hospitality publication, and I quote:-

“I’m starting with the man in the mirror; I’m asking him to change his ways; And no message could have been any clearer; If you wanna make the world a better place; Take a look at yourself and then make a change. As the world digests the passing of Michael Jackson, the restaurant industry is also being asked to look inwardly and make a change on the controversial issue of service charge…….” News Editor, 26 June 2009.

Phew..er, a joke, surely? Afraid not.

So, after the devastating Italian earthquake, did they make comparisons to the downfall in popularity of Italian restaurants and the need to up their game?

What utter guff.

We’re really pleased to announce that we’ve been nominated for the Best Direct & Promotional Strategy at this years’ Drum Marketing Awards. A great achievement considering the tough competition, not to mention a highly esteemed panel of judges.

Our entry, the Paddy Power Cheque Book, a strategy to steal OTC market share from competitors and confirm Paddy Power’s price advantage, delivered demonstrable success. The campaign that included a cheque book mechanic, staff interaction, SMS strategy and vast data capture is now firmly engrained in Paddy Power’s ongoing retail strategy. Contact us for the full story.

With Steve Jobs off sick, Apple seems to have taken ’small is beautiful’ a bit too far.

Have you ever sat on a bus a thought, “Wow I love that seat fabric, I wish I could have a sofa made from that”? Well now you can! The London Transport Museum is now selling furniture based on famous public transport seating fabrics. Check out the website to buy your very own orange and brown sofa, stool or bed: www.ltmuseumshop.co.uk/LTM/Furniture-collection.html