Commerce Weekly: Target doesn't want to be the showroom for online retailers. Target Sends Letter Vendors Asking for Help to Combat 'Showrooming' Comparison Shopping. Target Corp. is tired of being used.
In one of the starkest signs yet that chain stores fear a new twist in shopping, Target is asking suppliers for help in thwarting "showrooming"—that is, when shoppers come into a store to see a product in person, only to buy it from a rival online, frequently at a lower price. Last week, in an urgent letter to vendors, the Minneapolis-based chain suggested that suppliers create special products that would set it apart from competitors and shield it from the price comparisons that have become so easy for shoppers to perform on their computers and smartphones. Where special products aren't possible, Target asked the suppliers to help it match rivals' prices.
Today Amazon Will Give You $15 To Use PriceCheck and Screw Local Retailers. Amazon Price Check Discount Has Competitors Crying Foul. Amazon is giving comparison shoppers a quick-and-easy way to earn up to $15 in discounts, but the promotion is rubbing the online retailer's competitors and even some lawmakers in Washington the wrong way.
If you use Amazon’s Price Check mobile app on Saturday to compare the price of an item in a brick-and-mortar store with what you can get it for at Amazon’s website, Amazon will give you a 5 percent break just for going to the trouble. The Price Check app is free and works on the iPhone and Android smartphones. To use it, you scan a product's bar code, take its picture or say or type its name. The app then gives you the Amazon price. If you decide you'd rather buy the product from Amazon -- instead of the store you're standing in -- you can put it in Amazon's online shopping cart where you'll get a discount if you complete the purchase within 24 hours.
You can use the discount on three items for a maximum of $5 off each, so the most you'll save is $15. Retailers Fight Back Against Price Apps. Amazon Will Pay Shoppers $5 to Walk Out of Stores Empty-Handed - Tricia Duryee - Commerce. Amazon is offering consumers up to $5 off on purchases if they compare prices using the online giant’s mobile phone application in a store.
The promotion goes live Saturday and will serve as a way for Amazon to increase usage of its bar-code-scanning application, while also collecting intelligence on prices in the stores. This holiday season, mobile commerce is surging as more people become comfortable using applications on their phone to compare prices or simply shop when not at home or at work. On the Monday after Thanksgiving, the biggest online shopping day of the year so far, mobile sales reached 6.6 percent, jumping from 2.3 percent in 2010, according to IBM’s online retail study. Amazon is not the only company hoping for a strong mobile Christmas. Last quarter, eBay started airing TV commercials – its first in the past few years — to promote its mobile applications. Everyone except grandma is comparison shopping via mobile, study finds. Grandma and grandpa may not be doing it, but the rest of us are — and quite frequently at that.
Of course, we’re talking about the growing phenomenon of using a cell phone while shopping in stores to look up product prices or reviews. More than half of all adult cell-phone owners (52 percent) used their phone to either phone a friend, look up product reviews online, or comparison price shop during a 30-day holiday shopping period, according to Pew Research Center, a highly respected nonprofit center that studies the impact of the Internet on people and the world at large. Pew conducted telephone interviews with a nationally representative sample of 1,000 adults in the U.S., and detailed its findings in a report on how Americans used their phones to help them shop this past holiday season. “These findings show that the growing availability of smartphones and other mobile devices has dramatically changed the shopping experience,” Pew senior research specialist Aaron Smith said.
Shop O' Lot Offers 'Scan & Scram' Solution. US startup, Shop O’ Lot, has raised $500,000 (£312,000) to develop a retail mobile shopping app to help retailers keep their customers in the store shopping.
Shop O’ Lot was founded by internet veterans, CEO Bob Pack and CTO Andreas Hjelming. The team members come from AOL, Microsoft, Oracle and NetZero. Company backers include Roger Smith former CEO of Silicon Valley Bank, Dan Udoutch former EVP of Commerce One, and Shop O’ Lot founder, Bob Pack. Shop O’ Lot is a self-service platform which, the company says, makes major retailer participation very easy. The model is based on a predictive analysis engine, that builds a customer’s shopping profile, then allows retailers to reach these customers in real-time, while they are shopping. The Shop O’ Lot engine calculates real-time product recommendations and discounts for consumers so that they receive products and deals of high interest.
Mobile Commerce: How to Maximize it for You. Amazon app promo uses stores as 'showrooms,' say retailers.