Cupid Goes Head to Head With Economy This Valentine’s Day
Here’s the report about the prediction of American’s spending during Valentine this year, 2009, by The National Retail Federation. I thought it was interested so I brought it to you 
Thank you for good information from NRF; Here we go,
Click here for complete survey results and charts
For Immediate Release
Kathy Grannis (202)783-7971
grannisk@nrf.com
Cupid Goes Head to Head With Economy This Valentine’s Day
-Average Spending Decreases $20 as Consumers Buy Less for Each Other-
Washington, January 29, 2009 – There’s one thing that love may not conquer this year: the economy. The National Retail Federation’s 2009 Valentine’s Day Consumer Intentions and Actions survey, conducted by BIGresearch, found that consumers plan to spend an average $102.50 on Valentine’s gifts and merchandise, down from last year’s $122.98 per person. Total Valentine’s Day spending is expected to reach $14.7 billion.*
When it comes to spending, most people will still buy traditional favorites even though they plan to spend less. Over one-third (35.7%) of people will buy flowers, nearly the same as last year’s 35.9 percent, and 16.0 percent will buy jewelry, compared to16.6 percent in 2008. In addition, more people this year will send greeting cards than they did last year (58.0% vs. 56.8% in 2008). Others will head to their favorite restaurant (47.0%), purchase clothing (10.2%) or a gift card/gift certificate (11.0%).
“A bad economy won’t stop Cupid this Valentine’s Day, but it might slow him down,” said NRF President and CEO Tracy Mullin. “This year more than ever, consumers will look for creative and inexpensive ways to show those they love how much they mean to them.”
The majority of people (90.8%) will spend the most on their spouse ($67.22), with other family members such as children getting about one-fifth of their budget ($20.95). Consumers will also spend on friends ($4.74), children’s classmates/teachers ($3.59), co-workers ($1.94) and pets ($2.17).
“While some Americans will forego a gift and opt for quality time at home instead, others will simply set budgets and fixed amounts when exchanging presents,” said Phil Rist, Executive Vice President, Strategic Initiatives at BIGresearch. “Valentine’s Day this year will be more about small tokens of affection rather than extravagant purchases.”
The 35-44 year old age group will spend the most this year with the average person planning to shell out $119.19. Young adults 18-24 will be the second biggest spenders at an average of $113.68 per person, followed by 45-54 year olds ($108.82), 25-34 year olds ($105.59), and 55-64 year olds ($83.76).
About the Survey
The NRF 2009 Valentine’s Day Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey, conducted for NRF by BIGresearch, was designed to gauge consumer behavior and shopping trends related to Valentine’s Day. The poll of 8,850 consumers was conducted from January 1-8, 2009. The consumer poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 1.0 percent.
BIGresearch is a consumer market intelligence firm that provides unique consumer insights that are gathered online utilizing very large sample sizes. BIGresearch’s syndicated Consumer Intentions and Actions survey monitors the pulse of more than 8,000 consumers each month to empower its clients with unique insights for identifying opportunities in a fragmented and changing marketplace.
The National Retail Federation is the world’s largest retail trade association, with membership that comprises all retail formats and channels of distribution including department, specialty, discount, catalog, Internet, independent stores, chain restaurants, drug stores and grocery stores as well as the industry’s key trading partners of retail goods and services. NRF represents an industry with more than 1.6 million U.S. retail establishments, more than 24 million employees - about one in five American workers - and 2008 sales of $4.6 trillion. As the industry umbrella group, NRF also represents more than 100 state, national and international retail associations. www.nrf.com.
from : http://www.nrf.com/modules.php?name=News&op=viewlive&sp_id=661
picture : http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/redrose.jpg
Trump: Obama ‘absolutely right’ on executive pay cap
(CNN) — Donald Trump, businessman and CEO of The Trump Organization, knows a little something about money.
Donald Trump says President Obama is trying to solve the nation’s economic woes, but it’s “trial and error.”
Trump spoke with CNN’s Larry King about whether there should be executive pay limits, if there should be a stimulus plan and when there could be an end to the economic downturn. The following is an edited portion of the interview.
Larry King: Is Obama right or wrong to go after these executives with salary caps?
Donald Trump: Well, I think he’s absolutely right. Billions of dollars is being given to banks and others. You know, once you start using taxpayer money, it’s a whole new game. So I absolutely think he’s right.
King: What about the whole concept of bailouts?
Trump: Well, it’s a little bit different. A lot of people are not in favor of bailouts. You know, we talked about all the different things going on in this country. Let’s face it, Larry, we are in a depression.
If they didn’t do the bailout, you would be in depression No. 2 and maybe just as big as depression No. 1, so they really had to do something. The problem is they’re giving millions and billions of dollars to banks and the banks aren’t loaning it.
Don’t Miss
If you are a prime customer of a bank and if you need 10 cents, you can’t get it. The banks are out of business. They’re not loaning. Now, billions of dollars has been given. They’re supposed to be loaning out that money and they’re using it for other purposes, so it is a real mess.
King: If you were in the Senate, would you vote for the stimulus plan?
Trump: Well, I’d vote for a stimulus plan. I’m not sure that all of the things in there are appropriate. Some of the little toys that they have are not really appropriate, and they’re a little surprising that they seem to want it, because the publicity on it has been terrible.
I would certainly vote for a stimulus, but I would really vote for banks having to loan out the money because they’re not doing that.
King: In your adult career, have you ever seen it worse?
Trump: No, this is the worst ever. This is the worst I’ve ever seen. 1990 was a bad period of time, but this is far worse, and this is worse on a really global basis. I’m looking at different countries. Every country is bad. Now they’re blaming us because of what happened. You know, why not blame the United States? But every country is in trouble.
King: Can you put the blame anywhere?
Trump: Well, look, it’s something that, to a certain extent, happens. You go up, you go down. You have recessions. If you just look at the charts over the period of 150 years, you’ve had good times (and) you’ve had bad times.
Certainly, there’s been a lot of greed. There’s been a lot of stupidity. You know, like I say, today the banks don’t have money, they don’t loan money. But if you went to a bank two years ago and you wanted a $300 million loan, they’d say ‘No, we don’t want to do that, but we’ll give you $400 million,’ so I guess, to a certain extent, that’s part of the problem.
King: If you had the power, if you could wield, what would you do?
Trump: Well, the biggest problem we have is it’s trial and error, Larry. I mean we’ve never had anything like this before. It is absolute trial and error. They’re trying. The new president is trying. Bush left him with a mess — a total mess in many different ways. I really think he’s doing the best he can, but it is trial and error.
They try something, if it works, great. If it doesn’t work — and the problem is you don’t really know if it’s going to work for quite some time. If it’s really wrong — and it could be wrong — we’re going to really have a mess in two years.
from : http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/personal/02/05/lkl.donald.trump/index.html?eref=rss_topstories
When Sex Refuses to Sell
Just attracted by the topic from copyblogger site, what a WOW!!
You can see all the details below,
I remember the first big spike in traffic we received at the online publication I edited at the time.
It had to do with large breasts.
And it was one of the first lessons I had in traffic and – more importantly – quality traffic. It’s a lesson I still remember today when I write my blog.
Readers, Readers, Readers
Something journalists have in mind when we’re editing newspapers, magazines or online news sites – apart from reporting the news – is readership. That’s why headlines, for example, not only tell the story but often do so in an intriguing, thought-provoking way.
It’s also why some stories are chosen over others: they’ll be more interesting to readers.
It’s why (I think wrongly) the online newspaper I worked for several years ago followed the antics of Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan like a drooling fan.
But back to the breasts.
Back in 2000 we published a story about a survey – which was spurious at best, I’m ashamed to admit – that found Dutch women had the largest breasts in Europe.
The story got picked up by the Drudge Report, which linked to it from its front page and sent our traffic through the roof.
More stories about breasts, please, said the company money guys. We like that lovely traffic.
But they were wrong.
The story did us little good. Indeed it probably harmed us.
Why Not All Traffic Is Created Equal
Because when we looked at where these visitors were coming from, they were in locations we weren’t targeting. (Frankly, I suspect most readers were 14-year-old boys in their bedrooms.)
And because we made money through selling advertising on the site, it harmed us commercially: our click-through rate on that day plummeted. After all, people from around the world who were looking for stories about breasts weren’t the kind of prospects the banks and insurance companies that were advertising on the site were likely to attract. These financial institutions wanted high-earning executives in two specific European countries.
So when, six years later, I worked on the traffic-obsessed website of a daily newspaper – and therefore delighted to cover the antics of Britney and Lindsay – I was wary. While those stories might have done well on Digg.com and given a jolt to the day’s traffic, they did little to grow the readership that really mattered. They didn’t attract the kind of readers the newspaper and its advertisers were interested in.
And they weren’t the kind of readers who would enter into a relationship with the newspaper.
Chasing Britney and Lindsay was like drinking a Coke for lunch – empty calories.
Instead of traffic for the sake of traffic, I like to think of “the right kind of traffic” – the kind of viewers who are likely to come back, subscribe to your RSS feed, and sign up for your email newsletter.
The rest just bounce like a bad check. And that’s fine.
The Three Rules of Targeted Traffic
So here are my three tips for getting the right kind of traffic for your blog.
- Decide who your ideal reader (the person most likely to come back to your blog frequently) is and write your posts for that reader.
- Avoid going off-topic, even if you know that topic might get you on Digg.
- Write that post – and its headline – so that it’s as interesting to your targeted reader as a story about Lindsay Lohan is to a 14-year-old boy in his bedroom.
About the Author: Simon Payn has left the newspapering world and now blogs about the power of customer newsletters and offers real estate newsletters that Realtors can use to build relationships with clients and prospects. He’s also on Twitter.
from : http://www.copyblogger.com/when-sex-refuses-to-sell/
The Goal is the Interaction
You can’t deny that now a day, to have a blog is important to you, I think it’s such a really important factor to get in to the game! Here are some idea from Chris Brogan.
Do you want a more successful blog? Would you like to make more connections in Twitter? Are you wondering how to get more value out of your experiences online? Focus on everything that encourages more interaction and participation. It’s a magic trick that works every time.
A Tale of Two Interactions
I’d like to offer you a choice. You may either sit in a quiet room and watch a recorded presentation given by one of the smartest, most thought-provoking women in the world, or, you can have a live meeting with a very smart and incredibly engaging woman, eager to hear your ideas and to talk with you in detail about your future goals and needs. Which would you choose?
Another choice: hang out with your buddy who brags about his sales all day, or spend time with a couple of friends who share ideas and listen to your challenges?
When we talk in terms of people, it’s pretty obvious, right?
Now, which face are you showing through your online presence? Are you the live and participatory, the sharing and thoughtful, or are you a one way street?
The Simplest of Interactions
Commenting and rating and voting are all very low-impact interactions. One of the main points of Amazon.com is that people can rate the products they’ve purchased, or leave reviews. Albert Maruggi and I are doing some work with a company called Quick Comments. They have some simple interactions in mind from their tool. There are votes in Digg, and star ratings in YouTube.
We feel something when we do even these simplest of interactions.
Consider Your Online Participation
If you’re on Twitter pitching your products and services all the time, or pointing to your blog posts ceaselessly, are you encouraging interaction? Shift a good portion of your effort into finding people of interest and talking with them about their projects, their success, their challenges. (Good salespeople know this inherently: that it’s all about the other person. Some of the rest of us don’t come to this realization readily.)
On your blog, are you writing strictly as the authority? How can you encourage a more two-way conversation?
If you’re marketing or performing any kind of business communication through video, is there a way to add participation around it? How can you encourage more interaction than simply encouraging a viewing habit?
Even in the event space, participation is key. I run a conference series and we’re working on ways to amp up the interaction during the events (not to mention before and after). One way we’ve come up with was to make the primary theme of the events “Strategy Into Action.” We’re encouraging our participants (not attendees) to bring business case questions for the speakers and exhibitors to solve. Why? Because we thought it would be a great way to make the events more participatory. (We learned it from PodCamp.
Question Everything
If you’re using online media tools like blogs, podcasts, and the like to reach new people, what choices are you making along the way? How do those choices encourage or discourage more participation and interaction with your chosen audience? What roadblocks or turnoffs have you put in the way of these things?
Everything I do on the web is based on the goal of extended human interactions. These types of questions have made the difference in what choices I make in my blogging, in my use of Twitter and other social networks, in why I shoot video sometimes instead of just typing. I encourage you to take a quick audit of how you’re using the tools. How are you doing in the interaction/participation category?
Photo credit, YuvalH
from : http://www.chrisbrogan.com/the-goal-is-the-interaction/
Xantech intros XIS100 iPod dock for high-res TVs
I can’t wait to see it in Thailand!!! Cool stuff !!!
We’re used to seeing a new iPod dock every day or so. They turn up like bad pennies. But Xantech’s XIS100 iPod docking station is a little different, focusing on high-res videos. It’s perfect for the modern high-end A/V system. In fact, it’s being touted as the first docking station designed for high-resolution televisions and features a unique component video output capability that will enable owners of the new 480P video output iPods to see their video in full native resolution on a plasma, LCD or other compatible TV screen with component video output.
The Xantech XIS100 is a stand-alone iPod dock that is compatible with all current iPods. Comes complete with a 15 button remote with chrome finish. The dock station with touch panel also features an On-TV menu display for music and video navigation.
Anyone who likes a lot of video on their iPod will want to pick one up. No word on a date or a price yet.
from : http://www.slipperybrick.com/2009/02/xantech-intros-xis100-ipod-dock-for-high-res-tvs/
Art from Above: The Coolest Crop Circles and More
I used to post some similar stuff at my Thai language blog about Picture from Space; Face from Space - View from the TOP. Today I’ve got feed from WebUrbanist. Thought it’s cool, so let make a share. If you like it you can submit an RSS at their web site.
Whether you’re convinced that crop circles are caused by some extraterrestrial force or believe it’s the work of humans, you’ve got to admit that some of the designs are pretty incredible. And, these mysterious and intricate field patterns aren’t the only amazing things you can see from the air – snow raked into swirly designs, Japanese rice paddy art, strange spontaneous sheep formations and even ‘transformer’ robots made from choreographed vehicles all make for impressive high-altitude viewing.
Real-Life Transformers Made from Vehicles
(images via: SoothBrush)
Boilerplate
If you like it you can add RSS feeder at http://www.businessdictionary.com/
Boilerplate
Definition 1
Ready made content, design, or format that fits a variety of uses.
Definition 2
Standard legal language (the fine print) used by banks, insurance companies, landlords, service providers, vendors, etc., and printed often on the back of common insurance, loan, and tenancy agreements, and bills, invoices, receipts, etc. Boilerplate clauses are drawn from the long legal experience of big firms, and normally cannot be negotiated by the client or customer. See also adhesion contract and template.
boilerplate is in the Business Communications & Presentations and Corporate, Commercial, & General Law subjects.
boilerplate appears in the definitions of the following terms: adhesion contract, template and standard contract.
from : http://www.businessdictionary.com/
The Importance of Nurturing by Jeremiah
Since I started my work as a web analyst, Jeremiah is one of my mentor about how to do a good web site. Here’s an article from him.
It’s amazing how things come back around, when you least expect them.
Earlier today I talked to John Batelle, the CEO of Federated Media, he spends a lot of time educating clients and helping them learn, moving them from the “Why” to the “What” to the “How” questions. It pays off for him in spades, as he’s able to demonstrate his knowledge, leadership, and get his customers to trust him and his company.
A few years ago, I helped a junior PR person at an agency try to understand social media, I even had a phone call with her to give her some guidance and share what I know –there wasn’t anything in it for me. Two years later, she joins the corporate communications group of one of the world’s largest tech companies, and became my internal champion.
She arranged for some internal client calls where I offer them some advice (called client ‘inquiry calls) It grows to a scoping call, which grew from department to department to department. It’s now grown into a very large customer research project –that spans nearly the entire enterprise. We deliver the research results in the near future and hundreds of employees will be in attendance and the data will be used to shape how they approach social media for the long run. In fact, if you’re a social media vendor or agency to this brand, it’s likely you’ll eventually see some of the research that we prepared and you can factor into your work with the brand.
Just goes to show, that helping people –even when there’s nothing in it for you– can lead to great rewards in the future. Sadly, times for me have changed, I had 10 meetings alone today, and don’t have enough time to even talk to personal friends during the work day, so I have to rely on this blog to help others –although it’s not as personal as even a phone call.
Be good to others, share with them and nurture them, can’t thing of anything more ’social’ than that.
from : http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2009/02/02/the-importance-of-nurturing/
The Ultimate Urbanist Guide to Uncanny Architecture
I don’t know why weburbanist team has such an energy to find topics to stun me many times in a week. Let’s stunning you to with these cool stuffs.
We are surrounded by the built environment day in and day out, but how many buildings still turn your head, make you scratch it or even turn it upside down (your head, not the building … well, not most buildings anyway). Over time we have collected some of the most crazy architectural designs and creative engineering marvels from around the world and grouped them by type, theme and (as always) adjective - from the remotest and most unattainable luxury private island architecture to hidden rooms and doors that may be lurking in your own house.
Contemporary Architecture and Cutting-Edge Design
Though there are some unbelievable homes and amazing house designs around the world, many of the most incredible buildings designed today do not fit readily into our standard vision of architectural types. Tree houses bring us back to our childhood while house boats bring out the adventurer in us. The institutional places where the public come together, however, are where you can find the work of many of the world’s most talented architectural designers.
How do your customers describe you?
As promised, I want to spend the next couple Thursdays talking about word of mouth marketing. We all want our customers to tell their friends and colleagues about us but do we have any idea what they might be saying?
Here’s a ten minute assignment for you.
Go to your favorite free online survey tool, like Survey Monkey. Create a new poll and ask these three questions:
- Do you ever talk about McLellan Marketing Group (obviously, fill in your own company name!) emial
- If so, what do you tell people about us?
- If you had to describe McLellan Marketing Group in a single word, what word would you choose?
Now, send an e-mail to all your clients, past clients, vendors, etc. Explain that you’re trying to understand how you’re perceived in the marketplace and because you value the relationship you have with them, you’re counting on them to be candid on a very quick, 3 question survey.
The power of this is two-fold. One, you’re going to get some eye-opening insights. But second, you are making the people you survey feel important and valued. And in a subtle way, suggesting that you might be talk-worthy.
Send out the survey and prepare to be surprised. Most of the time, people do not spout off your features and benefits. They talk about what sticks with them, what feels different, something that surprised them.
What do you think they’ll say?
from : http://www.drewsmarketingminute.com/2009/01/how-do-your-customers-describe-you.html
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