Personalization & Recommendations: Telling E-Tail Customers What They Really Want

By Rachelle Crum
E-Commerce Times
06/20/08 10:22 AM PT

Personalization is one way e-tailers hope to bolster their cross-selling and upselling efforts and increase customer loyalty. Online consumers are embracing the idea of having tailored suggestions served to them during various stages of their shopping experience.

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E-tailers are taking a new look at personalization these days as they hunt for more ways to cross-sell, upsell and encourage repeat business. E-commerce solutions providers and research firms are advocating the integration of personalization into online strategies as one way companies can optimize cross-channel marketing and keep pace with the industry's changing dynamics.

Personalization tools let e-tailers make tailored, real-time recommendations for additional purchases at various stages of the shopping cycle -- from the initial view of product details to the shopping cart and final order confirmation pages. They offer e-commerce firms opportunities to maximize the value of each customer interaction and promote customer loyalty .

The leading book retailers appear to have mastered this strategy: Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) has its "Recommended for You" items and "Customers Who Bought ... Also Bought"; Borders' (NYSE: BGP) new online storefront includes a Magic Shelf -- a feature that lets customers view as many as 20 shelves of book, movie and music titles matched to their tastes; and Barnes & Noble suggests items "You May Also Like" during checkout, in addition to listing "also bought" information.

A Top Priority

E-tailers are turning to personalization for an assortment of reasons -- to increase sales, to keep up with competitors, and to differentiate themselves in a crowded field.

Penetration of U.S. households is leveling off, and "the trick now ... is to get more out of existing customers," says Forrester Vice President and Research Director Carrie Johnson.

Experienced online shoppers like recommendations, she notes; they are much more interested in engaging with a customizable tool than others, and they're willing to spend more money.

"The bigger the spender, the more interested they are in personalized recommendations," says Lori Trahan, executive director of marketing for ChoiceStream.

Seventy-six percent of consumers polled for ChoiceStream's 2007 personalization survey said they wanted personalized recommendations, and 56 percent said they were more likely to return to Web sites that offer them.

Research and Solutions

Other researchers and e-commerce solutions providers -- including the Aberdeen Group, Sitebrand, ATG and Loomia -- are also pushing personalization with renewed gusto.

For example, Aberdeen reports that a whopping 91 percent of the Best-in-Class organizations that participated in a 2007 survey saw improvement in online conversion rates after introducing personalization.

"More and more retailers are turning to it," Sitebrand President and CEO Justin Shimoon told the E-Commerce Times. "The technology has gotten much better, and it's a proven methodology."

Countless retailers have been running their online storefronts for several years now, and are ready to take their operations to the next level, Brian Collins, vice president of product management for ATG, told the E-Commerce Times.

Companies used to view their online stores as just another outlet, but "I think there's just a certain level of maturity that retailers are reaching online," he said. "More recently, they've gotten more focused on optimizing e-commerce and taking operations that they have and increasing sales."

Weighing Options, Measuring Results

However, piecing together a personalization strategy can't be done overnight. Among the numerous factors e-tailers need to consider are whether to use manual or automated personalization tools (or a combination of both); how to measure results; and how to match products to customers -- including new, anonymous customers they don't yet know anything about.

E-tailers can use clickstream or popularity-based data to serve new customers with recommendations, suggests David Block, ChoiceStream's senior vice president of product marketing and product management. Within a few clicks by a new customer, a personalization engine can begin to make timely recommendations.

Alternatively, a retailer can suggest popular or traditional items instead of going out on a limb with scant data from a few recent clicks. Of course, that's not very personal.

"Traditional recommendations are valuable but limited," Block acknowledges. "They don't maximize the real estate [but] they're certainly far better than doing nothing."

E-tailers can also piece together suggestions by analyzing users' historical data -- that is, accessing cookies, Sitebrand's Shimoon notes.

However, while retailers are collecting these piles of data, they aren't necessarily being studious about measuring the results, adds Block. "Most retailers put solutions in place and actually don't measure them, [but] measurability is critical. ... Without the measurability, you don't know if you're succeeding."

Google Adding Social Features to iGoogle?

THIS IS VERY VERY SMART!!!!!

Read Write Web
Google hasn't said so, but Read Write Web's Josh Catone surmises that the Web giant aims to turn iGoogle, its start page, into a social network. Earlier this week, Google unveiled a new developer sandbox for the start page that includes support for its OpenSocial APIs, which Catone says "makes this officially the start of a trend we're seeing in start pages to get more social."

In its FAQ about the new iGoogle sandbox, Google suggests as much: "This is not the final network that will be used in iGoogle," the company writes about its "friends" section. "Users will have full control over who their friends are and will be able to easily modify their list of friends. Stay tuned for details."

RWW and other pubs have pushed the idea of social start pages for some time now. The homepage, a users' most visited page, is certainly a natural competitor for a social network; "Facebook is just launching their platform," Catone says in a previous post. For companies that provide souped-up start pages, like NetVibes and PageFlakes (which was recently acquired by LiveUniverse), adding social features is a logical next step. If Google really is adding social features to its start page competitor, don't be surprised if that sparks an industry wide trend. - Read the whole story...

Good Data to Prove OQ value

Can User-Generated Content Generate Revenue?

APRIL 17, 2008

“Show me the money!”

The user-generated content movement is no longer a fad.

In the US, eMarketer projects that the number of user-generated content creators will rise from 77 million in 2007 to 108 million in 2012.

The content is being read, seen and heard, too.

The number of consumers of user-generated content will increase from 94 million in 2007 to 130 million in 2012.

“US Internet users are creating and consuming user-generated content in record numbers,” says Paul Verna, eMarketer Senior Analyst and author of the new report, User-Generated Content: In Pursuit of Ad Dollars, “across an ever-expanding range of online content that includes video, audio, personal profiles, avatars, photo sharing, Wiki entries and product reviews.”

Beyond written blogs, established media outlets like CNN and MSNBC, as well as startups like video aggregator YouNewsTV, are empowering consumers to submit video clips and still images of unfolding events.

“Since many of the growing numbers of Internet users creating social media are also consuming it, this is a content chain that feeds on itself,” says Mr. Verna. “There is a seemingly infinite demand for content, and there are legions of Internet users armed with laptops, cell phones and digital cameras ready to deliver.”

So the content is there, but is it accompanied by a viable revenue model?

”Advertising revenues against user-generated content are modest,” says Mr. Verna,” and they are expected to stay that way for some time.”

Or, as Andrew Keen, author of Cult of the Amateur, said in a Newsweek interview, “Nobody wants to advertise next to crap.”

"Given the size and level of engagement of the audience, advertising revenues around user-generated content will not approach the level one might expect,” says Mr. Verna.

Nevertheless, eMarketer anticipates US user-generated content advertising revenue will reach $824 million in 2012, up from $162 million in 2007.

TWINE semantic web tool VIDEO

This is very interesting and clearly in the center of the next wave of the internet Semantic Web. A very relevant video in relationship to the future and how it relates to oneQube.com

What is the Recommender Industry?

GUEST COLUMN: What is the Recommender Industry?
Author: MSG Staff
By Dr. Rick Hangartner

Dr. Rick Hangartner, Chief Scientist, MyStrands, has nearly 30 years experience developing computing hardware and software in the aerospace, data communications, heavy-trucking, and supercomputing industries. Prior to joining MyStrands, he worked for seven years at Cray, Inc. developing high performance computing hardware and software.

No, the headline on this entry is not a careless grammatical error. Nor is the question really “What is the recommender market?” That would imply that “recommenders” are mature, well-defined technologies that deliver specific features and value to the online world. Emerging recommendation technologies are currently setting the standards for discovery and personalization in today’s social networking-dominated Web 2.0 environment-and the future of online social networking is all about discovery and personalization. While search engines help you find things you know you are looking for, discovery helps you find the rest.

If we accept that every business must make its case in 10 to 20 seconds on its Web site, then we are all but forced to admit that recommenders, more than anything else, represent the conceptual answer to the question, “How can I get that visitor/user/customer to realize that I offer something of value to him or her?”

Although venture capitalists and Web 2.0 users may find that claim to be just the tiresome excuse they need for hitting the “Back” button, the point is that a good argument can be made that unlike search engines, the recommender idea is a formal concept that has as many different concrete examples as there are separate market applications.

The recommender industry really is the business of pulling three components together into a system that helps a user-driven business convince their potential customers that they should stay for a while. These three elements include,

1) An effective model that relates the needs visitors have to what the business offers,

2) Quality data to build a model instance that relates specific needs to specific offerings, and

3) Unobtrusive means for easily and quickly determining an individual user’s needs.

Note that these three components are not quite as simple as “good (statistical) algorithms,” “a lot of data,” or “simple user interfaces.” In the coming years, defining an effective model will increasingly involve a scientific approach to understanding user needs and the market strategy of the business. Gathering quality data will require more sophisticated understanding of which data are actually relevant to the model. Devising means for characterizing an individual user’s needs will depend on a refined understanding of how people implicitly and explicitly signal needs that they themselves may not even fully understand.

In short, the recommender industry is the evolving business of building and deploying systems that reify some of the psychology of human economic transactions. What this means for the marketplace seems relatively clear: Search engines as we know them will never disappear. In the near term, search engines will increasingly incorporate simple recommender technologies to handle approximate queries (e.g., “You asked for this, and based on similar queries/behavior by others, you might be looking for this.”). But in the long term, the recommender industry will be larger, and recommender technologies will be more pervasive than the search industry and search technology as we know it.

Beyond that, some general themes about the future of the recommender industry that seem to be worth watching for include,

Multiple revenue models: Unlike search engines, which primarily are monetized through contextual ads of some form, recommender systems will be monetized in multiple ways. Recommender technology suppliers will continue to partner with customer businesses to derive revenue as a share of explicit sales increases directly accredited to the recommender system. In the longer term, recommender technology will increasingly enable business models, including advertising schemes, which could not exist without it. An implicit valuation for a specific application of a recommender system will be derived from the enabled economic activity.

Increasing focus on how users require change over time: In that recommender systems reify aspects of the psychology of economic transactions, there is an increasing appreciation for the probable value of responding to how economic behavior changes over time. This includes how an individual’s needs change over time and how the needs of the community evolve. The former can, in part, be accommodated by simply taking care to build a recommender system instance using data that is an adequate sampling of individuals whose needs are changing. Adapting to the latter may require recommender system models that explicitly incorporate features of how community needs to evolve.

New concepts of personalization: One of the recent trends in personalization is using information about an individual’s social network to better characterize that individual’s needs and interests. This may be just one aspect of a new concept of personalization that puts the focus not on delivering an isolating, customized experience to a person, but rather on connecting an individual with affinity communities who can provide information of value to that individual. Few people really want to be out there all alone. And for those explorers who do, they might, in reality, be hoping to build a community of like-minded souls or be waiting for others to catch up with them.

More than anything, the future of the recommender industry is a business that will continue to grow and become more sophisticated as the science of recommenders greatly develops to increasingly encompasses computer science, psychology, economics and cognitive science.

MediaTrust ALERT : new oneQube home page

Chris Smith and Joe have turned out a new home page for oneQube . Nice new look as we move forward into 2008 launches.

oneQube

In the first week of January we will be giving a company wide update on oneQube. This company session will start to be a regular series on oneQube and other areas of MediaTrust.

ANNOUNCING: widgetQube 1.5 Apple dashboard RSS widget

Mac Dashboard Widget

Cutting-edge news delivery on a cutting-edge OS. Mac users will feel right at home with the Mac Dashboard version of widgetQube's friendly interface and unique features.

What's new?
widgetQube v1.5 includes Leopard compatibility, updated interface components and improved feed handling. Version checking has also been added to make updating widgetQube in the future even easier.

OpenSocial opens new can of worms

By Caroline McCarthy
http://www.news.com/OpenSocial-opens-new-can-of-worms/2100-1038_3-6216300.html

Story last modified Wed Oct 31 13:57:13 PDT 2007

When Google announced that its new social-networking initiative would extend to any site that wanted to participate, the land grab for the social Web's attention just got a whole lot more intense.

In a move that was anticipated for weeks, Google has unveiled a set of application program interfaces (APIs) that allow third-party programmers to build widgets that take advantage of personal data and profile connections on a social-networking site. But instead of limiting the project to its own social-networking property, Orkut, Google has invited other sites along for the ride--including LinkedIn, Hi5, Plaxo, Ning, and Friendster.

The initiative, appropriately, is called "OpenSocial." It's a clear contrast to Facebook, the social-networking site that became the talk of the tech world when it announced the opening of its developer platform in May but has kept developer activity restricted to its own service (and has since signed an exclusive ad deal with Microsoft in exchange for an equity investment, likely snubbing Google in the process). When other social networks began to announce their own "platform strategies" this fall, concerns were raised that developers would have to create a completely new application for each site. That could prove inefficient and costly, especially for smaller developers working on a shoestring budget.

OpenSocial, should it prove successful, would change that entirely. "At its highest level, Google is a company that is dependent upon having a great Web platform," said Joe Kraus, Google's director of product management, in an interview with CNET News.com. "This announcement is about making the Web better."

Creators of third-party applications are understandably optimistic. "In a lot of ways this is the greatest thing that could've happened to us," said Ali Partovi, CEO of social music site iLike. "We've already been very successful with that strategy on Facebook, but then spreading to every other social network out there without an open standard would be much more expensive, harder to justify, and harder to prioritize."

Executives at the social networks participating in OpenSocial were equally enthused. "We're in a period of time when we're realizing that social Web stuff isn't just fun, it's really fundamental," said John McCrea, vice president of marketing at Plaxo. "What we're seeing in walled gardens like Facebook and MySpace is an attempt to create a Web operating system, so there's been all this talk over the past six months about platforms...By supporting these OpenSocial APIs, we can carve out real estate that can be populated with any sorts (of applications)."

Notably absent from OpenSocial is MySpace, which has announced early-stage plans for a developer platform strategy and already has its advertisements served by Google. "We would love MySpace to be a part of it," Google's Kraus said, but declined to say why the News Corp.-owned social-networking site--or Facebook, for that matter--is not part of the deal.

MySpace representatives declined to comment.

Multiple sources who spoke to CNET News.com both on and off the record hinted that we will, indeed, only see the tip of the OpenSocial iceberg when it's formally unveiled on Thursday night. The RSS technology behind Google Reader, for example, was rumored to be the engine behind a super-powered "social news feed" akin to Facebook's. But that's potentially on the way. "Orkut is the first customer of OpenSocial on the Google side," Kraus explained. "We think there are opportunities to make Gmail and iGoogle more social as well," he said, but declined to elaborate.

Even before OpenSocial launches, there's already plenty of speculation as to how else the program could expand from its initial incarnation. "Their missing element is social search," pointed out Gartner analyst Ray Valdes. "That's not part of the APIs right now and Google doesn't really have a social search engine in the same way that Facebook has."

Or Google could leverage its new partnerships with information-rich social media sites to boost its AdSense advertising program, especially considering that Facebook is planning to move into the sector. "All that information that they're getting from those social networks, they could use that for an upgraded model of AdSense," suggested AllFacebook blogger Nick O'Neill.

But as the OpenSocial overseer, working through partnerships rather than its usual strategy of acquisitions, Google might not have quite as much power as it's used to. "Partnerships can certainly be very efficient," said RedMonk analyst Stephen O'Grady, who specializes in open-source technology. "They can also be very challenging. You're trying to get a bunch of different firms with competing interests to try to go along. Coalitions of this sort can be problematic over time."

It could also mean some rather un-Googly red tape. The individual social-networking sites are responsible for getting their own arms of the project up and running, and exactly when that will happen is by no means clear. Friendster users, for example, won't see any OpenSocial widgets until at least the beginning of December, and LinkedIn representatives told CNET News.com that while developer activity will begin soon, the full presence of the new platform won't be felt until early 2008.

Now on News.com

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Additionally, some of the OpenSocial participants have not abandoned their existing in-house platform strategies. "We have our own developer program," Friendster Vice President of Marketing David Jones said. "(Developers) will be able to use either Friendster's platform or OpenSocial...We already have hundreds signed up for the Friendster developer program." Jones added that Friendster's own platform will launch on November 30, before its OpenSocial integration does.

Then there's the Curse of the Zombie (or Vampire, or Pirate). By opting into OpenSocial, a social-networking site may find itself at odds with users who find embeddable applications to be distracting at best and spam-worthy at worst. This is especially pertinent to sites like Plaxo and LinkedIn, which promote themselves as productivity tools rather than ways to "poke" your friends. "In some ways, any of these different attempts to mash up between a property and things created by a vibrant developer community does open Pandora's box," said Plaxo's McCrea. "I think certainly, the results to date for Facebook are mixed because of some of those overly viral applications."

Adam Nash, LinkedIn's senior director of product, emphasized that Google is allowing participating social networks to decide just how open they want their OpenSocial platforms to be. "(OpenSocial) doesn't change the fact that we truly have no interest in zombie biting and food fights on LinkedIn," he emphasized. "In order to be in the LinkedIn directory, we will have some set of standards."

"I can't say that there will be no risks here," McCrea said. "I think we're in an early phase of the social Web, and it's an experimental phase, so I think we'll be learning as we go."

Googles Response to Facebook:"Maka-Maka"

Google’s Response to Facebook: “Maka-Maka”
Erick Schonfeld
15 comments »
Google may have lost the bidding war to invest in Facebook, but it is preparing its own major assault on the social networking scene. It goes by the codename “Maka-Maka” inside the Googleplex (or, perhaps, “Makamaka”).
Maka-Maka encompasses Google’s grand plan to build a social layer across all of its applications. Some details about Maka-Maka have already leaked out, particularly how Google plans to use the feed engine that powers Google Reader (known internally as Reactor) to create “activity streams” for other applications akin to Facebook’s news and mini feeds. But Maka-Maka goes well beyond that.
Maka-Maka will be unveiled in stages. The first peek will come in early November. As we reported previously, Google is planning to “out open” Facebook with a new set of APIs that developers can use to build apps for its social network Orkut, iGoogle, and eventually other applications as well. To recap what we wrote earlier:
Google will announce a new set of APIs on November 5 that will allow developers to leverage Google’s social graph data. They’ll start with Orkut and iGoogle (Google’s personalized home page), and expand from there to include Gmail, Google Talk and other Google services over time.
On November 5 we’ll likely see third party iGoogle gadgets that leverage Orkut’s social graph information - the most basic implementation of what Google is planning. . . . Google is also considering allowing third parties to join the party at the other end of the platform - meaning other social networks (think Bebo, Friendster, Twitter, Digg and thousands of others) to give access to their user data to developers through those same APIs.
We’ve now learned that the original November 5 date Google is shooting for may be delayed. “They need more time,” says one outside developer working on the project. “It is a challenge for them,” confirms another. Still, the expectation right now is that some announcement will be made the week of November 5 (perhaps the 8th or the 9th), and will most likely be limited to Google’s existing social network, Orkut. The APIs will be announced, along with as many as 50 partners that have created applications on top of the APIs. (Most of the top app developers for Facebook will be included—think RockYou, Slide, iLike, SocialMedia, etc.—and a few new ones as well).
All eyes will be on Google, but don’t expect anything too earth-shattering straight out of the gate. Many of these apps will be copycats of what is already available on Facebook (just as the very first apps on Facebook were ported over from other parts of the Web). This first go-round, Google will just be trying to match Facebook’s ante. Remember, even on Facebook, the best apps didn’t emerge on Day One. And now Facebook has a six-month lead.
The bigger challenge for Google in the U.S. is Orkut itself. While there may be 24.6 million monthly visitors to Orkut worldwide, only 500,000 of those are here in the U.S., according to comScore. Cool social apps aren’t much good if none of your friends use them.
That’s where the bigger plan for Maka-Maka comes into play. Maka-Maka is very strategic for Google. Responsibility for it goes all the way up to Jeff Huber, the VP of engineering in charge of all of Google’s apps. Huber is on record as saying that the way Google plans to compete is by using the Web as the platform instead of trying to lock developers into Google’s own platform. One way it will do that from the start is by creating two-way APIs so that any app created for Google can be taken to other Websites. (Whether this will extend to actual user profile data within Orkut or elsewhere inside Google remains to be seen because of privacy issues, but the apps themselves will be portable). And data from other social sites will be able to be imported into Google’s social apps as well.
The bigger vision is to combine all of Google’s apps and services through Maka-Maka. Google already has so much data on you, depending on how many Google apps you already use. It just needs to bring everything together. Your contacts are in Gmail. Your feeds are in Google Reader. Your IM buddy list is in Gtalk. Your upcoming events are in Google Calendar. Your widgets are in iGoogle. And don’t forget about your search history. Overtime, Google will connect all of these together in different ways, along with data about you from other social services across the Web, and give developers access to the social layer tying all of these apps together underneath. The real killer app for Google is not to turn Orkut into a Facebook clone. It is to turn every Google app into a social application without you even noticing that you’ve joined yet another social network.

Announcing: widgetQube iPhone Edition

Announcing: widgetQube iPhone Edition

Now, you can run the award winning oneQube widget on your iPhone. widgetQube iPhone Edition is available for download here.

widgetQube

The way the ‘always on’ generation stays informed. widgetQube is an interactive virtual desktop accessory that makes it easy to view news from favorite websites and blogs by leveraging rapidly growing widget based standards and technologies. widgetQube makes it easy to see what’s going on in the world, with up to the date news conveniently delivered right to your desktop. No searching or surfing required! widgetQube is a constant and ‘always on’ desktop companion. Its persistence will insure that you stay informed and up to the minute with news and information in our busy modern age. Best of all, widgetQube is free.

Check out our other widgets at http://www.widgetqube.com, including our Mac widget, which was picked for the Apple.com Staff Pick List for the week of May 07, 2007 and made the top 50 most downloaded widgets list for the same week on the Apple.com Widget Gallery. Our Yahoo widget was aYahoo Gallery Pick the following week and made the top 50 most downloaded widgets.

All Ads All The Time On NBCU's New Didja.com

by Gavin O'Malley, Thursday, Aug 9, 2007 6:00 AM ET

TO CALL IT AN AD-SUPPORTED video-sharing site would be an understatement. Rather--on the premise that ads can be as entertaining as the shows they support--USA Network is preparing to launch a site to serve up ads exclusively. Scheduled to go live early next year, Didja.com will serve as a free archive of new and vintage TV spots, movie trailers and other brand-related content. "There's no doubt that commercials are major drivers of pop culture," said Bonnie Hammer, president, USA Network and Sci Fi Channel. "All you have to do is check out traffic on any video-sharing site. We want to own that watercooler conversation and become the go-to destination for on-demand advertising content." For the initiative, USA is relying heavily on the resources of parent company NBC Universal and its varied entertainment assets through the Universal Motion Picture Group; Universal Television Group, including NBC, USA Network, Sci Fi Channel, Bravo, CNBC, MSNBC and the emerging networks; Universal Media Studios; NBCU Television Stations; NBCU Digital Media and iVillage. Following the lead of major video-sharing sites like YouTube, Didja.com will be laden with social networking features to encourage engagement and community building. As such, visitors can rate, vote, comment, and interact with the ads they dig up in the archive. Going a step further, the site's "mash-up" toolkit will enable users to create brand interpretations, tributes, and parodies with various editing and drawing tools. Other personalization features will let viewers customize the site's layout. For advertisers, the site allows them to unload content remotely through a turnkey interface where they have the option to enable social networking features and set timers to remove content on a predetermined date. In addition, customized brand pages will let them include additional product information and pre-sale tools such as store locators, coupons, and incentives. On the site, advertisers will be able to "interact with an engaged audience and extend their marketing budgets online," said Michael Pilot, president of NBCU ad sales. "Additionally, NBCU's clients will benefit from Didja.com's research capabilities, including virtual focus groups, behavioral targeting, and data mining." Pilot and his team are presently looking for five to ten charter advertisers for the Didja.com's launch, that can secure premium placement on the site, as well as cross-promotional opportunities.

Online booksellers benefit from Boomer generation

Used books are big business. Marketers and online retailers looking for more readers need only look into the boomer generation to find both according to a recent study from AbeBooks.com. Their poll revealed that so-called Silver Surfers buy used books online but are also interested in creating their own online bookstores.
by Kristina Knight
More than 8,000 US booksellers sell through the AbeBooks interface.
Hannes Blum, CEO of AbeBooks.com said, “We’re seeing a commitment to put more used books for sale online – sellers already offer over 100 million books through AbeBooks so that could expand to 120 million by the end of 2008, which is great news for people who love buying used, rare and hard-to-find books.”
The study revealed that most of the booksellers working through AbeBooks left a white-collar job - teaching, sales and even some library work - to create their online store. Primarily time is spent actually cataloging inventory. Researchers also found that 21% plan to launch an e-commerce site in the near future, 25% plan to increase their book volume by 10% to 25% this year and about 60% operate only online.
Bravely offering much more than simply the current best-sellers, these used book hubs appeal to those looking for specific older, used and out of print titles. This also means their consumer base is willing to spend a bit more per title than those shopping at brick-and-mortar superstores.
In addition to selling books, the demographic of these booksellers are also voraciously reading books. Despite spending copious amounts of time running their online stores, they are reading between three and five books every week.

TrustedOpinion: Another spin on recommendation services

TrustedOpinion: Another spin on recommendation servicesTrustedOpinions calls this the Radar Score, and it does a very good job of simplifying the data. The system also shows you how your own calculated rating on a product is different from the site-wide average.One score does not fit all. ...Original Signal - Transmitting Web 2.0 - http://web20.originalsignal.com