The discussion regarding  shopping this holiday season has included mixed predictions, with most anticipating a modest improvement over last year’s total spend. The standout, of course is online  retail – which both Comscore and Forrester predict will see a marked improvement compared to last year, as well as the rest of 2009. The following is a snapshot of this holiday season, by the numbers. It offers valuable insight to the ways in which various demographics are spending, the trends in spending behavior, and where and how consumers are looking to spend:

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1. Can you tell us a little about your background and how you made it into your current role at Yahoo! Shopping?

Greg Hintz: My background is more financial than technical as I have a degree in Economics, am a Chartered Financial Analysis charter holder, and began my working career at Goldman Sachs. That being said I love technology and the Internet, and consider myself a closet technology geek.

My first professional exposure to e-commerce came while running SEM campaigns in the Mortgage space for a comparison shopping engine in 2003. In 2004 I moved to Yahoo! working for three years on the Business Operations team in the Search group. Having spent four years in Search, I decided to learn the Graphical Advertising space by taking a role as the head of Operations Finance for the Entertainment BU at Yahoo! based in Santa Monica. From there I moved into the General Manager Role of Yahoo! Shopping in January of 2008. Given the empirical nature of running a comparison shopping engine I believe my financial background has really helped me in my current role.

2. And for those few that might not be familiar, with Yahoo! Shopping’s interface or the user experience – how would you describe how the site functions and why consumers and e-tailers would want to be part of it?

GH: On Yahoo! Shopping, users can search, browse and compare prices between millions of products from tens of thousands of merchants. Our user experience makes it simple to narrow down this comprehensive selection by grouping the products into more than a thousand categories with millions of different product attributes. Whether you like your jeans skinny or boot cut, or your camera to be point and shoot or SLR, it’s easy to find the right product for you. When users have found the right product they can read reviews from users and experts, compare prices, and find which merchants have coupons or free shipping.

For e-tailers, Yahoo! shopping provides access to the largest audience of shoppers in the comparison shopping space – we’re the #1 comparison shopping site with more than 21 millions users per month. Yahoo! Shopping is the focal point for users across the Yahoo! network throughout the holiday season. Not only is the audience large, but it is well qualified. Users who come to the site with the intent to purchase, and when they click through to our advertisers they represent highly qualified leads. Whether advertisers want to drive immediate sales, or want to build their brand through graphical ads, Yahoo! Shopping is an essential place to advertise during the holiday season and throughout the rest of the year.

3. Are there factors that set Yahoo! Shopping apart from other online shopping communities and comparison sites?

GH: There are several factors that make Yahoo! Shopping one of the best places on the Internet to shop. In the early stages of shopping we provide more information for users. We have integrated the largest selection of “how to buy” articles into our categories, so users can read from trusted sources ranging from “Consumer Reports” to “Good Housekeeping”, which features to look for and which to avoid.

When users are doing their search we provide more attributes to narrow choices down than on other sites, including options such as the ability to narrow clothing and furniture by color.

Finally, when you’ve narrowed your choices down, Yahoo! Shopping is simply the best place on the internet to find a deal. We have integrated the most comprehensive selection of coupons with our core shopping experience so it’s easy to save money once you’ve found the right product.

4. So with all of that said, what do you believe Yahoo! Shopping’s role is in the shopping space?

GH: We are aware that people visit a number of different places when they shop, but we believe that Yahoo! Shopping is an essential place people should visit during their shopping experience. It’s a great place to get information and read reviews, it’s a great place to quickly narrow down your choices from millions of products and tens of thousands of merchants, but most importantly during these tough economic times, it’s the best place on the internet to save money.

5. In what ways is Yahoo! Shopping promoted, and – in this highly competitive industry/market – what is the most difficult part about creating new customers? What about retaining existing customers?

GH: Yahoo! Shopping is predominately promoted through online marketing channels, but we also benefit from the hundreds of millions of people who visit the Yahoo! network every day. When it comes to online shopping, people tend to visit numerous sites before making a purchase. We retain customers by providing the value proposition that you can read reviews and articles, find top brands, brick-and-mortar stores, as well as, your mom-and-pop shops right here on our site. And with our new deals and coupons site, Yahoo! Deals (http://deals.yahoo.com), people want to check back every day to take advantage of our exclusive daily deals.

6. With risk over-simplifying, how would you summarize this last calendar year?

GH: Given the state of the economy, the last 12 months have been extremely interesting in the e-commerce space. Some major trends have developed including increased sophistication of online shoppers, continued focus on deals/discounts/coupons, and finally a renewed focus on ROI maximization from e-tailers. We spent a lot of time over the past 12 months improving the User Interface and Narrowing Functionality of our site to meet the needs of increasingly sophisticated online shoppers. We see our users spending more time searching and then refining that search while on our site. As our users lives become busier they are looking for the most efficient way to save time and money by comparison shopping online.

Additionally, we launched Yahoo! Deals to address the needs of our users to save money given the current economic climate. Coupon usage and searches for online deals have spiked over the past couple of years as consumers look to find ways to stretch their paychecks further. Yahoo! Deals is the first website to provide daily deals, online coupons, grocery coupons, local coupons, store circulars and exclusive deals all in one place. Usage of Yahoo! Deals has grown dramatically since its launch as saving money by shopping online becomes a core part of consumer behavior.

Finally, our merchant partners have responded to the rocky economy by lowering prices to help drive sales. This in turn has caused our merchant partners to put more of a focus on ROI maximization. A little over a year ago Yahoo! Shopping Product Submit launched a bidded marketplace in an effort to help merchants focus on their most profitable categories and thus maximize their ROI. We continue to focus on ways to improve this very important metric in an effort to help e-tailers ride out this current economic slump.

7. What new tools or services have Yahoo! Shopping employed in the last year, in response to the recession?

GH: Yahoo! Deals is one great example of how we responded to the recession. It is the most comprehensive deals aggregation site on the internet. The site features exclusive daily deals on products ranging from video games, to clothing, to products for the home. The site features the largest selection of coupons available including online, local, and grocery coupons. The site also features other ways to save including weekly ads for stores in your neighborhood, personalized deals, and even a cheap gas finder. To make it simple to sort though all of these options we include the ability to search all of our deals, and save items for later.

Because we know how important comparison shopping is to consumers now, we also recently launched an iPhone app to help those consumers do their research on the go. Putting the capabilities of Yahoo! Shopping into the hands of consumers in the shopping context is extremely powerful. In the past, making comparison shopping conveniently available while people are shopping was not really possible. But now it’s a reality with the advent of true hand held computing in devices like the iPhone. In our app, shoppers can read and save detailed product information, compare the best prices and the get read reviews wherever they are. We’re very interested to see how the mobile landscape develops and are excited to be part of it.

8. E-tailers hype up Cyber Monday as the online equivalent of Black Friday, but does research indicate that this is the case? What has Yahoo!’s experience with this recent phenomenon?

GH: Generally speaking, yes — we do see spikes in traffic on Cyber Monday. But Yahoo! did some new research that showed that the Friday after Thanksgiving is becoming the new “Cyber Monday.”

The report showed that not only is Cyber Monday still a top online shopping day, but that the traditional offline shopping day Black Friday also proved to be a significant day for online sales conversions. In fact, online retailers experienced a greater percentage increase in conversions on Black Friday than they did on Cyber Monday.

We have some research here:

http://www.yadvertisingblog.com/blog/2009/10/12/black-friday-is-the-new-cyber-monday/

9. What do you think can be expected from shoppers – and from e-tailers – this holiday season?

GH: I hate to sound like a broken record, but the current economic climate is really driving consumer behavior this shopping season. Based on our internal data it is clear that holiday shopping started much earlier this year than previous years. Additionally, our Yahoo! Deals traffic has spiked as our users try to save money while shopping online. Based on these two data points, my opinion is that our consumers want to buy the same number of gifts this year as prior years, but have much less money to spend. As such, they are looking for cost savings aggressively and using comparison shopping websites as a tool to accomplish this.

10. Is there anything else you would like to add?

GH: One final interesting data point is that retail inventory levels are expected to drop significantly year over year. Specifically, Comscore mentioned that container shipment orders from retailers in the US are down 14% vs. last year. At the same time, consumers were trained last year to expect massive sales at retailers during the holiday shopping season. These trends could lead to a game of chicken between consumers and retailers this holiday season:

• Because of lower inventory levels, retailers may hold prices steady. However, as the shopping season wears on if consumers continue to wait for sales before buying retailers may blink and massively cut prices, which would be a big win for consumers, and a big loss for retailers.

• Alternatively, if consumers notice the hot products this holiday season are not available due to the lower inventory levels they may buy without waiting for huge discounts, which would be a big win for retailers, and a big loss for consumers.

In either case, shoppers who buy online, or simply pre-shop online and then buy in stores will win this holiday shopping season due to the time and money saving offered by comparison shopping engines and other e-commerce sites. I am really excited to watch this shopping season play out and look forward to continued growth in e-commerce in the years ahead!

Greg Hintz is the General Manager at Yahoo! Shopping.

The Sydney Morning Herald recently released an article on November 13, by Paul McIntyre, revealing the interesting results of a recent Nielsen Online study. According to a study of 100,000 Australians, an astonishingly high number of Internet users were able to recall ads they had viewed  online, and admit they were more inclined to buy those products. Interestingly, users who were unable to recall an ad – but had also seen the ad per Nielsen’s tracking -  turned out to be similarly influenced  by ads, as reflected in their buying patterns.

According to Tony Marlow, Nielsen Online’s research director for Asia-Pacific,  these findings are, “…real positive. It means you can get your message through to people without being intrusive or annoying.” The data from the Nielsen research also revealed that nearly one-third of online users who have seen an ad are then able to recall it when asked, a result researchers claim to be exceptionally strong.

According to Neilsen, this research suggests that the online industry will increasingly compete with rival media sectors for a larger portion of Australia’s $12 billion advertising market. Chief executive of The Interactive Advertising Bureau, Paul Fisher, said that Australia’s online ad industry has doubled its market share gains against other media sectors in the first six months of 2009 to 14.5% and may very well top 16% for the December half. To Fisher, “this is only going to accelerate the fact that online is one of the most effective advertising platforms.”

via Paul McIntyre @ The Sydney Morning Herald

DMNews.com featured an article by Carol Kroll last week, bearing mildly optimistic forecasting about retail e-commerce and advertising this holiday season. According to recent analysis by Google and OTX (a consumer research and consulting firm) 53% of 2009 holiday retail advertising budgets will remain the same as those of 2008, while 41% of retailers plan to increase their ad spending compared to last year.

According to Sandra Heikkinen, a spokesperson for Google, “…retailers had more of a chance to adjust their inventory.” She continues, “last year, they’d had allocated their inventory before the downturn and needed to get items off the shelves. This year, they were able to plan a bit better.”

She also added the fact that e-commerce – one of the few performers in last year’s holiday shopping season, – will continue to shine in 2009. Compared to 2008, two-thirds of retailers expect online sales to increase this year; only 12% expect sales to decrease. Coupons will continue to be a major motivating factor for consumers this year, according to the study, which revealed that 68% of consumers plan to use coupons this holiday season.

Last month, the National Retail Federation projected a 1% decline in overall holiday retail sales this year, decreasing from last year’s drop of 3.4%. The NRF also predicted a 3.5% decline in retail sales for the full year of 2009.

via at Carol Kroll @ DMNews

Black Friday is quickly approaching, and we all know what this means. Retailers are preparing for the post-Thanksgiving rush, and customers are doing their homework on the best-selling gifts, and where to find them at the best prices. But the holiday shopping season has changed  considerably in the last several years, most notably with the recession, and because of the steady growth of online retail. Have you ever wondered what Black Friday figures consisted of? The following info-graphic illustrates some interesting facts and figures about what is generally referred to as the most popular shopping day of the year – we call it, “Black Friday, by the Numbers”:

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Wonderful news!

We are very honored to learn that Permuto was just named to BusinessWeek’s inaugural list of “The World’s Most Intriguing Startups” for 2009.  The list highlights the hottest startups today who have a grand vision that forces you to consider how industries, economies, or the world could be remade.  In addition the company needs to be established and gotten some traction.

Permuto’s profile on the list can be found here.

Mashable recently featured a post that defines and identifies current social shopping trends. The author of this piece, Clay McDaniel – a co-founder of social media marketing agency, Spring Creek Group – claims that the Internet has, “…radically changed the way we shop.” Searching for promotion codes, free shipping, free return shipping, virtual models, and online chats with sales associates have all become commonplace today. According to a study released by Burst Media, 85% of all consumers plan to do shopping online this coming holiday season and will continue to do so throughout the next year. To McDaniel points we’re are entering whole new dimension: social shopping. Read more…

Permuto’s CEO, Shaukat Shamim, had the opportunity to present and participate in a panel today at the Monaco Media Forum (MMF).

Now in its fourth year, MMF brings together leaders of new and old media for two and a half days of high-level discussions about the future of online, broadcast and print communications.

Hosted by HSH Prince Albert II, the invitation-only event focuses on emerging opportunities in technology, distribution and content, along with related developments in marketing and finance.

Update: Here are some pictures from today’s event.

According to Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, some of the most fundamental changes that are taking place in new media are coming from retailers. To Sorrell, retail are the people who move fastest - especially in context of the recession. Retail understood price point evolution and the changing market place better than anyone.

View the video for more:

Cyber Monday is generally referred to as the online equivalent of Black Friday, the holiday season’s single busiest shopping day. The notion first came about when Shop.org realized that online sales tended to spike up for many retailers on the Monday after Thanksgiving. However, when the term was first used as a marketing tool, it was little more than that — in fact, to many it was only considered hype. However, over the last five years the term has become something of a self-fulfilling prophecy as more and more retailers are beginning to participate in Cyber Monday promotions, with daily sales rivaling the actual largest online shopping day of the season (traditionally mid-December). Interestingly, this may be the year Cyber Monday actually becomes the biggest online shopping day of the holiday season:

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