Graham Charlton is Editor of the Econsultancy blog, covering e-commerce, SEO, and more. He also contributes to our Best Practice Guides and other reports. You can contact him at graham.charlton@econsultancy.com.
The Mirror's response to EU cookie law compliance
With just a few days left before the ICO begins to enforce the EU e-Privacy Directive, we are starting to see a few sites unveiling their approaches to compliance.
Two such sites are FT.com and Mirror Online, which are both using pop-ups to alert visitors to the sites' use of cookies.
As well as taking a look at the two news sites' responses to the EU directive, I've been asking Malcolm Coles, Product Director, digital at Trinity Mirror Group, about the Mirror's approach.
What do consumers think of social media marketing on mobile?
Stats show the massive growth in the use of smartphones to access social media, but how will consumers react to social media marketing on their mobiles?
Some of the stats in this DMA infographic suggest there is some resitance to this. For example, 44% regard marketing on mobile social media as invasive, while 52% believe that ads should only be seen by fans or followers of brands.
How can marketers react to multi-screen trends?
With increasing smartphone penetration, the growing use of tablets, as well as laptops and PCs, it's more than likely that people are viewing TV while using another device, or with one close at hand.
For our Multi-Screen Marketer report (free to Econsultancy members), produced in association with the IAB, we looked at the trends in this area, and the important lessons for marketers.
I'll look at some of the stats from the report, as well as examples of publishers and brands that are beginning to adapt to this trend.
Start Me Up! A profile of ProofHQ
ProofHQ aims to help marketing teams collaborate on content by digitising drafted design work, print ads, web pages, etc.
I've been asking CEO Mat Atkinson to explain more about the company, its business model, and future plans.
Ten interesting digital stats we've seen this week
I've rounded up some of the most interesting digital marketing stats I've seen this week.
Stats include multi-screen usage, mobile email, online returns, buying patterns of tablet users, social media customer service and Twitter's mobile user numbers.
This week's top six infographics
Here's a round up of some of the best infographics we've seen this week.
We have infographics on Facebook's IPO, bounce rates, keeping users engaged with your emails, tag management, and some great mobile stats.
If you can't quite read the text, click on the images to see a larger version...
Performance Marketing Awards: the winners
On Tuesday night, the sixth annual Performance Marketing Awards was held in London, attended by more than 800 people and judged by Econsultancy Research Director Linus Gregoriadis, among others.
The event was previously known as the a4u Awards, but the name was changed to broaden the remit of the awards, allowing entrants from the various sub-channels of performance marketing, including social, mobile, email, search and display, not just just the affiliate sector.
Handling online returns: 14 best practice tips
Returns are an issue for every retailer, and some sectors more than others.
They could be viewed as bothersome, but the returns process does offer an opportunity to showcase your excellent customer service and can have a positive impact of future retention rates, if done well.
There is much you can do to reduce returns rates, providing better imagery and information on product pages, but even the best site will experience returns.
So then it comes down to how you handle the returns process, and the better you handle this, the better your retention rates.
Here are 14 tips to help you to avoid annoying your customers...
Online shoe fitting app reduces returns by 23%
An app which allows customers to find more accurate information about the shoe size they need to order has managed to reduce fit-related returns rates by 23%
US retailer Running Warehouse has been using the Shoefitr app on its product pages since 2010, and the tool has been very popular with consumers.
By reducing fit-related returns, the app has enabled Running Warehouse to increase its profit margins by 2.5%.
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