Lenovo has teamed up with VeriFone to offer a mobile POS solution based on Lenovo's new thinkpad. This offers yet another processor agnostic solution for merchants and retail chains. It also reaffirms VeriFone's commitment to support the growing change in how payments are accepted among customers.

The new unit will feature some great security features such as remote wipe and tracking as well as resetting devices. These are great features for IT in major chains and should give VeriFone a competitive edge among agnostic POS solutions.

It looks like Barnes N Nobles is finally settling their patent disputes with Microsoft and teaming up with Nook. This is a great opportunity for the platform to not only have access to more books, but more importantly access to educational textbooks.

Nook is positioning itself to be the digital replacement for the text book. Although acceptance is far from certain, the lower price point and subsidiary investment of 300 million by Microsoft gives them a good chance. Ideally schools should give these away to freshman as part of their enrollment package with a subsidy from the new venture. This same plan helped to establish Microsoft software back in the late 90's as the software of choice for business owners.

Looks like a nice competitor for the Ipad is finally arriving.

Well is looks like we have a Heartland 2008 all over again. Major news outlets as well as Visa/Mastercard are reporting a major data breach at an acquiring solution today. Millions of card numbers are exposed with some of those card numbers already being used for illegal purchases.

Both MasterCard and Visa emphasized that their own networks had not been penetrated.

In data breach situations, credit card companies generally offer affected customers fraud monitoring services at no cost -- and customers aren't on the hook for any fraudulent charges. The card issuers themselves are responsible for those costs.

FTC first action against affiliate networks

In a precedent, the FTC has settled with affiliate networks who's sub affiliates used fake news runs to advertise various products and services. This decision is forcing networks to be accountable for the advertising their sub-affiliates promote. Recently the FTC held a company responsible for the same type of infringement. In both cases the company and networks were unaware of the advertising their affiliates were promoting, but still held accountable.

The settlement requires the  defendants to clearly state when their commercial messages are advertisements rather than legitimate journalism. How does this affect the marketing your company is running? 

Companies today focus on graphics, color, and other tactics. With the new advertising platforms today, its so easy to forget the simple things.Mobile advertising typically fails to incorporate an old but very basic opportunity, the phone call.

Today's mobile marketing platforms need to have a click to call function built into all of their ads. What a better way to convince a customer then placing a trained sales associate on the call with an interested client. This can even be an incentive based ad campaign to increase conversion. Not only will the marketer be able to ROI more effectively, but they can also capture data about the customer and why they may not be converting through direct conversation.

Its important for the sales associate to have the ability to sell multiple levels of offers to the client as the initial mobile ad may not be exactly what the customer is seeking.

For more information on how to convert mobile ads into sales, contact us at Total-Apps.com

It looks like Google is getting ready to change its "Googlebot" again. Just as sites have started to see results from the dreaded Panda update of 2011, Search Engine Land's Barry Schwartz reports that over optimized SEO sites are about to be targeted.

Now the specifics of course are not detailed, but we can guess it will have to do with keywords or tag clouds, and focus more on content then back links. This change along with the integration of Google + content looks to shake up the SEO world for 2012. Look for most companies to guess through the 3rd quarter before true results can be seen.

Yahoo has thrown its hat into the patent lawsuit arena by filling suit against Facebook. It's important to know Yahoo has done the exact same thing with Google during their IPO. With the change in leadership, Yahoo is looking to reestablish its hold on the advertising market by requiring licensing fees. This has a secondary benefit of additional revenues from a big up and comer such as Facebook.

With companies poised for IPO especially fragile to lawsuits, there is a good chance of this settling before that date. It really just depends on what they decide to do. Yahoo has far more patents then Facebook and could give them the biggest fight yet on who own the technology used in the space today.


 

Selling an app through Google Play? Your options for receiving payment are about to be limited. Google is pressuring mobile application developers to accept Google Wallet as the only form of accepted payment within the Google Play application store. This will remove cheaper options such as PayPal, Boku, etc. and force developers to incur a higher processing cost for their apps to get to market.

The purpose is a more streamlined purchase process and "catch up" for Google Play to the Apple app store model. Both of these model reduce the capital available to developers to advertise and expand their game based platforms. Hopefully over time the price structure of these distribution networks will mirror more of an Amazon and Ebay Store cost. Until then developers will just have to survive.

Mobile credit card swiping is the revolution of technology, not the process. Regardless of of fancy or easy it the transfer of funds are, they still go through enterprise bank level systems. Square is a very expensive no start up cost model. They are designed for micro merchants (under 1k per month) and offer no customer support in order to save costs.

Rates are 3%+ and 0.35 cents with settlement times ranging from a few days to 1 month depending on your history. You do not have your own descriptor (IE name on clients bill) which give your customers the view that you are a start up(same as paypal). That being said mobile credit card processing is going to replace what we call voice authorization in the credit card space. Here are 20 business that could benefit from the use of a mobile credit card payments

Flea Market Vendors:

These vendors will benefit the most as they can move lots of merchandise and give customers more option then cash. They can also lower the cost of using wireless terminals (700 a piece) and have more in the salesmans hands to increase sales and cover more ground

Handyman:

These guys are notorious for having to call in approvals on a paint laced phone. Having the ability to swipe your card there and email you a receipt for your work would help them greatly. Also customers can pay once the work is done and feel more confident that the repair man will show vs a cash transaction.

Delivery Services:

Pizza and grocery delivery can take place at point of delivery now again with a swipe. Mobile swipe technology (at least ours =)) geo tags the sale and prints a google map of the location as an added security feature.

Tow Truck Services:

No more calling it in or verifying and collecting afterwards. Stuck in the middle of the night, the mobile app can let you pay for repairs, parts, and service right on the side of the road. This is why AAA has started using battery trucks. buy and install on site.

Street Vendors:

Fake watches can now be charged on your credit card! This will increase quality of the products as customers can charge back if their fake rolex stops ticking in a few days. Also it keeps the vendors honest.

Churches:

Tired of watching people pass the basket and looking at them only put in a dollar. Well just place a swiper in the basket and swipe your donation away. No one will know how much you pay. ;)

Non Profit Organizations:

Donations and events are typically done offsite. Giving one of these to your volunteers and have them return it end of day is a great way to help your organization.

School Bakeries:

Remember Moms and students with the little cash box and never enough change or asking for 1 and 5's? Never again with the mobile swipe technology. They just swipe and go.

Small Business Owners:

Gives them mobility and lets them take deposits or partials right at the end of a sales meeting. 100 dollars down sir and a signed contact. Then they just charge the rest upon completion of terms.

Fast Food Chain Drive Through:

In and Out does it with order taking, but taking it  step further and allow them to swipe the card through a mobile POS(point of sale) system would greatly accelerate the drive through lanes during those busy times.

Hotels and Beach Front Resorts:

No more asking for ID and charging the room. Nice to just take a card on the beach or at the bar. A card can even be on file at time of check in with a mobile card acceptance at all serving locations where the client signs.

County and State Fair Booths:

Tired of trying to find the ticket booth or having 4 tickets and need 5 to play? how about a swipe and go model or even the solar powered RFID and NFC model mobile swipers. Click and play. instant gratification.

Package Delivery (Replace COD)

Give customers another option when packages are sent Charge on Delivery. the same system you sign for can easily have a swiper built in. Same signature would count as a confirmed sale.

Vending Machines

Although its starting to get out there. Technically mobile swipe technology could be rolled into vending machines and allow people to pay with their credit cards instead of cash. This would reduce increase payment options for the customer. (although E wallets like PayPal and Kuapay will probably be used)

Peer to Peer Purchases

Wanna buy that guitar from your friend? Let him accept payment from your mom's(I mean your student) credit card. 

Garage Sales

How many times have you found that item you've been looking for only to be 20 bucks short and someone else snags it. Well with mobile swipe, your garage sale could accept credit cards in the future.

Trade Shows:

Accept payment for events or have staff walk around and upsell existing attendees with shows and merchandise.

These are just a few of the businesses that can get away from the country and engage their customers through out their shopping experience.

We get asked alot what is the best way to optimize a landing page? This is truly the million dollar question for most online merchants. A company can drive as much traffic as possible to a page, but if it does not meet the customer's needs or is confusing, conversions just cannot happen. Here are some suggestions for maximizing conversions on your landing page.

Make checkout Simple
We've all seen sites that have tons of upsells or it's impossible to find the check out button. Think less is better when it comes to the check out. You can always capture more data on your customers or offer them other services through a monthly newsletter.

Remove Links
Some customers leave because another section of your site interests them. When they are on your buy page, make sure they are not distracted by other items and focused on completing the purchase.

These small changes should help you increase conversions on your website.

Visa announced a new partnership with Vodafone today. The new mobile payment solution will use Visa's payWave technology and installed SIM cards in smartphones to handle the NFC transactions. The mobile wallet will also be able to manage other accounts like loyalty and rewards programs and gift cards.

The service will be launched first in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Turkey, and the UK starting sometime in the next financial year and will roll out to other markets over time.

Any Visa card issuers will be able to work with Visa and Vodafone to enable mobile payments for their customers, backed by all the security, trust and global acceptance the Visa brand represents.

Vodafone said the partnership is just a part of its larger m-commerce strategy, a strategy it hopes will give consumers a comprehensive mobile-based alternative to the cash and cards. Vodafone said it is already in discussions with a large number of service providers like banks, retailers and event organizers to host a broad range of services on its new mobile wallet.

A recent study is confirming retailers fears. That customers are using their stores to browse, then purchasing online using widely popular bar scanning software. Market research firm ClickIQ Inc found that 46 percent of the respondents who shopped online within the past six months first checked out the product at their local retail stores and then made the purchase online, often from a different source.

This trend is looking to grow forcing companies like Target to request unique products from their manufacturers. Until then, stores will have to compete more on price as 87 percent of respondents shopped online because it was cheaper.

The IRS announced to a couple retail trade groups that is would not require merchants to reconcile the amount they list on Form 1120 and other business income-tax returns regarding gross payment card sales. Merchants were concerned they would have to match with what their merchant acquirer or network reports to the IRS as card receipts on a new form, the 1099-K.

The IRS had already given merchants a pass on such reconciliation for tax year 2011, but groups such as the National Federation of Independent Business, a small-business organization, and the Retail Industry Leaders Association representing large retailers had sent letters urging the IRS to remove the requirement for tax year 2012 and beyond.

Visa is looking to roll out a new fee to acquirers in the United States. The fee is looking to replace or lower the variable fee currently being charged. With other issuers not following suit, Visa is believed to be attempting to increase its competitive edge with merchant acquisition.

Banks have are awaiting details on the fee to determine if they will absorb or pass on the fee to merchants. With banks looking for ways to recoup lost funds due to the Durbin Amendment, we should anticipate the latter.

Marketing your company with zero advertising dollars use to be impossible. But with the emergence of Social Marketing, SEO, and other great tools. Its now possible to get your message or product in front of millions of people for no money. Here are some simple ways to start

Network Face to Face

To build your company, start networking. Ask what people do. Say hi at dinners. Talk to your friends and family and keep talking about your message or service. Determine where your product or service can help those you meet and offer to leverage each other's assets to obtain higher ground.
Be Persistent

Be Persistent

Just because they do not return the first call does not mean they are not interested. Most business owners or entreprenuers are really busy. Call once a week or every 3 days until you can make a connection. Persistence is key here. If you do not follow up, you will not grow your network.

Get Online and Promote

No website? Missing a corporate email address because you are just getting going? No problem. Set up business pages on the major social Networking sites. You can ours here Total-Apps. Start communicating and participating. It will not only allow you to promote, but see where your product fits in the marketplace.


These are just a few of the great ways to promote your company with zero advertising dollars. To learn more, inquire with one of our account specialists on merchant accounts and accepting credit cards for your venture.