Global Media News

Successful E-Mail Marketing: Fashion E-Commerce

If you have ever shopped online, you may have signed up for the store's email newsletter. What's that? You know, all of those annoying daily emails about shopping their newest collection and the three day sales where everything is 20% off. 

Although they can be annoying, believe it or not, these companies do find a way to make you open up the email and click through to their website. They may even get you to make a purchase; all from a simple email.

But is it really all that simple?

Even if you hadn't planned on making a purchase or shopping online anytime soon, Fashion E-Commerce Brands and Businesses always know just the right words to say to engage you into opening what you might consider spam mail. 

With subject lines such as "Offer ends today! Extra 20% off all sale items! Today only! You asked for it! It's back! Back in stock! Limited Time Only!" This pattern of simple phrasing with an explanation point may get you excited too if you're an avid shopper. Key words that Fashion E-Commerce brands tend to use are "save, today, sale, enjoy, extra, and FREE". Now who can resist that last one there? 

Although social media has been taking over the internet world lately, email marketing for e-commerce brands still remains the most powerful E-Commerce marketing tool to engage customers. E-mail marketing allows consumers to reach out to their customers with offers, news, product launches, and more. 

According to Targeting Mantra, there are five main factors for Fashion E-Commerce brands to keep in mind when it comes to email marketing.

1. Frequency: Less is more. Try not to spam your customers' inboxes; sending too many emails might force them to unsubscribe or kick you to their Spam list.
2. Subject Lines: Being gentle and subtle in your subject line without overselling will allow for better responses and openings. Using everyday words is more human.
3. Content: Attractive visual content that is easy to read works best. 41% of emails opened are through mobile devices so be sure they are optimized as such. 
4. Personalization: You are mailing an experience, not just an offer. Be personal with your customers and send things like trend alerts, styling tips, and a birthday shoutout.
5. Cart Abandonment: These emails should be a reminder to the customers that leave items behind in their online cart in order to fulfill the sale. According to SalesCycle, eCommerce brands who sent cart abandonment emails received 46% open rate leading to 35% of the returning customers completing their checkout processes!

Email marketing does not have to be complicated or annoying to your customers. Using these tips will help increase your click through rates as well as your sales!

Media Censorship In Dubai

Media Organizations in Dubai are subject to strict content control by the government.

In Dubai the news is incredibly analyzed before the papers hit the news stand. Editrs scans news articles for any vulgar material. Most of the foreign newspapers are viewed as racy and have to be edited. Anything that doesn't meet Dubai's media standards is marked out with a dark line. Magazines, newspapers, books, you name it, has to be regulated before clearance. Although the telecommunications law guarantees freedom of speech, political media cogent is monitored daily. 

The governed are not getting full use of their rights to Freedom of Speech. The 1996 telecommunications law that guarantees Freedom of Speech is overshadowed by the serious regulation of political media. Journalists rely on self- censorship in order to avoid sanctions. The journalists who sensor their work tend to avoid criticizing political leaders, ruling leaders, religion, morals, or government policy. 

The city of Abu Dubai is home to 2,369,153 people. The hot weather and seven star hotels drives traffic to vacationers. The city is a big tourist attraction and is set up to stay that way. The media is censored in order to mold the idea of the city. Its goal is to attract celebrities and investors.  The press are supported by government funding. Neighboring countries such as India censor any reading materials such as magazines, books, or news papers. If the reading materials don't meet the consent of the countries media regulation agency, ( the National Media Council) whole articles can be removed.

A wealthy Indian news editor, Prem Singh says, "Nude pictures and anything [written] against these countries, especially Dubai. Anything against Islam." Prem would mark over any breasts that are too exposed in news papers or magazine before they are sent to UAE. As reported by Press Reference,  Most of the radio (13 AM, seven FM, and two short-wave) and television (15 total) stations available outside the free-zone are owned by the government with a few notable exceptions. These stations broadcast to around 820,000 radios and 310,000 televisions in the country. 

References:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18292869

BBC News Country Profiles. Available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ .

Read more: http://www.pressreference.com/Sw-Ur/United-Arab-Emirates.html#ixzz3aGlcWl7k

Google Overshadowing Other Manufacturers

Its' difficult for smaller companies to shine when large scale companies get all of the shine. Google has pushed its competing rivals buttons such as Yandex. Yandex is a Russian Internet company which operates the largest search engine in Russia with about 60% market share in that country. According to bbc.com, Yandex alleges that its rival, Google has an unfair advantage because it insists device-makers set Google as the default search setting if they want to pre-install its Play store. 

 

Googles restrictions are conflict with the way Yandex markets its company. The amount of shares on android phones are affected because of  Google services. "Google's rivals have claimed Android is used as a way to give Google's other services an unfair competitive advantage". (bbc.com) 

 

Although Yandex has filed an antitrust complaint against Google,  the search engine has yet to respond. Google will most likely make an account that their rival search engines can be downloaded to android phones as long as their services aren't pre-downloaded. 

 

It's agreeable that Google is one of the largest most used search engines. With such reliable and safe services, Google attracts millions of servers worldwide. Of course others countries would like their citizens to use there soft- ware hence that challenge of competing against Google. Other internet companies have complained about the unfair benefits that Google has. The "take-it-or-leave-it" rule where manufacturers can either install all of Googles complete serve including google maps, gmail, google play, or reject cellular service all together. 

"We believe that user-centric services, such as search, maps, email, etc., should be unbundled from the Android OS. It is essential to return to a level playing field where competition is over quality of products and services rather than bundling and pre-installation."

 

Android is by a long way the most popular mobile device in Russia. Googles restriction of  apps and other services are pushing away customers from local smart phone vendors in Russia. "Google has been under investigation for years in Europe regarding its approach to desktop search -- something that Yandex's CEO has publicity backed. The European Commission also recently voted to push forward with legislation that could see Google (and other search providers) forced to unbundle its search engine from its other services.Google wants there search engine to be the main search engine or nothing at all. 

 

 

Japan's Economy Boosted Thanks to... Dragon Ball Z?

Popular all over the world, Japanese animation (Commonly known as anime) has become a multibillion Yen export. Lots of Anime series and movies are based off their illustrated counterparts, Manga (Japanese comic books). If a single story is created in manga form, chances are it can be turned into an anime series, launch action figure, video game, and apparel sales, even inspire live action films. In some cases, theme parks could even spawn from the womb of artful creation that is manga/anime. 

In 2009 Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso aimed to create 500,0oo new jobs, raise exports of Japanese "soft power" (Anime, film, manga, games, etc.) from 2% to 18% and in doing so, save the economy. Since Japan relies so heavily on overseas sales, it's no wonder the popular anime/manga series Dragon Ball Z (above) has made its comeback in the last few years. 

Although the series ended in 2003, Akira Toriyama's brainchild has still maintained a cult following, remaining one of the most popular anime series in the world. DBZ's follow up series Dragon Ball GT, not so much. Even though the series ended in 2003, it was remastered, re-edited and re-released in 2009 as Dragon Ball Z Kai. The series has still retained its popularity, tying with Spongebob Squarepants in cable TV  ratings just last month. 2013 saw a new feature length animated  film carrying the title of Dragon Ball Z: Battle of the Gods. (right)
This film was greatly anticipated by the American fans who grew up in the 90's watching the original show. It's anticipation was met with a theatrical release in over 350 theaters in the U.S. and Canada in August of 2014.

The trailer for another DBZ film, "Resurrection of F" (below) has just surfaced all over the internet, exciting fans worldwide. Some may have criticisms of the film but regardless, another film has emerged from a franchise thought to be dead! This is closely following the American release of the video game Dragon Ball
Xenoverse (left) in the U.S. This is a win-win for fans of the franchise, but also for the Japanese economy which has been following through on their plan to revitalize through the creation and export of more anime/manga, and other soft power products. Perhaps this is contributing the the upward trend the Japanese economy is predicted to have this year.

Verizon Tech News Site Bans Stories on U.S. Spying

 Verizon is getting into the news business. What could go wrong?

Is Vine good for journalists?

     Vine is a mobile video sharing app. It allows its users to create and share six second videos. The videos loop continuously and are posted online. Vine is owned by Twitter. It can be used to show action and explain stories. Journalists use Vine to share videos of breaking news as it is happening. 

Upshot Journalism

     Upshot was created because of new opportunities being created for journalists due to the spread of digital data and the Internet. 

  

Twitter Partners with IBM

    Twitter and IBM have announced a partnership. This partnership will transform businesses to understand their markets, customers, and customers. 

    

CVS and Rite Aid Reject Apple Pay

    Apple Pay was to replace the consumer's wallet of credit cards with its mobile system. But this mobile system has hit a roadblock. CVS and Rite Aid have removed Apple Pay from their stores.

eBay's Security Flaw Existed for Months

    A security flaw on eBay's website has been exposing eBay's customers to malicious websites.  This has been happening on eBay's site since Feburary. It has been revealed that by clicking on some of the listings on the site will automatically redirect customers to harmful sites. eBay has failed to fix and inforem users about the security flaw, despite having known since Feburary.

    According to BBC News, an eBay user Paul Castle contacted eBay in order to report the problem in a chat log which outlined the problem in detail with eBay's staff. This is not the first time that eBay has been hit with a security breach. eBay had a massive security breach which happened in May. The breach affected 145 million customers, which was performed by unknown hackers. The information stolen was email addresses, encrypted passwords, mailing addresses, and birth dates.

    The site eBay gives permission to many of their users who sell on eBay to use Javascript and Flash to make their listings more attractive, which is related to the security flaw. The search engine of eBay only allows customers to find completed auctions that are more than 15 days old. In each case of the listings, it appears that cross-site scripting (XSS) was used to steal the customer's information using Javascript. Cross-site scripting (XSS) is not allowed on eBay and eBay uses a range of security features, which are designed to detect and remove the listing containing the harmful codes. BBC News uncovered that many of their listings have been posted for more than 15 days, which posed dangers to eBay's users.

    In an interview BBC News reporter Dave Lee, a spokeswoman for eBay, "The company assures that they have a security team for the site, but the hackers used tactics capable of by passing their security. These hackers intentionally adapt to their code and tactics to try to stay ahead of the most sophisticated security team."      

    The site eBay is being heavily criticized by security experts for failing to react quickly to the problem and allowed it to go on for so long. This is the second time eBay has had security issues this year.