Believe it or not, we’re nearly halfway through the first month of the New Year! Even though 2012 is just getting started, there are plenty of ecommerce and social commerce-related headlines being made.
Today, we will examine the findings of some recent studies that say that tablet ecommerce will have a big impact in 2012, and find out more about ICANN’s new top level-domain names.
Tablet-Based Shopping To Impact Ecommerce In 2012, Studies Find
According to a study conducted by UK firm Logan Tod& Co, tablet-based ecommerce will play a larger role in 2012 than it did in 2011. 14% of the online shoppers surveyed in the study said that they made purchases during the holiday shopping season using an iPad or other tablet. Of those surveyed, 26% said that they plan to make even more tablet-based ecommerce purchases during the 2012 holiday season.
Since the screen size of the typical tablet is somewhere in-between a traditional smartphone screen and a computer screen, says the Logan Tod &Co. study, shoppers are likely to spend more time browsing on tablets than on phones. And since tablets, unlike many computers are portable (even more so than laptop computers) they have greater appeal to shoppers on the go.
A similar study, conducted by Mobile Commerce Daily, found that mobile commerce in general, and tablet commerce in particular, drove many purchases during the holiday season worldwide.
MCD reports that travel companies in particular saw an increase of tablet-based bookings in 2011. Large ecommerce companies, including Zappos and Amazon have also developed tablet-based catalogues and tablet-based apps in an effort to drive sales and tap into the growing market.
Personalized, Top-Level Domain Name Extensions To Be Available This Week
As we first reported in June of 2011, ICANN (International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has been planning to offer new, personalized top-level domain name extensions for months now.
This Thursday marks the start of the application acceptance process for business owners wishing to claim a personalized extension, which can include generic extensions (.travel, .drink, .shopping, etc.) as well as trademarked extensions. (As long as the applicant holds the trademark.)
Although the application fee to become a registry holder of a TLD (top level domain) includes a fee of $185,000, the Wall Street Journal reports that many business owners are planning to apply.
While it is still too early to gauge the popularity of personalized TLD, it is clear that if the idea of personalized domains does catch on, it will likely change the way that websites are marketed and presented in the future.
