So INSTORE Magazine is supposed to be the current industry best source for information, right? Every jeweler we know swears by the magazine for its fresh take on things and business worthy information.
Unfortunately, they are a print magazine, and that means by the time their magazine is mailed out they run the risk of their information being out of date. Staff writers tend to do what they were trained to do. That is to say, when they need input on a topic they seek out sources for information, except there's just never enough time to provide investigative reporting or to cooperate their first source.
Let me add another caveat here before I tell you why I'm upset. I do enjoy my monthly infusion of INSTORE Magazine information, and I've had the pleasure of and editorial and interviews with Trace Shelton. I also agree that their jewelry industry information is top notch.
But they should not be reporting on the Internet Industry unless they are really going to have their facts straight. They especially should not be quoting reports from December 2009 ten months later in the October 2010 issue!
Now to the point.
Grab your October 2010 INSTORE and rifle to page 103.
Second column.
"E-Commerce"
Go ahead, read it. But don't you dare trust it!
Here's why.
They are referencing this report:
http://www.keynote.com/keynote_competitive_research/industry_studies/mobile_retail_holiday_study_2010.html
If you don't want to buy the report you can read the highlights here:
http://www.internetadsales.com/keynote-mobile-retail-shopping-site-performance-below-par
The INSTORE "answer" really doesn't reference any more than the free highlights provide, so let's go through it.
The study from Keynote was conducted from November 18, 2009 - January 4, 2010.
We prefer to get our data from comScore.com, here's what we see for the same period of time:
* 234 million USA smart phone users.
* 41.6% of smartphone users had a Blackberry--that's 97,344,000 users
* 25.3% had iPhones--that's only 59,202,000 users
* Of all smartphone users 27.5% were browsing the internet, and that's 64,350,000
Source: http://www.comscore.com/index.php/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2010/2/comScore_Reports_December_2009_U.S._Mobile_Subscriber_Market_Share
Apparently no one told more than 64 million people that their phones were too slow to use on the internet.
Since 10 months ago, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint, MetroPCS, etc. have continued to wage war with network speeds and smartphone CPU speeds.
According to comScore.com in August 2010 here are the mobile user numbers:
* still 234 million USA smart phone users.
* 37.6% of smartphone users had a Blackberry--that's 87,984,000 users
* 24.2% had iPhones--that's 56,628,000 users
* 19.6% were using Google Android phones--that's only 45,864,000
* Of all smartphone users 34.5% were browsing the internet, and that's now 80,730,000!
Source: http://www.comscore.com/index.php/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2010/10/comScore_Reports_August_2010_U.S._Mobile_Subscriber_Market_Share
Do you REALLY want to ignore those figures? On average that's 1.61 million people per state in the United Sates.
The conclusion of the study that INSTORE references says "consumers ... have no patience." But with these numbers clearly spelled out, don't you think there are at least 500 mobile users within driving distance of your store?
In the past 12 months many forward thinking service providers have created easy to manage content management systems which include mobile modules. Including my other company Sapphire Collaborative (www.sapphirecollaborative.com) where we have the industry's ONLY dedicated Jewelry CMS that give all the power to the retailer. Check it out on your phone at http://perosijewelers.com/mobile
In this still-difficult economy, every penny still needs to be counted and future planning needs to be considered carefully.
INSTORE Magazine usually helps the jewelers plan properly, but in this case they dated themselves extremely badly, and gave the worst internet advice that I've seen since 2006 when I attended an "internet marketing guru's" seminar at an IJO conference.
Hey, you guys at INSTORE, give me a call next time you need help: 888-872-0274
For the rest of you please google "TFYQA" and have a great day.
