Business Markets

The euro crisis has now claimed a centre-left Prime Minister in Greece and a centre-right one in Italy. Leftist Spain is keeping a low profile, trying very hard not to be noticed – almost certainly in vain.

Yet it would be a mistake to write off the Mediterranean economies as “all the same”. Greece is a true basket case, a welfare state in the literal sense – a state dependant on welfare – underwritten mainly by the Germans. Italy, however, is in many ways a strong economy, at least in parts, with lots of viable businesses and an understanding of the need for international marketing. The present crisis is all about past deficits rather than future prospects.

Italy’s underlying problems go back a long way: weak governments since the beginning of the Republic encouraged structural inefficiencies. As a result, public sector debt has grown out of control under governments of both left and right. This could

Read full post…

Despite claims that “mobile” is the new dot com boom, many companies have yet to get the message.  Even though industry behemoths (like Google) are chiming in and pushing advertisers and retailers to “build for mobile,” droves of popular ecommerce sites are still serving Flash-laden, image-intensive, generally cluttered websites to their smart phone and mobile Web users.  Some of them have “Buy” buttons so small that touch screen users can barely even click on them.

As for the companies that have responded to the mobile craze, their implementation of mobile optimized pages often falls short.  To wit, a 2011 survey of mobile Web users and websites found that a full 77% of large companies’ mobile “optimized” sites take more than 5 seconds to load.  Five seconds?  That’s a near-eternity in cyberspace.  Consider the lost advertising revenue alone, let alone missed sales, as impatient mobile users ignore ads in their hurry to find real content.

So what’s an ecommerce company to do that’s hoping to give their mobile site a much needed refresh?  While individual companies’ needs vary depending on their particular industry and niche, nearly every mobile e-commerce site can benefit from this list of tips:

• Focus on—and predict—what’s most important. Prioritization can be hard, e

Read full post…

A journalist at the British tabloid The Sun was arrested Friday in connection with alleged payments to police as part of the investigation into illegal phone hacking by London-based employees of media giant News Corp. , according to a report by Reuters.

News Corp. owns The Sun and is also the parent company of FOX Business.

A spokesman for News International, which runs News Corp.’s British newspapers, confirmed to Reuters that an arrest had been made, adding “the company is cooperating fully with the investigation.”

The spokesman couldn’t immediately be reached for comment by FOX Business.

Scotland Yard initially announced the arrest, according to Reuters. Scotland Yard has been investigating whether journalists bribed police officials in an effort to obtain stories on British celebrities and politicians.

News Corp. shut down its weekly tabloid News of the World in July after the phone hacking scandal erupted.

Dear readers,

Occasionally I like to comment on social media marketing lessons we can learn from other industries.  I wrote about lessons we can learn from television shows like the Voice or Major League Baseball teams.

This weekend is the largest poker event of the year, the World Series of Poker main event final table.  I thought in homage to this major poker event we’d talk about social media marketing lessons we can learn from looking at professional poker players.

We can learn a lot by looking at the Twitter accounts of some professional poker players. 

The most popular poker pro on Twitter, is probably also one of the most popular in the world. Texas Dolly, Doyle Brunson. The godfather of modern poker has done a great job developing a following on Twitter.  Doyle has over 382,000 followers on Twitter.  This

Read full post…

Airlines often will roll back a fare increase if a major competitor refuses to match it. That’s because the competitor’s cheaper price will show up first when consumers go online to search flights by price.

DALLAS — The latest attempt by airlines to take advantage of full flights and boost their prices appears to have failed.

Most airlines decided not to go along with the higher fares, and those that had raised prices began rolling them back on Friday.

Analysts and industry insiders have been expecting that the weak economy will hurt travel demand, but the signs are mixed so far. Airlines say demand appears to be slipping among vacationers who are trying to save money, but corporate travel is holding up well.

US Airways Group Inc. raised fares Wednesday by up to $10 per round trip on higher-priced tickets usually favored by business travelers.

Delta Air Lines Inc.

Read full post…

The state’s Department of Public Utilities, at the request of high-ranking public officials, announced it will investigate the preparedness and response by utility companies to last weekend’s snowstorm that knocked power out to tens of thousands of Central Massachusetts residents, many for several days.

After criticizm and calls for the investigation from Attorney General Martha Coakley, U.S. Sen. Scott Brown and state Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Richard Sullivan, DPU chair Ann Burwick announced that the DPU will launch a probe.

It will focus on multiple factors including: compliance with DPU regulations; emergency preparedness and restoration plans; allocation of resources during storm response and timely dissemination of information.

The review is on top of a similar review of work by utility companies following damage caused by Tropical Storm Irene in August.

The DPU, which regulates utility companies in the state, has the authority to levy fines and require changes to storm response plans by utility companies.

Read full post…

“In the coming 10 years, the inflation rate will most probably stay very low; current expectations are for around 1.8 percent,” he told the mass-selling Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

“This means: in the euro zone we have price stability. This is something we are very proud of, and rightly so.”