Online retailers shudder at the thought of visitors leaving their website without buying anything. They would be surprised to know that most people that visit a website intending to buy a product give up only because of confusion. The navigation, product descriptions and checkout procedures leave them confused and frustrated. Many of us would have experienced this when shopping online and now there is help coming our way.

Some online retailers who realize this problem, started offering real-time chats with sales agents, but even these have not done much to help. The reason being, most visitors who are frustrated do not bother to click on chat-invitations. These chats also prove to be expensive to the retailer, because only a small percentage of visitors out of the hundreds that visit, are serious shoppers.

Smart retailers are beginning to understand the psyche of a shopper and have begun noticing their movements on the sly, targeting those visitors that are confused and are most likely to leave the website without buying. The retailers keep a check on people that keep jumping frequently between web pages that offer similar products, those that scroll up and down the page many times, those who linger or even people that re-read the description of the product that has already been placed in their shopping cart. These repetitive movements identify shoppers that are confused and are unable to decide on which product to buy. This is when the retailers intervene through chat and try to help them decide.

This is done with the help of a new service called the “confusion index” for online retailers, which is going to be out soon. This service will be more effective as more factors about a visitor are analyzed. The confusion index ranks the confusion of a visitor on a scale of 1 to 100 from mild confusion to utter confusion, based on their activities. The confusion ranking increases when a shopper fills a form slowly. Taking the example of a shopper planning on buying a laptop, the confusion ranking rises higher and faster, if the shopper hesitates before typing an answer to certain questions, such as the requirement of RAM and bus speed etc. This confusion index can reach much higher if the shopper is from Wyoming or Montana, the two U.S. states that are least computer-savvy. (more…)

Imagine making a call to someone with a simple tap either on their name in the contact’s list, their SMS or even on their email.

The 3G iPhone redefines mobile phones with all the features it comes with. It is a combination of three products in one – an iPod with a widescreen, a revolutionary phone with a boat load of features and an internet device that consists of a great web browser in the same class as the desktop browser with HTML email.

The original iPhone was an expensive toy and in spite of the talk it created and several people queuing up to get it, it still did not have as huge an audience as expected initially, and picked up enough steam only with the passage of time and dropping of prices.

Apple changed all that with this second generation iPhone, which is all set to be released worldwide on July 11. Apple 3G iPhone is not going to have a fixed one-rate for all, and comes with new sales policies.

The new 3G iPhone comes with a cost of just $199 for the 8GB model, which available in black; and $299 for the 16GB model, available in both black and white.

Previously, Apple wanted to release it at the year-end; however, this date has now been brought forward by several months. It is also going to be available internationally in 70 countries.

Taking off the wraps, the 3G iPhone with its thin edges is said to be a winner in the looks department.

The functionality includes, GPS mapping, the ability to run 3rd party applications and working with enterprises like Microsoft Exchange. (more…)