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Ahmet Kirtok

2007 Holiday Sales Stats For Online Businesses

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 27, 2007

[photopress:online_sales.gif,full,alignleft]According to a recent Forrester Research report, online holiday retail sales in the U.S. are expected to hit $33 billion in 2007, a 21% increase over last year’s sales. Personally speaking, our online sales have already doubled this holiday season. Even though we have run a big discount through an email campaign, black friday was not our best sales day. For the holiday season our best day was yesterday (Cyber Monday).

Our prediction shows that our ecommerce business sales will increase around 50% for the month of december (compared to november), and we will try to keep the increase until June with different promotion techniques.

Included in Forrester’s report were the following findings:

Apparel and Accessories: This category will top holiday shopping lists.
(80% of respondents said that they will purchase something in this category online.)

Free Shipping: A majority of consumers still have interest in free shipping promotions.
(61% of respondents said they are more likely to shop online from a retailer offering free shipping.)

Less Flare: Fewer consumers are willing to pay for extras such as gift wrapping, or overnight delivery.
(26% of respondents said they would pay for expedited delivery prior to the holiday season, down from 45% who said they would do so in 2006.)

*Forrester defines the holiday shopping season as the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

ComScore, Inc. also released recent information and predictions regarding the 2007 holiday season. ComsScore, a global leader in measuring the digital world, projects that the months of November and December will see approximately $29.5 billion in online consumer spending.

2006 versus 2007

Non-Travel (Retail) Spending (Excludes Auctions and Large Corporate Purchases)

2006: Jan-Oct: $77.5 Billion
2007: Jan-Oct: $93.6 Billion
(21% Increase)

2006: Nov-Dec (Holiday Season): $24.6 Billion
2007: Nov-Dec (Holiday Season): $29.5 Billion
(Projected 20% Increase)

Their reports also show that the first eighteen days of the holiday season saw more than $7 billion in online retail spending.
Holiday Season to Date, 2006 versus 2007

Non-Travel (Retail) Spending (Excludes Auctions and Large Corporate Purchases)
2006: November 1-18, $6.01 Billion
2007: November 1-18, $7.04 Billion
(17% Increase)

“The online holiday shopping season got off to a slow start in the first week of November, but it has since picked up sharply,” notes comScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni. “Sales in the first ten days of November were up modestly versus year ago, but surged to levels in excess of 20 percent by mid-November. It’s likely that warmer than average weather at the beginning of November kept people outdoors and away from their computers, weighing down early holiday season sales, especially for key online categories like apparel. The growth rates during the second and third weeks of November are likely to be better indicators of how the remainder of the season will play out.”

Many will sale most of the ecommerce niches are already saturated. DO NOT Believe them. There are so many ecommerce niches that needs new online stores desperately. Even some big names still don’t do a good job in online marketing. For me, an ecommerce business is like a long term investment. People will shop online more, and your ecommerce site will keep growing if you work hard on it.

Happy Holiday Sales!

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ThePoint.com People Solving Problems

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 16, 2007

Post image for ThePoint.com People Solving Problems

The Point is a social and consumer activism site found by Chicago based Andrew Mason that just launched this week. I like the concept, and tested it myself by starting a campaign.

The concept is simple; A member creates a campaign, and participants pledge to take action only when enough other people have pledged to do the same thing. If the tipping point is reached, members agree to boycott a product, donate money to the cause, or take some form of civil action. You can review all the campaigns, and decide to participate or not.

If the site becomes popular, one of the main concerns might be the cencorship. I couldn’t find any information if ThePoint.com will use any cencorship towards any campaigns in the future or not. This part from the Terms & Conditions Page may give us some idea:

The Point may remove any Content and The Point accounts at any time for any reason (including, but not limited to, upon receipt of claims or allegations from third parties or authorities relating to such Content), or for no reason at all. To report Terms of Service abuse, please email: abuse@thepoint.com

TechCrunch points that ThePoint.com has already raised $2.5 million from angel investors, and will soon try to raise more in a VC round. I’m very curious about the monetization techniques they will use. I will definitely write a followup.

Andrew Mason, the founder of ThePoint.com, has posted this comment at TechCrunch after a question raised by a reader about the similarity of ThePoint.com to PledgeBank.com ;

Pledgebank is a great site and shares the same basic “I’ll do something, but only if others cooperate” model, but beyond that, there are more differences than similarities. First, The Point is largely focused on “do this, or else” campaigns — ultimatums targeted at a third party that are designed to, once they tip, quickly force a change by creating an unendurable financial stress. For many campaigns on The Point, the tipping point is something that can be quantified — it’s the point where the cost to a target of the group action becomes greater than the benefits of not changing. The tipping point of a campaign on The Point shouldn’t be determined by a prediction of how many people are likely to join, rather, a calculation of how many people are needed to force change. On The Point, it’s less important that a campaign tip than it is for people to have the sense that they will only be asked to take action when the conditions exist for a combined action to solve their shared problem. We also have an awesome feature called conditional anonymity — your identity isn’t revealed until the campaign tips — that makes The Point a singularly powerful tool for forming issue-specific workplace unions.

Overall, I like the idea and the site (usability, design, and concept is pretty good). I will definitely be checking the campaigns, and will participate.

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True Entrepreneurs Learn From Failures

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 15, 2007

True entreprenurs love to take risk. Some do their homework better than others before taking risk. Taking risk might lead you to success, but at the other side, it might lead you to failure. When you read the success stories of entrepreneurs, you also find out their previous failures.

Why am I writing about taking risk, and learning from failures?

I have recently had some conversations with a few friends about starting a business. These friends of mine work corporate jobs, and always searching for opportunities to start their businesses. I have observed a particular difference in business perspective between them and myself. When they talk about a business opportunity or make a business plan, they are looking for absolute ZERO risk. They always mention, oh of course you have to take risk, but when it comes to reality, they are scared to take risk. They know it, but they don’t accept it. One thing I have learnt as an entrepreneur is “Failing is a part of entrepreneurship”. If you take risk to achieve big goals, you will not be 100% successful. You will fail along the way.

I took a risk, Failed, then what?

Always re-evaluate your business along the way. You will make many small mistakes, it is normal. If you can find out what you are doing wrong, correct it, and learn from your mistake, you are doing the right thing. Even if you fail, the key is trying to learn from your failure.

Never get discouraged

Keep your motivation at the maximum level. I set goals with daily sales for instance. If I can’t reach that level, I work harder. If I reach the level, then I set a higher goal. Setup your daily, weekly, monthly (short term) goals, even write them on a post-it and put it on your desk, wall, monitor. Never get discouraged if you can’t reach your goals, work even harder.


The Biggest Successes are Often Bred from Failures by Randy Komisar (8 min. video)

Click to Watch The Video

According to Komisar, what distinguishes the Silicon Valley is not its successes, but the way in which it deals with failures. The Valley is about experimentation, innovation, and taking new risks. Only a small business that can deal with failure and still make money can exist in this environment. It is a model based on many, many failures and a few extraordinary successes.

If you don’t like the idea of taking risk and failing, here’s a short but useful formula:

NO RISK = NO FAILURE

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Is Google OpenSocial The Next Big Thing?

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 14, 2007

Google OpenSocial

Exponental growth rate of Facebook usage all over the world led many developers create applications for Facebook, and for other social sites. VC’s are also interested in good applications. While small businesses and online marketers already make money with Facebook Advertising, application developers are looking for ways to increase their earnings.

Main problem developers facing was the compatibility issue between social sites. If you have an application project for Facebook Platform, first you have to learn the Facebook Markup Language, but if you want to implement this application to another social site, you need to rewrite the code for the other site’s markup language. This process is very time consuming for developers.

To help the application developers, Google has launched OpenSocial this month.
[click to continue…]

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Sales Pitch Video, Guaranteed No Funding

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 13, 2007

Ali G invents ice cream glove and goes out to shop for VC funding. This is hillarious, and a must to watch.

Look at Donal Trump’s face, he was kind of pissed with the whole situation.

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Digital Telepathy Creates Web 2.0 Startups

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 13, 2007

You have the great idea for a Web 2.0 Startup project. It might be the next Facebook. But you don’t have the experience to properly put a business plan, sales pitch for VC’s, or any development experience. You believe in your idea so much, you have the entrepreneur spirit, but no experience. What would you do?

[photopress:dp.jpg,full,alignleft]Duncan Riley from TechCrunch introduces us to the company which will answer your questions; Digital Telepathy. If you are an experienced entrepreneur in Web 2.0 field, you might not need a helping hand even though Digital Telepathy offers services for existing startups looking for advice on taking their business to the next level, but if you are new to all Web 2.0 thing, this might be a great choice for you.

Duncan Riley explains the 3 “Biz in a Box” Products which Digital Telepathy offers;

The concept is simple: Digital Telepathy offers three design my business options with varying service levels based on the length of each plan. The 15 day plan provides a wannabe startup with market research, strategic alignment, scalable revenue model, instruction manual for project completion and a concept summary delivered as a “Biz in a Box”. The 45 day plan offers (in addition to the 15 day plan) “initial buzz building,” and a range of design services including basic prototyping, usability testing, blueprints, concept mapping and other design services. The 90 day plan adds development services including full scale back-end development for beta release, front end development, private beta invites, feature development and more.

Prices range from $15,000 through to $250,000. Each project has its unique needs, therefore you will need to contact them for a quota. Below is a comparison chart for Digital Telepathy’s services:

Digital Telepathy Product Comparison

Check out the projects they have already done. Their work looks promising.

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Facebook Flyers Becomes Facebook Ads

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 12, 2007

Facebook Ads

Update – November 23rd, 2009 I have written a detailed article about Facebook Ads. Please take a look at the Facebook Ads post if you like to learn more about Facebook Advertising.

Facebook had flyers ad networks called; Facebook Flyers Basic (CPM Flyers Ad Network within Facebook), and Facebook Flyers Pro (CPC Flyers Ad Network within Facebook). Many blogs, especially affiliate blogs had posts about these services such as “how to cheat the $50/day limit”, “affiliate link banning”, etc.

Facebook will be discontinuing the flyers services and started an ad service called Facebook Ads or Facebook Social Ads.

Click to Enlarge the Image for Full Preview Page


Click to View the Full Image

Here’s the explanation of Facebook Social Ads from Facebook:

Facebook Social Ads
Social Ads leverage the power of Facebook News Feed by serving relevant stories about friends engaging with your business.

New Facebook Ads also has service called “Facebook Pages”. Basically you can create a Facebook page for a company, product, artist, etc. and promote it. Here’s an example of a Facebook Page. Creating a Facebook page is free, you pay to promote it.

Here’s the description of Facebook Pages from Facebook:

Establish an interactive presence on Facebook.
Every Facebook Page is a unique experience where users can become more deeply connected with your business or brand. Users can express their support by adding themselves as a fan, writing on your Wall, uploading photos, and joining other fans in discussion groups. You can send updates to your fans regularly — or just with special news or offers. Add applications to your Page and engage your users with videos, reviews, flash content, and more. Creating a Facebook Page is easy, free, and great for all types of businesses.

If you are an affiliate marketer or online marketing professional, Facebook Ads might a great place to run highly targeted ad campaigns.

I’ll be creating a test campaign and blog about it with details and screenshots to help the beginners.

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Startup Weekend – How to Create A Company in 54 Hours

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 12, 2007

[photopress:startup_weekend.png,full,alignleft]Have you ever thought about starting a company within 1 weekend from concept to completion? Is it even possible?

If you try to do it yourself, it might be little hard, but a group of highly talented and motivated people might succeed. They are actually doing it.

Founded in 2007 by Andrew Hyde, Startup Weekend is a concept of a conference focusing on learning by creating.

It is free to participate, and founders receive equal shares of founder stock of the company they create. 5% of each company created goes towards Startup Weekend.

It is so crazy, but I love the idea. I have no idea if these startups will live long, but who cares? It’s the idea of learning while you are doing it. You get to read so many case studies at school, at Startup Weekend, you will be in the case study. It never gets better than this.

Startup Weekend already got some national media coverage, and I’m sure will get much more.

Some of the news mentioning Startup Weekend:

[photopress:swa.jpg,full,centered]

A picture from Atlanta Startup Weekend where Skribit.com was born.

Scheduled Future Weekends

  • San Francisco (November 16-18)
  • London (November 30- Dec 2)
  • Dublin (December 7-9)
  • Los Angeles (December 14-16)

If you live in one of these cities, and have a passion about entrepreneurship, you HAVE to attend the Startup Weekend in your city.

Big THUMBS UP for this brilliant idea ; Startup Weekend.

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New York Startup Interviews By nextNYers

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 12, 2007

[photopress:nextnyers_1.jpg,full,alignleft]We watch so many interviews of tech startups from Silicon Valley and CA. Finally, there’s a site for New Yorkers which will only interview New York Tech Startups, and it is called nextNYers. Being an entrepreneur living in NYC, this makes me happy.

About nextNYers
The hottest up-and-coming technology, new media and Web 2.0 companies are profiled on nextNYers: the new weekly web series that tells you which companies in the New York City area should be on your radar through interviews with their top executives.The profiles offer insight into their vision and industry, their competitive landscape and their unique abilities.

First Episode of Magnify.net CEO and Founder Steve Rosenbaum

nextNYers is in partnership with NY-based tech blog CenterNetworks, which will post each week’s show.

I will be watching the episodes at nextNYers each week, and will write about some of the companies. Time to support local tech companies.

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Adwords Quality Score or Personal Credit History?

by Ahmet Kirtok on November 10, 2007

A good credit history always helps in life. When you buy a house, you get better mortgage rates, you want to get a lease for the new BMW, first they will check your credit history. Google started caring about the age of the sites for some time now, as we all know. Google thinks the websites are like good wine. When it gets older, it gets better. Now, the same thing is happening with Google Adwords Quality Score.

Amit from SuperAffiliateMindset had a post yesterday about the affect of the age of your Adwords account to the quality scores you will get for your campaigns. I have figured this out by myself almost a month ago. I was trying a new campaign with a brand new account, and all the quality scores became Poor, and OK after a few hours. When I have paused the campaign and started the same one at my old adwords account, all QS’s went to GREAT right away, and stayed there.

The important question is:

Is the age of your Google Adwords Account only criteria to get great QS?

It’s just like personal credit history, older the better. Let’s compare 2 person’s credit histories. Both have the same credit card for 10 years, but first person pays it all every month before the due date, and the second one is always late on payments, goes over his limit. Who will get a better credit history?

Therefore, there are many factors considered when assigning quality scores for your campaigns. Basically, Google assigns a credit history score for your adwords account. Here are a few factors that I strongly believe are used to determine the quality of a Google Adwords Account:

  • Age of the account.
  • Your average monthly spending.
  • Your average CTR’s (Click Through Rates)
  • Number of inactive keywords accountwide
  • Number of unapproved ads

For brand new accounts, I don’t believe you will be penalized for a long time before getting great QS’s. It doesn’t make sense to scare new advertisers businesswise.

So, if you want to try/test new campaigns I’d highly recommend using a test account instead of your main account. It might hurt your Google Adwords overall QS’s, and increase your overall cost.

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