Xbox 360 and video games

How to Use Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes transfer

dvdmmm — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:57:33 GMT

Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes Transfer is an easy to use iTunes utility designed to help you backup/recover/transfer your whole iTunes library and media files. It's a simple way to keep your iTunes in sync everywhere. You can use "iTunes to iTunes Transfer" to backup your own iTunes library or synchronize multiple iTunes on different computers. The backed up library file is pretty easy to transfer to other iTunes, and it's easy to manage. So with this iTunes Transfer software, you can manage your iPod/iPhone/... on different PCs.

How to Use Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes transfer

As an iTunes user, you must face the problems about transfering iTunes songs, iTunes library, iTunes video and etc to different computer or multimedia mobile devices. How to solve these questions? With Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes transfer, all your annoyances of backup iTunes library, restore iTunes library and transfer iTunes will be solved neatly.

How to solve the problems with iTunes transfer?
Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes transfer is your first and best choice of iTunes transfer. This iTunes transfer can help you to transfer iTunes songs, iTunes library, iTunes playlists, and so on to different computer, or other popular multimedia player, such as iPod, iPhone and etc. All you need to do during the iTunes transfer process is only a few clicks. Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes transfer can make your iTunes transfer much more easily and quickly.
How to backup iTunes songs with iTunes to iTunes Transfer?
Step1:
Backup iTunes songs, launch the iTunes to iTunes Transfer, to set up the Options.
Launch the Cucusoft iTunes to iTunes Transfer, if you still not install the software, you can download the trial version
for free, and then there will be a window pop up, to remind you to set up the options before backup iTunes songs.

Tips: The window of option contains the selections for both language and the folder you want to backup iTunes songs, after setting up, click OK to continue.

Step2:
Backup iTunes songs, Input backup info.
You can click the backup button on the interface of the backup iTunes songs software, then there will pop up a dialog window, you have to make sure the backup name, and typewrite the name for backup iTunes songs of the creator, then click “OK” to continue.

Step3:
Backup iTunes songs, start to Backup iTunes songs.
In this step, the backup iTunes songs software will scan your iTunes library of PC, if there is no problems, backup iTunes songs will start then automatically.

With the full version, you can :
Backup iTunes songs and keep your iTunes in sync everywhere.
Synchronize your iTunes library with an existing backup job.
Create multiple backup jobs including backup iTunes songs.

You can download at http://www.dvdtoipodsoft.com/cucusoft-itunes-to-itunes-transfer.html

Agility a key ingredient to Success in Retail Industry

ramukumar — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 09:27:38 GMT

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Online business is too difficult for me to maintain. How can I succeed in such a big online marketplace? I am surviving pretty well within my local region and do not have a need to go online or do any kind of online business.

You will probably disassociate yourself from the above kind of retailers but the fact is Survey done by Forrester in Year 2002 had 80% or more surveyed persons in UK(with an error percentage of 3-5% ) having the same or similar opinions as listed above.

Since then, over the period of last five years, things have changed drastically. Businesses today not only realize the benefits and necessity of being online but also are going online or doing some kind of business online.

To speak of the sales volume, in Year 2008, total online sales in UK surpassed GBP 59.8 Billion (source Reuters) up more then 28% over 2007.

Having had gone online, Retailers seem to ask the following questions

I am not able to sell online through my website. What should I be doing?
What are the benefits of being online?
How can a customer be led to my website and to my online store to purchase?
How much should I spend on my online business on a monthly basis?

All these are valid and are very important questions and I will attempt to answer to a certain degree in this article. We at RiteCart (www.ritecart.co.uk / www.ritecart.com ) will provide you with free consultancy, input or help on any or all of the points listed above. RiteCart is one of the leading ecommerce and a Multi Channel solution provider in the market today.

Further more, I would like to stress upon that retailers should consider Online business at an equal level if not at a higher level then their retail stores. What does this mean?

Online business would need your time and attention
Online business would need significant investment (although much lower then any of your retail store)
Online business would need significant monthly expense for maintenance and marketing activities
Finally, Just for any other investment, You will have to Sow before you Reap

Coming back to questions,

On point 1- I am not able to sell online through my website. What should I be doing?

Being able to sell online and to maintain selling online, retailers will require focusing on the following three major aspects

Website Design. Design your website keeping customer usability in mind. Web-Usability guideline is a good starting point to begin with. A good tool will not only help with the presentation but will also take care of what needs to be presented to user based on user behavior on the online store
Marketing. Your website needs to be known and should bring customers and sales inbound. Sending out mail/ email shots, Being able to analyse customer behavior and demographics in your tool, Optimizing your store for Search engine, Having affiliates and stalls, Using Web 2.0 techniques, having presence in popular marketplaces like Ebay, Amazon, etc goes a long way in having both inbound customer and sales
Customer Service. How is the customer treated before and after Sales? How prompt and detailed is the Technical Service provided by your Service Provider? In-fact Customer Service happens to be the single biggest factor to have repeat business. Remember it is easier (statistics say 6 times easier) to generate sales from repeat customer then from a new customer

On point 2, what are the benefits of being online?

Definitely, More Sales and More Revenue.

It may not necessarily mean sales through online store only. Having a store online not only helps you to sell online but also helps you to build your credibility with your existing and prospective customers.

Point is, online store goes a long way as a very effective marketing channel which may result in increase in your retail store sales. Most of the retailers have ignored or are unaware of this fact.

On point 3, How can a customer be led to my website and to my online store to purchase?

Having an ecommerce website is necessary for retailers but is not enough. It is very important to think about ways to increase your sales. Your website is a potential unknown entity in the world of internet and is and will be quite an arduous task to make it a known one.

So some of the possible ways to increase sales are

Having your presence in marketplaces like Ebay, Amazon and other market places. Remember, these marketplaces are quite popular with your current and your prospective customer base. So make them your ally
Support for Tele-sales
Sending promotional mail and email shots to your current / prospective customers
Using Web 2.0 Techniques
Having commission based affiliates and Stalls for everyone (Ritecart provides an innovative way of extending your ecommerce business to stalls, which can be placed in Blogs, Articles, practically anywhere on the web)
Optimizing your website for Search engine like Google, Yahoo, MSN and others
Being able to add new marketplaces channels with ease and with very little effort
Cross marketing your multiple channels of business (All online and offline channels). Helps to increase customer confidence and your credibility in the market

On point 4, How much should I spend on my online business on a monthly basis?

There is no single $ amount to answer this question. But this point was put down to emphasize the need of significant spending on a monthly basis to maintain and run your ecommerce solution

At a high level, I would split these costs into following category

Infrastructure cost – Cost of hosting and other regular third party services
Maintenance and support cost – application support and maintenance cost
Marketing cost – SEO, Ecasting services, other marketing activities
Customer Support and Service

It is needless to mention that all of the above factors are critical and are very essential elements to your success.

To bundle up, it is quite clear that businesses need to reach their current and prospective customers in a channel of his/her liking. Today, more and more businesses are doing that or trying to do that.

It is also clear that as the industry evolves; more and more new channels will be required to be added to business so as to be able to reach their current and prospective customers and to make the sale happen.

Agility of the business would be therefore be a very critical factor for businesses to thrive and succeed; And Multi-Channel solution goes a long way in helping businesses to do that.

Author, Tony Mercer, is UK regional sales director for RiteCart ecommerce and Multi-Channel (www.RiteCart.co.uk) solution business.

Is Multi-Channel solution more attractive then ecommerce?

ramukumar — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 09:25:57 GMT

Having worked as a retail industry expert in ecommerce industry for more then a decade now; I have presented quite a lot number of times, case for going ecommerce to several of my business customers. Different cases were meticulously prepared based on customer profile, market segment, turnover and lot of customer business specific variables. Even then, every time I sit in front of customer, I have had a strange inkling in my stomach, for those un-prepared questions, which make my job of converting prospects into sales all the more difficult and sometimes even impossible. Over the years, I have had my share of good success and some good failures as well.

In my engagement with RiteCart (www.ritecart.co.uk) multi channel and ecommerce solution Provider Company, I had learned to realize that my job of converting prospects into customers has been easier compared to what it was maybe a couple of years back. This realization was after; I looked back into the ratio of my approached prospect to the converted customer. Seasoned statistician may disagree with my conclusions and can weigh in lot of factors, which will make any logical conclusions blur. But since I am not a statistician, I am going to attribute this change in the conversion rate to the following attributes

Ecommerce is a proven industry now
Economy had been booming
Ah-Uhh! I have been selling Multi-Channel solution (www.ritecart.co.uk)

I think the first two factors definitely form a large share of my reason to have the increased conversion rates but personally I am interested to know more about the effect, the third factor had on conversion rates.

Ecommerce conversion has always been about convincing customers for adding a new prospective line of business, an additional channel for generating revenue, a channel with a very low initial investment and more importantly at the end of pitch having them convinced and acknowledge that it is their business of future.

All that said; the act has been always trying to paint the beautiful picture of future and to make the customers imagine how it will look like once they go online. Any sales-men would tell you that selling imagination to customer is much more difficult then providing what the customer needs or at-least thinks he needs.

Things have been different with Multi-Channel solution. It has been taking me a quite a less effort to convince customers to go for multi-channel (www.ritecart.co.uk) solution, even though they are priced way higher then a stand-alone ecommerce solution. Before I go into my analysis of the reasons, let me try to briefly describe what Multi Channel is and how a small to a very large business can benefit out of it.

Multi- Channel business (sales) can be defined as a business having more then one channel for selling its goods (products/services) to its prospective customers. These channels can be retail stores (one or many epos systems), ecommerce stores (one or many), EBay stores, Amazon stores, Other Multi-Channel stores, Telephone sales (using IVR), etc.

Multi-Channel solution like RiteCart multichannel solution (www.ritecart.co.uk) can be described as a solution, which supports all the above channels and has an architecture that allow to keep on adding new channels as and when they develop.

To keep it short, let us quickly look at some of the key benefits a Multi channel ecommerce solution can provide to any business

Allows business to integrate its offline Point of Sale solution with its Online ecommerce solution
Allows business to have a single administration tool to control, manage, view its inventory (stock) level and the stock movement across different warehouses
Allows business to define products once and use it across different channels
Gives decision maker a complete picture of his entire organization. Allows generation of various reports and provides analytics to plan future sale
Reduces time spent on definition of products, stocks, warehouses and sale by having single administration tool across different channels
Allows business to add new channels like Ebay, Amazon and other market place solutions and provides a single administration tool to control and manage these channels
Reduces learning curve for the usage of the tool, as the same tool can be used for new channels as and when they are added in business
Increases productivity, efficiency of work and reduces time spent in administration and handling of the system

If you go through point 1- 8, you will see that, I haven’t even mentioned about how adding multiple channels to a business can bring an increase in your business revenue or sales. All the benefits described are on easier management of business, optimization of time spent, increase in productivity, better visibility of overall business, ability to add new channels and ability to manage your business better.

Whether you are small or large, most of you realize that you need to have an ability to add new channels and support your current multiple channels of business. In the past, people have used different tools and solutions to handle multiple channels, with Multi Channel solution like RiteCart multi channel and ecommerce solution (www.RiteCart.co.uk); you can handle all of your sales channels in one single solution.

Most of the business have one or more channels of business already and do realize that the agility that multi channel solution like RiteCart Multi channel solution provides, can go a long way to increase their bottom-line and make their business successful and competitive in the market.

Author, John Lollis, is US regional sales director for RiteCart ecommerce and Multi-Channel (www.RiteCart.co.uk) solution business.

Blackberry tour vs Nokia N97: compare them in the process of making decision

misgreen — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 03:15:14 GMT

This summer there are some very strong devices out there including Blackberry Tour, Nokia N97, HTC Magic, iPhone 3G S, Palm Pre. Some may prefer iPhone 3G S or Palm Pre, but at last I have narrowed down my choices to Blackberry Tour and Nokia N97, and I’ve had a really tough time choosing between the two:

Blackberry tour:
· Supports high-speed 3G EV-DO Rev
· Non-touchscreen, a large, highly tactile, full-QWERTY keyboard for fast and precise typing
· Advanced media player for videos, pictures and music, a 3.5 mm stereo headset jack and support for the Bluetooth Stereo Audio Profile (A2DP/AVCRP)
· 256MB Flash memory, support cards of up to 16GB
· Built-in GPS with support for geotagging, BlackBerry Maps
· Allowing users to edit Microsoft(R) Word, Excel and PowerPoint files directly on the handset
· Easy mobile access to Facebook(R), MySpace and Flickr(R), as well as popular instant messaging services including BlackBerry Messenger, Yahoo! IM, AIM(R), Google Talk and Windows Live Messenger
· Support for BlackBerry App World, as well as third-party mobile applications
· BlackBerry Internet Service allows access to up to 10 supported personal and corporate email accounts
· No Wi-Fi, it is said to be added in the future.

Nokia N97:
· Sliding QWERTY keypad and touchscreen display
· Memory – 32GB Internal memory, 128 MB RAM, microSD up to 16GB
· Camera – 5 MP (Carl Zeiss optics)
· OS – Symbian
· Battery – 6.6 hours talk-time and 430 hours standby
· Radio – Stereo FM radio with RDS, Visual radio; FM transmitter
· Widescreen – 16:9, 3.5in TFT, 640 x 360 pixels
· 802.11b/g; USB; Bluetooth with A2DP; GPS with A-GPS
· 3.5mm audio jack
· Handwriting Recognition
· A little expensive, at about $650

That’s the simple information I have got about the two phones. Here I should explain my smartphone requirements. I’m looking for a device to serve as my personal telephone, media player, mini computer and business assistant. For personal telephone, it is used for daily contact, to make calls and receive calls. Both Blackberry tour and Nokia N97 were easy to use and very convenient to dial a number.

For multimedia, both of them are advanced media player for videos, music and pictures. Blackberry tour supports video formats including MPEG4, H.263, H.264 (encoding and decoding 30fps), WMV and audio format including MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA. Nokia N97 can play mp4 and 3gp videos with up to 640*360 pixels resolution. Personally I prefer to watch movies with Blackberry tour. In the meantime I go to Nidesoft Inc to get programs Nidesoft Blackberry Converter Suite, which rip DVDs and videos into Blackberry-friendly files. Just copy the converted file to memory card, pop it into phone’s card slot, and enjoy. Or use program Nidesoft Nokia video converter if you would like to choose N97 as media player.

As for connectivity, the Nokia N97 looks like a good all-rounder, with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and an Infrared port. The BlackBerry Tour features Bluetooth as well, (with A2DP) but is somehow lacking Wi-Fi (just like the much-derided BlackBerry Storm). Although the rumor said that the Blackberry Storm 2 will have Wi-Fi. N97 also features an FM radio, which the Tour doesn't.

If you always travel around for work then Blackberry can be a wonderful assistant. The BlackBerry Tour smartphone provides the industry's leading mobile solution for email, messaging (IM, SMS, MMS) and social networking together with built-in GPS. I like type emails and message with the full-QWERTY keyboards fast and easily. N97 also have GPS and can send emails, but the business-oriented Blackberry tour is better for business assistant.

In the end, I make up my decision. The Blackberry tour won out, it made the most sense to me as media player and business assistant. But as I’ve noted the Nokia N97 was also pretty impressive and could be a viable option for many others.

How to enjoy DVD with iPod /iPhone,BlackBerry, MP4 and any other portable devices.

haiyeer — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 08:08:33 GMT

How to enjoy DVD with iPod /iPhone,BlackBerry, MP4 and any other portable devices. In this era of rapid development of science and technology, several of media portable players emerged and have enriched our daily life greatly. Watching DVD movies has not confined to fixed DVD players. Do you Want to put your DVD movies on your mobile devices like iPod touch, iPod classic, iPod nano, iPhone, iPhone 3G, Apple TV, PSP, PS3, PSP GO, Blackberry(.MP4, .WMV), Palm(.MP4) QuickTime(.MOV), iTunes(.M4V, .MP4), Youtube (.FLV), iMovie(.MP4), Creative Zen or iRiver ? No problem, the easy-to-use DVD Ripper makes it all possible! I strongly recommend you Nidesoft DVD Ripper. This DVD Ripper can rip DVD files to almost all popular video and audio formats in high quality at fast speed.

You may download this software here: http://www.nidesoft.com/downloads/dvd-ripper.exe And get more information about it here: http://www.nidesoft.com/dvd-ripper.html
After download and install this powerful software, only four steps are needed to complete the conversion.

Step 1: Insert the DVD disc into the DVD Drive.
Click the Open DVD button, browse your computer, and find the DVD folder of the movie. (It is not only load DVD disc, but also could open a disk backup’s directory.)

A DVD may have multiple titles and each title contains one or more chapters. After your DVD movie is loaded, its contents will be listed. Click “+” to show the chapters in a title. Then you can click any title or chapter to preview it in the preview window on the right.

Step 2: Click the "profile" button and select the format for your player.
Tips: If you want to convert your videos into portable players, you'd better select format according to your player. Then the output videos would be much more compatible with your player. For example, If you want iPod movies, select "iPod Video MPEG-4(*.mp4)". Or If you want movies in FLV format , select "YoutTube Video (*.flv)".

Step 3: make settings for your converting videos: Click the "settings" button, you may set your video resolution, video bitrate, audio channels and audio bitrate for your output video.

Step 4: Click the "convert" button. Please wait before the conversion succeeds!

Ok, you have ripped your DVD movies to other format you want, now just enjoy it.

Frequently FAQ:

Q1: What are the differences between the trial version and the registered version?
The trial version can be used without charge for a period of 2 minutes. The registered version has no time limitation and makes no watermark on the created movies. If you want to continue using this software and convert DVD movies without watermark, please order and register this software.

Q2: Can this software keep the subtitles with movie?
Yes, Nidesoft DVD Ripper does support selecting and adding movie subtitles. After load DVD, you could click one title and drop the subtitle setting box to select the language you want, and the audio language selection is similar.

Q3: How to change my video effect?
If you want to adjust the effect of your movie, please click the “Effect” button and a pop-up effect window will appear. It allows you to edit your movie’s effect including “Brightness, Contrast, Saturation and Volume”.

Q4: Could I merge or split the videos while rip DVD?
Of course. Select any chapter or title to convert, then you will get the video segment of this title or chapter from the whole DVD file .Or you may trim your video with trim function to get any segment. (Click "Trim" button and you will see the trim window. You can move the slide below the screen or enter the start time and end time on the right to get any segment of the video. The blue line part is the video you will get.) And if you would like to put several titles or chapters which you select into one output file, please click the check box of the “Merge into one file” before converting.

Q5: How to save my favorite pictures from some movies?
If you like the current image when preview video, you can use the "Snapshot" option. Just click the "Snapshot" button, the image will be saved and you can click the "Open" button next to "Snapshot" button to open your picture.

Q6: How can I find the files conversion has finished?
The default path is C:\temp. But you can click the browse button and select a location on your computer for the output video files. Then click the Open Folder button and the folder kept the output video files will be opened. It's very convenient!

Q7: How to get movie and music from YouTube and other video files which are not DVD files?
Don't worry .You may try Nidesoft Video Converter which could convert video or audio files between all popular formats. It can help you! Click here for more information.

Q8：I have a question not listed in the above. What could I do?
You may send email to: support@nidesoft.com. I am glad to help you solve your problem.

the best system ever

pbaker1234 — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 11:39:07 GMT

i love the x box 360.

Agility a key ingredient to Success in Retail Industry

ramukumar — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 21:02:06 GMT

To speak of the sales volume, in Year 2008, total online sales in UK surpassed GBP 59.8 Billion (source Reuters) up more then 28% over 2007.

Having had gone online, Retailers seem to ask the following questions

I am not able to sell online through my website. What should I be doing?
What are the benefits of being online?
How can a customer be led to my website and to my online store to purchase?
How much should I spend on my online business on a monthly basis?

Further more, I would like to stress upon that retailers should consider Online business at an equal level if not at a higher level then their retail stores. What does this mean?

Online business would need your time and attention
Online business would need significant investment (although much lower then any of your retail store)
Online business would need significant monthly expense for maintenance and marketing activities
Finally, Just for any other investment, You will have to Sow before you Reap

Coming back to questions,

On point 1- I am not able to sell online through my website. What should I be doing?

Being able to sell online and to maintain selling online, retailers will require focusing on the following three major aspects

Website Design. Design your website keeping customer usability in mind. Web-Usability guideline is a good starting point to begin with. A good tool will not only help with the presentation but will also take care of what needs to be presented to user based on user behavior on the online store
Marketing. Your website needs to be known and should bring customers and sales inbound. Sending out mail/ email shots, Being able to analyse customer behavior and demographics in your tool, Optimizing your store for Search engine, Having affiliates and stalls, Using Web 2.0 techniques, having presence in popular marketplaces like Ebay, Amazon, etc goes a long way in having both inbound customer and sales
Customer Service. How is the customer treated before and after Sales? How prompt and detailed is the Technical Service provided by your Service Provider? In-fact Customer Service happens to be the single biggest factor to have repeat business. Remember it is easier (statistics say 6 times easier) to generate sales from repeat customer then from a new customer

On point 2, what are the benefits of being online?

Definitely, More Sales and More Revenue.

Point is, online store goes a long way as a very effective marketing channel which may result in increase in your retail store sales. Most of the retailers have ignored or are unaware of this fact.

On point 3, How can a customer be led to my website and to my online store to purchase?

So some of the possible ways to increase sales are

Having your presence in marketplaces like Ebay, Amazon and other market places. Remember, these marketplaces are quite popular with your current and your prospective customer base. So make them your ally
Support for Tele-sales
Sending promotional mail and email shots to your current / prospective customers
Using Web 2.0 Techniques
Having commission based affiliates and Stalls for everyone (Ritecart provides an innovative way of extending your ecommerce business to stalls, which can be placed in Blogs, Articles, practically anywhere on the web)
Optimizing your website for Search engine like Google, Yahoo, MSN and others
Being able to add new marketplaces channels with ease and with very little effort
Cross marketing your multiple channels of business (All online and offline channels). Helps to increase customer confidence and your credibility in the market

On point 4, How much should I spend on my online business on a monthly basis?

There is no single $ amount to answer this question. But this point was put down to emphasize the need of significant spending on a monthly basis to maintain and run your ecommerce solution

At a high level, I would split these costs into following category

Infrastructure cost – Cost of hosting and other regular third party services
Maintenance and support cost – application support and maintenance cost
Marketing cost – SEO, Ecasting services, other marketing activities
Customer Support and Service

It is needless to mention that all of the above factors are critical and are very essential elements to your success.

Agility of the business would be therefore be a very critical factor for businesses to thrive and succeed; And Multi-Channel solution goes a long way in helping businesses to do that.

Author, Tony Mercer, is UK regional sales director for RiteCart ecommerce and Multi-Channel (www.RiteCart.co.uk) solution business.

Is Multi-Channel solution more attractive then ecommerce?

ramukumar — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 20:59:47 GMT

Ecommerce is a proven industry now
Economy had been booming
Ah-Uhh! I have been selling Multi-Channel solution (www.ritecart.co.uk)

To keep it short, let us quickly look at some of the key benefits a Multi channel ecommerce solution can provide to any business

Allows business to integrate its offline Point of Sale solution with its Online ecommerce solution
Allows business to have a single administration tool to control, manage, view its inventory (stock) level and the stock movement across different warehouses
Allows business to define products once and use it across different channels
Gives decision maker a complete picture of his entire organization. Allows generation of various reports and provides analytics to plan future sale
Reduces time spent on definition of products, stocks, warehouses and sale by having single administration tool across different channels
Allows business to add new channels like Ebay, Amazon and other market place solutions and provides a single administration tool to control and manage these channels
Reduces learning curve for the usage of the tool, as the same tool can be used for new channels as and when they are added in business
Increases productivity, efficiency of work and reduces time spent in administration and handling of the system

Author, John Lollis, is US regional sales director for RiteCart ecommerce and Multi-Channel (www.RiteCart.co.uk) solution business.

Pauls XBOX 360 Wireless Setup

Marksman007 — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 21:30:33 GMT

Paul, I thought that I heard you say once on Windows Weakly (damned if I can find it) that your 360 is hooked up to your network wirelessly.

Could you tell us what you are using for your wireless network? I’m sure that you have got a much better insight into this than me.

I have a Netgear wireless router and the MS USB antenna on the 360. Hooking a cable up to the 360 is not an option & the lag is almost too much to handle.

Could you please share your setup?

Thanks for the info,

Gary

How to choose an ecommerce product? - Part II

ramukumar — Thu, 15 May 2008 18:16:37 GMT

In the part I, I had discussed briefly about how most of the small businesses go about selecting a product, whereas a successful small businessmen would be careful and would evaluate the product based on various aspects listed below before making a choice.

I will relist all the important factors, which one should consider before buying an ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) or software for their company.

1. Ease of configuration

2. Ability to Scale

3. Useful latest features

4. Available marketing tools with the product

5. Ability to analyze data (analytics, not only google analytics!!)

6. Reports

7. Integration (with other modules, Like epos with near realtime online/offline synchronization of data and other packaged application )

8. Customer Service

9. Technical Support

10. Technical Implementation Aspects

11. Build vs Buy

Ease of Configuration-

It is very important that the product is configurable and suited for one’s current needs and future needs, Like some of the things one may want to determine that how easy it is to

· Add products, categories and catalogs. Can this be dynamically created using administrative tool and dynamically displayed on the user side? Can it support multiple images with different resolution to be displayed on the user side?

· Look and manage all the orders placed by the administrator? Before placing the order, does it check for inventories? Does it notify the administrators, if the inventories go below a threshold value? Can the administrator mix and match the shipment to the customer?

· Create new sales store and new warehouses for inventories? Can the store’s inventory be picked up from different warehouses?

· Define several types of prices for the same product like list price, default price, component price, sale price etc? Can the price be dynamically setup using a rules engine?

· Associate a product with host of features like size, color, height, width, UOM, density, length etc? Can the product be setup and shown on the user side on any of the feature mentioned above or any of your new custom features?

· Return an order, look at shopping list/wish list, browse through the items last visited, go to most popular products in store, discounted product or special product in store, look at promotional products, place a review on the product, recommend a product or provide a valuable feedback and look at the products which are most sought by the people who had brought the same product as the customer in past?

· Can I select or add a new payment processor easily? I may want to use PayPAL today but I may need GoogleCheck out tomorrow. How many Payment engines does the product support?

· Customize my shipment company or add a new shipping company? Can I integrate directly with ups, RoyalMail, USPS, Fedex etc?

Ability to Scale

As the company grows, eCommerce infrastructure should be able to grow with you, supporting more customers, products, and traffic as needed. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always occur, which is why scalability is such an important element in any ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) .

It is very important to know on what technology is the product built upon. Does the vendor have enough support or knowledge on the product?

This may sound like a mute point but all these factors do really matter. It may be easy for a vendor to use an opensource product and provide the required solution but most of the opensource solutions fail in the kind of support you get and to the kind of ownership you/vendor have on the product.

It has been my experience that even with the best of the open source products, when you look deep into the code, you realize that the pieces of code have been written by people who really don’t know what the other coders have been writing introducing lot of overheads in the code and a code which is in no way modular or object oriented, making it all the more difficult for any vendor company to provide support.

Important point is look for a company that treats your online store as an important long-term investment, and has a product with that track record. These priorities will keep you and your site up and running—whether your order volume is five a day or five thousand—without skipping a beat. Remember, an eCommerce company or product should support the total growth of your business, not limit it.

Useful latest features

Although this may not sound important or required but this does remain one of the most important criteria while selecting an online ecommerce solution or product.

The latest features provide means and ways to improve your marketability and thereby the sale of your product. To name a few,

· Products Last visited by the user

· Ability to provide reviews by the user

· Ability to list down the product rated higher by user community

· Create Composite product and offer discount for composite products

· Dynamic pricing of composite products. To price dynamically user created composite products

More current features product has, easier it is, for the merchant to rollout new marketing initiatives. Also it is very important that the product is designed and built in such a way that it is easier to add/remove features.

Available marketing tools with the product

Sooner or later you will want to provide returning customers with a special discount, or use a coupon as a promotional device. Does your ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) or solution allow for that contingency in your checkout? Can you easily generate creative marketing content and integrate it into the site’s infrastructure? Can you easily identify your targeted customers based on the data you have by analyzing the data in hand? and or does the system seem limiting?

Coupons and other promotions can be key conversion tools, so make sure your ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) allows for this kind of marketing flexibility. Remember, promotions and marketing tools can make a difference in the crowded online marketplace, and can help set you apart from others who have their online presence in the market.

Ability to analyze data

Once you have your ecommerce solution deployed, you will want to find ways and means to increase the sales of your product. You may want to look at your current customer base, understand their trends, their demographics, their preference, and the overall customer behavior. All these helps you to prepare your business better, find effective marketing tools and eventually get more sales done.

To effectively achieve this, you would need means to analyze your data. As a product selection criteria, it is very important that you specifically know that what are the different analytics, which are provided by the tool

Reports

Reports are important for the management as it helps them to see the overall picture of the order and sales in the organization. It is important to know what are the different reports supported by the ecommerce solution. I would recommend that one should list all of the reports required for the organization and try to ensure that those reports are covered or are generated by the ecommerce solution. It is also necessary to know how easily more reports can be added or generated by the system.

Other important aspect of reporting is the support of different formats. The most common formats are CVS (Microsoft Excel), PDF (Adobe) and Quickbooks.

Integration

Integration is one of the key non functional requirements; one should look at, before choosing ecommerce software (www.ritecart.co.uk). Some of the key questions would be how easy is it to integrate with third party software? Does the ecommerce provider have the pluggable modules provided like Epos (Online electronic Point Of Sale) and Accounting package?

Palindrome Software Labs (www.palindromesoftware.com) has been very successful in marketing and selling its RiteCart enterprise product, which has ecommerce, epos, accounting and other pluggable modules.

Major sales in the RiteCart enterprise have been the epos and ecommerce combination. RiteCart (www.ritecart.co.uk) has n tier architecture for its epos module. Epos module has online/offline synchronization with the order management, warehouse management and ecommerce module

As I said earlier, ecommerce solution should be the tool for business to enhance its marketability, sales and in no way should limit it.

Customer Service

Any online retailer will understand how important customer service is to maintaining the success of a business. In choosing an eCommerce package, as a consumer, customer support is all the more important. Make sure that eCommerce software provider does provide with the elements you need to keep an online business operating at its peak level at all times. Does the vendor offer notifications regarding product updates or enhancements, personalized service, and technical support? Is there an option for an online help with live chat and IP2IP calling (www.supportnow.biz)? Keep in mind that the eCommerce solution provider should offer the same individualized service that one would want to give to his customers.

Technical Support

In the same vein, one shouldn’t have to jump through hoops to get someone to aid you if there is a problem with your online store—so make sure the service providers have experienced, reliable technical support and are committed to fixing a coding error or bug quickly. Quality counts; be assured that your ecommerce service provider (www.palindromesoftware.com) has people behind and are equally committed to quality and the customer experience as you are.

Technical Implementation Aspects

This is one of the most neglected factors by the ecommerce customer community.

Remember, Ignorance is not always bliss. it is important to understand that the product development technology plays a vital role in defining product features, customization, support and ease of product usage.

It is fairly common these days to use a scripting language to build products because that is the easiest way to build a product for the product supplier!!

I encourage customers to ask some specific questions, to name a few

· How can I customize the product behavior? Does it use XML or Property files?

· How can I change my query? Can I change without looking into the code?

· How can I change the content?

· Can my Home page flash dynamically pick up product images, price and other details from my database

· What language is used for development for product? Scripting language like PHP and others are a huge no, no. Make sure that your product is built using a software language like Java or .NET (most preferred ones)

· Can I add more modules to my product? How simple is it? Is the development Object Oriented

Our product RiteCart (www.ritecart.co.uk) is built using robust MVC/Struts framework, which is modular, extensible and configurable. Technologies used in this product are Java, XML, BSH.

Build vs. Buy

Over the period of time, this has become one of my favorite customer questions. Build or Buy?

I usually answer this by asking a question- how much ROI do you expect out of your ecommerce investment and product?

Building is an expensive option (not from cost point of view but from ROI Point of view).

You can build your solution using one of these options

1. Build with a good reliable vendor onsite (with or without an open source solution)

2. Build with a good vendor offshore

3. Build with a small vendor onsite/offshore

4. Go for your own development with some open source tools

Point 1, 2 &3 are feasible but one should ask himself the following questions, is the cost feasible? Will the vendor understand all the functional needs of the ecommerce solution? How long has the vendor been in the ecommerce solution market? Will the solution be ever built? Will it work as per expectations? Can the software vendor be relied upon? How much time will it take? What impact does it have on my business if it is not delivered to my satisfaction?

Finally for option 4, if you decide to pursue an open-source application to manage your store, make sure to thoroughly research and examine your options. Is the project continuously updated, or has it been stagnant for a long time, with very few updates on the project and very little news as to where it is headed? Several open-source solutions are released every year. However, very few have the longevity that you will need to be used as a foundation for your online store. Examine the programmers behind it, and others who use the program.

Buying option is a much easier option. One can feel and see the solution. One can make sure that he has got everything in the product he needs. Also, he can be rest assured that the company has the required functional, technical and support expertise to support all of his needs.

Finally, look at the company that’s behind your eCommerce solution (www.ritecart.co.uk). What have they done in the past? Are they a growing enterprise, likely to continually make improvements to their firm, and pass on those benefits to you? When considering a package, make sure that the company you are dealing with is credible, with a solid reputation to back up any claims. See where your customer and technical support will come from. Is it in-house or out-sourced? Do they have a solid, supportive community in the form of a forum, blog, or network of satisfied eCommerce businesses (www.ritecart.co.uk)? Examine the philosophy behind the company. Ask for references or email others, who’ve used their services in the past, and see what they have to say about the different aspects of the company you may be working with. These are the people who are going to help you build your business and make it a success; so choose wisely.

Ritecart product (www.ritecart.co.uk) is sold in two flavors (Lite & enterprise). If you are looking for ecommerce software, Please request for a quotation from our Sales team.

We have got the right product for you tagged with the right price!!!

Author is working as a Senior Retail Analyst with Palindrome Software Labs (www.palindromesoftware.com).

How to choose an ecommerce product? - Part I

ramukumar — Thu, 15 May 2008 18:11:56 GMT

What is ecommerce?

Ecommerce (www.ritecart.co.uk) can be described as a commerce conducted electronically. It is the whole process of being able to make a sale of the product over the World Wide Web.

Electronic commerce that is conducted between businesses is referred to as Business-to-business or B2B. B2B can be open to all interested parties (e.g. commodity exchange) or limited to specific, pre-qualified participants (private electronic market).

Electronic commerce (www.ritecart.co.uk) is generally considered to be the sales aspect of e-business. It also consists of the exchange of data to facilitate the financing and payment aspects of the business transactions.

How does one go about choosing an ecommerce product?

It is my observation that while selecting an ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) most of the customers seem to be asking themselves the following set of questions

· How will it appear on the customer side?

· Will it be an attractive website?

· Will it display all of my products?

· Can I use open source and do some developments specific to my requirement?

These questions are valid and are important but these questions should be asked only after the selection of product is done. It is very important for business, which are for a long haul to really look for ROI (Return of Investment) from their ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk).

Before selection of any product, it is very useful to list down why you need a product or software, in this case ecommerce software?

Some of the answers will be/can be

· Increase presence in Online market and thereby have more sales

· Introduce a new channel of business- Have a new online channel for selling goods

· Establish Brand name, making future rollout of products/commodities easier

· Simplify management of all sales and inventories

· Increase productivity by integrating both Online and Offline model

· Increase visibility of the entire business operations by integrating both online and offline models together

· Be competitive, Just because a neighbor doing it!!!

I like the last one, because that way, one doesn’t have to really think hard but to follow his neighbor!!

Anyways, once one has his reasons chalked out, he would have also realized that this is a true line of business and needs much more investigation, investment and business initiative to make it a real success.

Online business can be only successful as successful as the tool is (the ecommerce product). To draw a comparison, one may want to travel 80 miles in an hr and may be really trying hard but that ain’t be possible with a bullock cart or may be even with a horse wagon. One would atleast need a car to make that happen.

Coming back to success, success of the ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) would lie on how the product fares with all of the following aspects.

1. Ease of configuration

2. Ability to Scale

3. Useful latest features

4. Available marketing tools with the product

5. Ability to analyze data (analytics, not only google analytics!!)

6. Reports

7. Integration (with other modules, Like epos with near realtime online/offline synchronization of data and other packaged application )

8. Customer Service

9. Technical Support

10. Technical Implementation Aspects

11. Build vs Buy

Please keep watching for my second post on the same topic, where I will expand on each of above selection criteria’s. If you happen to take your decision before my next post, consider RiteCart ecommerce product (www.ritecart.co.uk) software marketed by Palindrome Software Labs Pvt Ltd (www.palindromesoftware.com).

When will there be a major revision of the Xbox 360 hardware ?

timiteh — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:45:43 GMT

As a fan of the first Xbox, i was really interested by buying the Xbox 360.

However the recurrent problems(noise,lack of reliability,etc...) as well as the lack of a built-in HD drive has prevented to buy one until now.

I am waiting for the first major hardware revision of the Xbox 360 which hopefully will solve most problems(especially the noise and the reliability).

I hope that i won't have to wait for too long or i will rather invest the money i save for the Xbox 360 in the upcoming upgrade of my PC.

I prefer consoles gaming to PC gaming but a most significant upgrade of my PC(full HD monitor for example) would be overall much more useful to me.

GLaDOS Called my house!

pmcgrath — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 17:09:48 GMT

The other night I received a phone call from a computer, a female computer. She claimed that she was the automated alert system for the county schools and was calling to inform me that my children were going to be let out early on Friday. Right about the time I was thinking how much she sounded like GLaDOS from Portal, I heard "...and lunch will be served." AAAAAAAAA!!! Damn near dropped the handset. "Kids, don't eat the cake!"

Share : how to rip DVD and convert Video to iPod or iphone or zune

reallyman — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 11:54:59 GMT

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Halo 3. A review from an ordinary gamer.

subzerohitman721 — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 04:57:42 GMT

Wednesday Morning at 6:30 am and I finally beat Halo 3. I took breaks, slept, and kept any eye on my kids. Thats right, kids over Halo any day. After finishing the campagin mode and scoring 420 out of the 1000 points within the game, I have to say I'm very satisfied with the game. Halo 3 delivers with graphics, challenge, appeal, a beautifully written storyline, and a fitting ending to the series. While some were complaining it was too short, I really felt that Halo 1's levels were massively too long. The slightly shorter levels and well timed cinemas really kept me into the game. I loved the evolution of all the old and new vehicles.

I found the AI to be better prepared at battling the Master Chief, using better hit and run tactics to prevent you from gaining ground. Unlike the previous ones, where all of them were just gunning for you, it felt like the enemies were using defensive lines. The better placed heavy weapon cannons and better use of military tactics made the game that much more invigorating to play. The number of NPC's that died througout the game really did shock me and I really was emotionally stunned. The quest for Cortana and the use of the Cortana effect was a great new way of storytelling. Although the repetative ending of the massively rediculous drive to the ship was stupid, it didn't totally ruin the game for me. The music, explosions, enemy tactics, and the thrill of racing to the end immersed me to the point where I didn't care if I had done this before.

The ending although somewhat subdued, I felt that the ending was fitting of the theme of finish the fight. They kept the theme very consistent and gave a realistic view of how real wars end. Of course civilian populations do cheer the end of wars with hope and promise. However, for guys who went through it, the scarrs of war do haunt them for the rest of their lives. Having seen the Vietnam Memorial in person, you see the finality and coldness of such conflicts that games rarely live up to. Many games celebrate the end of conflict by glorifying the battles but not the men and women who participated. By being frank and honest, Bungie kept true to real life. Wars end, funerals happen, memorials are made, and we hope that we learn something from the conflict. The fitting scene between the Arbiter and Lord Hood was honest and true that real veterans of war would relate to.

Halo 3's true emmersion in the art of a fictious war and the excellent delivery by both Bungie and Microsoft gets my abosolute seal of approval. Looking at the whole sceme of Halo 3, it delivers in a way that no title from Sony has done yet. It has done it in a way that no Wii title has yet to live up to. Its not a 100 percent near perfect title, but yet no game is truely ever perfect. But as far as I'm concerned, it was the perfect out of the box experience that I expect from titles that I loved in the past such as Star Wars: KOTOR series, Metal Gear Solid series, Zelda series, and Grand Theft Auto series. I so cannot wait for the Halo movies.

Halo 3 Multiplayer Joining system

Tobywuk — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 10:35:59 GMT

The one thing that I am disappointed in with halo 3 is there System for joining multilayer games. Although you may choose your basic game criteria, I find you are unable to be more precise when choosing and the game type you join is at random. I understand they do not list current games as they would just fill up to quickly but i miss the multilayer game list that other Xbox games have.

What do you think?