Twitter launches discounts linked to your credit card

Your Twitter addiction might save you some money starting Tuesday.

The company has launched Twitter Offers, which lets marketers run promotions that you can redeem via your credit card. If a Twitter Offer pops up in your timeline, now you can add the Offer to your credit card or debit card. When you click to buy the item, the discount will be applied, though the cash back won't show up for a few days.

As with Twitter's Buy button, to redeem the offer, users have to click on it. Then they'll be directed to a landing page where they can enter their credit- or debit card info.

Once you enter your card information, Twitter has it on hand so you can redeem future offers without that hassle. (Having your data also helps Twitter push its "Buy" button.)

For advertisers, Twitter Offers presents a way to track ROI for Twitter-based promotions. If 50 people redeem an Offer, for instance, they can work out how much they spent for each redemption.

The company says it is planning to work with a "handful" of unnamed brands for Twitter Offers this holiday season.

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How to Optimize Your E-Commerce Website for Holiday Shoppers

Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday 2013 have come and gone, but the holiday shopping season has only just begun. Over the next several weeks, U.S. shoppers will be checking off their lists, and according to Shop.org, they'll be spending a projected $82 billion online this holiday season. If you're an e-commerce retailer, it's in your best interest to keep your website in tip-top shape this month.

Small e-commerce businesses, in particular, stand to gain a lot by putting themselves out there and competing with the bigger retailers during this peak selling season. Debbi Lechner, vice president of marketing for Web.com, suggested that small businesses improve their website right away in order to maximize sales.

"We know that small business owners are strapped from both a time and resource standpoint, but they want to get the most out of this busy holiday season online," she said.

SEE ALSO: How to Start an Online Business

Lechner offered the following tips for optimizing your e-commerce website for increased holiday sales:

Feature special offers and discounts on your website. Make sure that your holiday offers are featured prominently on your home page. Update your website's images, keywords and search engine optimization to help shoppers find your business in search results.

Share your holiday offers on social media. You should frequently post your special offers to your top social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. Linking your posts back to your website will promote calls and orders, and drive more traffic to your website. You will also see increased awareness and followers of your social channels when customers share your offers with their friends.

Consider pay-per-click advertising. Pay-per-click advertising is the fastest way to drive prospective customers to your website to learn about your special deals and offers. You can advertise on Google, Bing, Facebook, Twitter and more, and target your advertising on these sites to better reach your local customers. To do this, edit your existing messaging into short advertising phrases and test your responses. Make sure you measure your results to maximize your budget.

Make sure your website is mobile-optimized. Today, more and more consumers use theirmobile device when considering a purchase. Be sure to provide your prospects and customers with a good online experience, regardless of whether they are browsing via a smartphone, tablet or PC.

Be ready with your customer support. Holiday shoppers want a positive customer experience. Make your contact details easy to find on all pages of your website. You may want to consider adding temporary help to answer the additional calls, if you think you will need it. A simple answering service can ensure you don't miss a call and lets customers know you plan to get back to them quickly.

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What Will Make Consumers Tick in 2014?

With each passing year, marketers must come up with new ways to engage their customer base.

Advertising and marketing communications firm JWT has recently released its ninth annual forecast of key trends that they believe will drive or significantly impact consumer mindset and behavior in 2014. Among the trends businesses should be aware of include:

Immersive Experiences

Entertainment, narratives and brand experiences will become more immersive and altogether more enveloping in a bid to capture consumers' imagination and attention. Examples are:

Zombie Apocalypse: Experience a Zombie Apocalypse in Manila thanks to Outbreak Missions. In the live action survival experience, victims are challenged to problem-solve and find a cure for the outbreak.

The Rain Room: In 2013, visitors to the Museum of Modern Art in New York could control the rain in this special exhibit. Falling raindrops would pause within immediate distance of the human body.

Oculus Rift: A virtual reality gaming headset allows players to watch and play as if they're inside the game screen. The product is due for release in 2014.

Nike's "The Art of Science of Feeling": In New York City, this exhibit used sensory technology to simulate barefoot running on various surfaces. This was to promote the Nike Free Hyperfeel shoe.

Do You Speak Visual

Expect a shift to a visual vocabulary that relies on photos, emojis (icons used to express emotion), video snippets and other imagery, largely supplanting the need for text. "Visual" is a new lingo that needs to be mastered. Examples include:

Taco Bell and frozen yogurt chain 16 Handles, have been sending disappearing, 10-second coupons and new product teasers to consumers using Snapchat.

Sony's "Pin it To Give It" initiative donated a dollar to charity every time a Pinterest user re-pinned from the board. Donations went to the Michael Phelps Foundation.

Tinder, the most popular visual-only dating app, paired with the USA Network to offer sneak previews of the show "Suits" when users liked a photo of a "Suits" cast member on the dating app.

Proudly Imperfect

Imperfection and even outright ugliness — the quirky, the messy and the flawed — are taking on new appeal in a world that's become neatly polished and curated. Imperfection provides an unfiltered, all-too-human version of reality that reflects all the diversity that's seen in everyday life. Examples are:

Culinary Misfits: Some European businesses are promoting imperfect produce as a way to avoid food waste. Culinary Misfits is a small catering company in Berlin that uses only "ugly" vegetables. In Germany, the Rewe Group launched a private-label line of "nonconformist" produce, and another retailer, Edeka, has tested selling ugly produce at a discount, branded as "nobody is perfect."

Ugly Selfies: Ugly Selfies have become a counter to the glamorous self-portraits that proliferate on social media, including #badhairmondays and #nomakeup moments.

The End of Anonymity

Thanks to an array of new technologies and a growing drive to collect personal data, it's becoming nearly impossible to remain unobserved and untracked by corporations and governments. As anonymity becomes more elusive, expect pushback from consumers and a growing paranoia around technologies and services that affect privacy. Examples include:

The creation of Mondelēz, a "smart shelf" that analyzes shoppers in the vicinity. Mondelēz collects data to determine which demographics veer toward which products and whether brands are placed well.

Facial recognition technology: NEC IT solutions developed a facial recognition system called NeoFace, and the company is selling it to retailers to help salespeople recognize VIP customers.

Countersurveillance fashion and accessories are on the rise for those who don’t want their data collected. OFF Pocket, designed by technologist Adam Harvey, blocks GPS, Wi-Fi or cellular signals from reaching mobile phones.

Raging Against the Machine

As digital age takes hold, consumers are starting to both fear and resent technology by putting a higher value on all things that feel essentially human and seriously questioning (while not entirely resisting) technology's siren call. Examples are:

In Amsterdam, Kit-Kat launched Wi-Fi-free zones for people to "have a break."

As a Valentine’s Day promotion, Spanish telecom operator Movistar created an "I Off You" app that lets people give significant others the ability to disconnect their phones.

Remixing Tradition

With social norms quickly changing and a new anything-goes attitude, people are mashing up cherished traditions with decidedly new ideas, creating their own recipes for what feels right. Examples include:

Pope Francis, widely seen as more progressive than his predecessors for shaking up Catholic traditions, is also the first pope with a Twitter account.

In an effort to accommodate those who are unable to attend funerals, more of them are being live-streamed.

The World Muslimah Pageant serves as a showcase for Muslim women and helps to infuse Islam into the more popularized Western beauty pageant.

Traditional holidays such as Dia de los Muertos (The Day of the Dead) are being embraced in countries outside of its origin, such as the United States, which has created dolls for the celebration.

Mobile As Gateway To Opportunity

In emerging markets, mobile devices are coming to represent a gateway to opportunity — helping people change their lives by giving them access to financial systems, new business tools, better health care, education and more. Examples are:

iCow, a mobile application that helps cattle farmers in Kenya optimize milk production and provides tips to keep the animals healthy. The app also keeps track of milk production, breeding and gestation.

MAMA (Mobile Alliance for Maternal Action) aims to cut mortality rates for expecting mothers in Bangladesh, India and South Africa by sending personalized text messages that detail each stage of pregnancy.

Telepathic Technology

Thanks to the rise of brain-computer interface and emotion recognition technology, brands are getting more adept at understanding consumers' minds and moods, and reacting in a very personalized way. Examples include:

In 2012, artist Yahu Duenyas designed an interactive exhibition in a Brooklyn warehouse that enabled visitors to levitate using their brainpower. Participants were strapped into a harness and had EGG sensors on their foreheads.

In order to raise awareness about driving safety, JWT Australia designed a car that uses neurotechnology to make it "go" when drivers are paying attention and "slow" when they're not.

The power of brain science could help assist armies during a war; U.S. and Japanese armies are looking to develop helmets that could read brain waves and allow soldiers to transmit code words to each other with their minds.

Mindful Living

Consumers are developing a quasi-Zen desire to experience everything in a more present, conscious way. Once the domain of the spiritual set, mindful living is filtering into the mainstream, with more people drawn to the idea of shutting out distractions and focusing on the moment. Examples are:

Google holds a bimonthly series of silent “mindful lunches.”

Marketers are providing a counter to FOMO, the fear of missing out — which drives consumers to multitask and feel stressed about their choices — by highlighting JOMO, the joy of missing out.

A few companies are tapping into this disruptive technology to create apps that help facilitate a state of mindfulness. Headspace's meditation app provides daily meditation sessions, and random "mindfulness buzzers" that prompt users to "check in" with themselves.

The Age of Impatience

With the mainstreaming of the on-demand economy and the always-on culture, consumer expectations for speed and ease are rising exponentially. As businesses respond in kind, making the availability of their products and services more "instant," impatience and impulsiveness will only continue to increase. Examples include:

Thanks to Netflix releasing full television series all at once, consumers can now binge-view their favorite TV shows and learn the fate of characters within hours, rather than weeks or months.

Users can get what they want when they want it with eBay, Google, Amazon and grocery services, including Walmart To Go offering same-day delivery in certain markets.

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Wi-Fi Provider Gogo Jumps Into the Justine Sacco Saga

Inflight Wi-Fi provider Gogo has injected itself into the fracas about IAC Senior Director of Corporate Communications Justine Sacco's unfortunate tweet on Friday.

Sacco became the topic of Internet discussion Friday evening after she tweeted, "Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!" Sacco, who was on a plane to Africa as the response to the tweet played out, has not responded though her account has been deleted. Gogo, which provides wireless Internet on flights, used the occasion to highlight its service:

At this writing, Gogo's tweet has been retweeted close to 1,000 times and favorted more than 600 times. A few followers of the brand questioned the tweet, however, asking among other things, if Wi-Fi was actually available on Sacco's flight and if the brand was taking advantage of the incident to indulge in real-time marketing.

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Sisters Use Instagram to Build a Brand, Flaunt 'Family Jewels'

The best advice brands get about branding via social media is to "be yourself" and "show a human side to your brand." Few small businesses do these things better than Dannijo, a high-end jewelry line founded by sisters Jodie Snyder Morel and Danielle Snyder. They founded the brand in 2008, after a life of tinkering and crafting with their dad's medical tools, which inspired the brand's industrial chic look.
The rise of the visual web has been a blessing for the sisters, whose colorful baubles and statement pieces pop on platforms like Instagram (77,000 followers) and Pinterest (9,000 followers), and even Twitter, thanks to its visual "Twitter Cards." Their website even features a shoppable Instagram gallery powered by Olapic, and customers who interact with user pics on the site are 3x more likely to convert, showing the power of social media and user-generated content.

The designers have accrued a massive social audience both as a brand and individuals, and they use social media to sell the brand by embodying a lifestyle. The sisters live a glamorous life — hobnobbing with supermodel friends, partnering on a special collection with their friend Rashida Jones, popping down to Art Basel and appearing at Bergdorf Goodman. Jodie and Danni capture all of these moments — as well as red-carpet shots of celebs donning Dannijo — to craft a social presence that is inspiring and FOMO-inducing. They key is that they incorporate their wares into nearly every shot, without seeming like shameless self-promoters. Part of that is thanks to their creative execution — Instagrammers "like" beautiful executions, so they don't mind overt product placement if the look is styled and the image is particularly well done.

When we do dainty, we #PileItOn. #earparty #finebydannijones NOW @ http://t.co/JhmD61TiOz cc @iamrashidajones pic.twitter.com/eCC0QnztVp
— DANNIJO (@DANNIJO) November 20, 2013

"We're really cognizant of the fact that the different platforms bring different experiences to the customer," says Danielle. Image-focused Instagram is the sisters' go-to platform for "when we're trying to showcase the styling of something, or a color palette or anything that you would want to see in a magazine."
One of the strongest elements of Dannijo's social presence across platforms is its use of hashtags, which help to foster conversation and infuse the social profiles with the sisters' personality, while also establishing the personality of the brand itself. A few of their favorites:

• #sistersister — for sisterly moments, like when they're traveling to Toronto or hitting up Art Basel
• #armparty — a wrist shot, chock-full of bracelets and bangles
• #putabibonit — for their trademark bibs
• Occasion-specific hashtags, like #BaselingHard and #DANNIJOatHolts, and a hashtag for every product, such as #EmmyCuff and #KeiraNecklace
  Watch the video above to hear the sisters Dannijo explain how they've built their social following and what they credit their success to.

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InVision Raises $11.6M From FirstMark Capital And Tiger Global

InVision, a prototyping tool for thousands of web developers and designers, has recently closed an $11.6 million Series A round from FirstMark Capital and Tiger Global.
The company launched in 2011 out of New York with a mission to make it easy for designers to share, interact with, and get feedback on their prototypes. Users can easily upload Photoshop files to the web and add interactions to form a simulation, all within a normal web browser under a single link (which can be password protected).
In February 2012, InVision raised a $1.5 million seed round with FirstMark. The startup has since focused on facilitating the conversation around these prototypes, which can now happen with a much wider range of people.
Founder Clark Valberg explained that traditionally, the communication between designers and coders about the final look and feel of a project was limited to an inner circle of people. With InVision, a wide range of people across the company can consult on the design and give their feedback asynchronously.
That might sound like data overflow, but one might also consider it a less risky alternative to launching a real product before the design department is ready. That is, after all, the argument. Some startups believe that design, in multiple drafts, should come before coding out the product, while others believe that you should push a real product out as quickly as possible to get users (and ultimately receive their feedback).


Valberg isn’t opposed to iterating based on user feedback, but believes that it’s better to get much of that initial iteration process out of the way before you “lose a lot of control” by making your product publicly available.
The new funding will allow InVision to continue picking up new customers, which currently range from small startups to huge corporations. The company is also working on “some interesting partnerships”, as well as some enhanced marketing and new features.

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Tweet a Selfie to See Your Smart Car Doppelganger

Smart Car USA launched an odd promotion on Twitter: The company will dress up a car to look like you if you tweet a picture of yourself.

The campaign, which began Tuesday and ends Thursday afternoon, asks fans to tweet a selfie with the hashtag #smartwrapme. The automaker will then tweet a photo with a car "inspired by their looks."

Smart Car is no stranger to Twitter antics. The brand caught attention in June 2012 when it offered a response to a user who complained that bird poop totaled his car. Smart Car responded with an infographic making the case that it would actually take 4.5 million birds to accomplish that feat.

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7 Reasons Every Startup Video Looks the Same

Did you see that latest startup's video? You know, the one with the animation and the bouncy tune?

Don't remember exactly? It's not your fault.

This year, we saw some innovative launch videos including HelloFlo's "Camp Gyno" andGoldieBlox's controversial "Princess Machine". Most, however, relied on clichés.

But don't blame the ads' creators. Yann Lhomme, co-founder of ThinkMojo, a company that creates videos for startups, says he's tired of following clichés, but entrepreneurs still ask for them. "You would think people would be sick of it, and a lot of people are getting sick of it now," he says. The tide may be turning, though. More than a few people criticized Instagram for using a gratuitous combination of hipsters and an AMC Pacer in a video that introduced Instagram Direct last week.

Meanwhile, as we look back on the wasteland of 2013, here are seven startup-video clichés we can do without in 2014:

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Facebook Video Ads Are Here, but Will Users Click?

Facebook's motto is "move fast and break things," but it appears the company tried to do the opposite with its latest ad product.

Facebook confirmed Tuesday that it is testing video ads this week that automatically start playing in the News Feed on desktop and mobile. The move is among the most significant of the company's many, many efforts to introduce new revenue-generating products following its IPO last year. Some analysts predict that video ads could be a billion-dollar market opportunity for Facebook, but it comes with the risk of potentially alienating users.

For nearly a year, there have been rumors that Facebook was close to introducing video ads, but the timeline was continually pushed back. Sources familiar with the rollout told Mashable that Facebook showed some advertisers the video ads over the summer, but delayed the launch to continue tinkering with the details. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO and cofounder, was said to be personally involved in making the video ads more palatable to users.

"We've all seen over the years how users can respond to changes on Facebook," said Andrew Lipsman, VP of industry analysis at comScore, alluding to the blowback from previous attempts to introduce new ads and features. "[These video ads] are clearly intended to respect the user experience."

While the ads will autoplay in the feed — the dreaded A-word — there won't be any sound unless users click or tap the video on their device. To put it another way, the video ads may make the News Feed a little busier, but they won't make it noisier. If that sounds like a minor difference, consider how disruptive autoplaying content with sound was on the original MySpace.

By muting videos, Facebook may significantly reduce the number of users who will experience an ad on the page, but those who do click to listen to the ad will be more valuable to brands because they've opted in to the experience. The question is whether and how much users will choose to click.

On other platforms like YouTube, Hulu and various news publications, users view video ads in order to consume the video content that comes after. As of right now, Facebook — which is not primarily a video platform — would be asking users to watch the ad simply to watch the ad. That might work well for entertaining ads like movie trailers, which is how Facebook is testing the video ad feature this week, but as Lipsman points out, "how well will that extend to other categories where it's more general consumer brands?"

"The onus is on creative shops to make the most of this opportunity," said Colin Sutton, director of social for Omnicom's OMD, a media agency with members on the Facebook Client Council, which Facebook set up to engage with advertisers. "We are as an agency really, really bullish on this product... What we've seen from testing and what the Client Council has been testing is that response rates are through the roof."

The number of video ads online more than doubled between October 2012 and October of this year, according to comScore and data provided by eMarketer suggests that engagement is significantly higher for in-stream video ads than other formats. In its blog post Tuesday, Facebook revealed that it has been experimenting with ways to make videos more engaging since September and has seen engagement increase by more than 10%.

"The average click-through rates on video ads are between 0.8% and 2%. We would expect higher click-through rates on Facebook ads," said Aaron Goldman, head of global marketing at Kenshoo, which is part of Facebook's Strategic Preferred Marketing Developer program. "Anytime Facebook introduces a new ad unit, we see high engagement in the beginning and that's more because it's new and jumps off the page." That is particularly true for video ads, which will literally jump off the page by virtue of being a moving image on a page filled with static content.

Beyond that, Goldman and others we spoke with expect Facebook to boost engagement by letting marketers target video ads at particular users based on age and gender, among other factors.

"This is a clear shot across the bow that Facebook can start to replace ad dollars on television," Sutton says, "and potentially do a lot more work for the money.

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Best Buy Rolls Out Google Hangout for Last-Minute Shoppers

Best Buy is experimenting with Google's new Google Plus-enabled ads with a shoppable Hangout for those seeking last-minute holiday gifts.

The Hangout, which is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. ET Tuesday, will be hosted by Carolyn McCarthy and feature Austin Evans, Marques Brownlee, Soldier Knows Best and Machinima, tech pundits with relatively large YouTube followings. During the course of the Hangout, a menu will appear on the right-hand side of the page. If the four discuss certain laptop models, for instance, a link will appear where viewers can click to buy the item.

A Best Buy rep says she doesn't know if consumers will be watching the Hangout on their laptops or on their phone or tablet: "Whichever way works best."

To direct fans to the Hangout, the retailer is running Google's Google Plus-enabled ads, that let users share or +1 the banner.

Google has only offered a few shoppable Hangouts until now. The company's first was with Diane Von Furstenburg this fall and Verizon Wireless also did one for Cyber Monday. The feature is still in beta and is only available to a limited number of clients, the rep says

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Blue Nile Goes Responsive, Pop-Up to Sell More Bling

If you get married, you're taking part in an ancient tradition that's been around for more than 4,000 years, historians say.

If you're buying the bling that goes with it these days, you could be using a technologically sophisticated, of-the-moment process that just joined the love-struck party in 2013, says online jewelry retailer Blue Nile.

Seattle-based Blue Nile, a low-overhead business known for undercutting traditional bricks-and-mortar jewelry stores founded in 1999, knew it needed to update its digital shopping experience. Executives at the retailer had noticed a trend among the target Millennial audience: Most of these men, between 25 and 35 years old, were browsing Blue Nile on their mobile phones, iPads and other gadgets.

But the Blue Nile website had been designed primarily with the PC- or laptop-shopper in mind. Trying to navigate on any other device meant a "suboptimal experience," says Jon Sainsbury, Blue Nile's VP and head of strategy.

"That young customer was migrating to tablets and mobile devices," Sainsbury says. "We needed to be device-agnostic, and we needed to give people a simple, consistent brand experience across platforms. And our site, basically, was due for a facelift."

Image: Image: Blue Nile

Executives did just that, deciding to use a responsive design that would allow users to view the website on any size screen and any platform. They briefly considered an adaptive design framework, but ultimately didn't think it met the company's needs and didn't position it to deal deftly with new developments in the tech world, such as the iPad Mini and next-generation Samsung phones.

A responsive design also could prove to be a leg up in the global market, since Blue Nile ships to more than 40 countries.

The website redesign figured prominently into a partnership for an experimental pop-up shop in Nordstrom. The program, which launched in November, put a Blue Nile display case of 75 styles of engagement rings and 40 wedding bands in the high-end downtown Seattle store near its Wedding Suite bridal boutique. Shoppers can look, but not buy, the jewelry on display; a Blue Nile consultant, armed with an iPad, can lead prospects through the process.

"This deal would've been tough without the redesign," Sainsbury said. "The site renders beautifully on the tablet."

Blue Nile browsing on an iPhone. Image: Blue Nile

If the "bricks and clicks" program goes well during its six-month test this holiday, it could later roll out to 17 other Nordstrom stores around the country.

Blue Nile executives wouldn't disclose the cost of the holiday campaign and website revamp, but said its timing couldn't have been better. Independent research from holiday 2012 found that 80% of online shoppers in the U.S. were browsing on multiple devices, Sainsbury says, with more expected to join this year.

Blue Nile's own studies further proved the point: A year ago, 35% of its shoppers arrived at the site on mobile devices; by mid-2013, that number had jumped to 45%, and the recent Thanksgiving and Black Friday period saw 60% of the marketer's traffic come from mobile.

Blue Nile wanted not only to take advantage of that trend, but specifically to capture upscale, tech-savvy potential buyers who were considering popping the question.

With the revamped site ready for action, Blue Nile launched a mobile ad campaign on Google to drive traffic to the site from those online shoppers who were searching for fine jewelry. (Blue Nile's assortment contains everything from under-$100 gifts like a sterling silver sweetheart locket to $25,000 diamond solitaires and blue sapphire cocktail rings).

Engagement rings make up the lion's share of Blue Nile's business — nearly 70% of sales volume annually — and Christmas is a key selling period for that life-changing bauble. Blue Nile was now ready to try to draw in its target young buyers and give them a digital experience that could carry over from the laptop to an Android to a Samsung Galaxy and to use unique features like Blue Nile's build-your-own ring app on all those platforms for the first time.

Consumers think hard about such a purchase, Blue Nile's metrics have found — it takes consumers two to four weeks to go from looky-loo to buyer, after having studied hundreds of pages of content and upwards of 50 to 100 diamonds.

Blue Nile's interactive gift guide also got an overhaul with a mobile-first design. It's no longer paginated, but has an infinite scroll that has caused a "fantastic lift" in the number of consumers who spend time there, Sainsbury says.

The work quickly started paying off. The percentage of tablet traffic that viewed a product detail page increased from 30% to 40%, and the percentage of smartphone users who entered the diamond search page increased from 25% to 30%. About 50% of click-throughs from Google are coming from mobile devices this holiday season, the company says.

Blue Nile more than doubled the number of customers using its education section via smartphone. Sainsbury says that section, filled with breakdowns of diamond lingo and other information, is an essential step in the buying process.

And consumers aren't just dipping their toe in the water, they're sealing the deal. They have made several orders for rings, necklaces, pendants and other bling — in the five and six figures — from their tablets and mobile phones this season.

"We've been very pleased with the site's ability to get further down the purchase funnel," Sainsbury says. "We're encouraged by what we're seeing."

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7 Free Shipping Deals for Last-Minute Online Shoppers

Whether you're on a budget this holiday season or not, there's at least one offer no shopper can turn down: free shipping.
Going to brick-and-mortar retailers used to mean saving on shipping costs. Now, many online retailers are making it more cost effective to simply shop from your couch. (Consider money saved on gas and time waiting in long lines.)

See also: Amazon Raises Free Shipping Minimum for First Time in a Decade

We've all struggled through the last-minute mall excursion before. You spend more time looking for a parking space than you do shopping, and the store almost always has the perfect thing — at a different location "nearby." It's not like shopping in person helps with getting the right size, either. Unless of course, you're buying for yourself, in which case you should remember they call it the season of giving for a reason.
So before you spend your weekend trudging through the mall, consider these free shipping options for the U.S. and Canada this holiday season. They could save your sanity as much as your pocketbook.

Free Shipping Day: Dec. 18

In its sixth year of existence, Free Shipping Day marks a 24-hour stretch in which thousands of online retailers offer free shipping in the U.S. to customers with guaranteed delivery by Christmas Eve. Some of the offers and merchants won't be revealed on the Free Shipping Day website until 12:01 a.m. ET on Dec. 18, but 448 merchants have already signed up to participate, including REI, Sports Authority, and Neiman Marcus.

Free Shipping Day was the brainchild of Luke Knowles, the co-founder of FreeShipping.org. The day is something of a win-win, benefiting consumers but also driving sales and traffic to participating retailers. According to the website, Free Shipping Day helped produce more than $1 billion in online sales in 2011.
The site also includes Free Shipping Day in Canada, which takes place this year on Dec. 12 for those consumers looking to send gifts within the country.

Nordstrom

The upscale retail chain offers free standard shipping on all its orders in the United States, and not just around the holidays. Year-round free shipping delivers orders within three to six business days after processing. Known for having a stellar return policy — legend has it a customer in Alaska once returned a set of car tires to Nordstrom even though the retailer doesn't sell tires — Nordstrom allows users to ship returns back to the company free of charge. Buying an expensive piece of jewelry? Watch and jewelry orders over $1,500 are expedited in one or two days and insured at no additional cost.
The only bummer — free shipping doesn't apply to items purchased at Nordstrom Rack, the retailer's off-price chain.

Amazon

If you have an Amazon order totaling $35 or more, you may qualify for free shipping in the United States. Not all items on Amazon are included, and we've reached out to Amazon to see if there's a system for why some items are eligible for free shipping while others are not. Those items that are eligible — it will be clear at checkout whether or not you are receiving the deal — ship five to eight business days after the order is processed.
If this number seems higher than you remember, you're onto something. Amazon offered free shipping on orders of $25 or more for nearly a decade before bumping it up to $35 in October.

Best Buy and Target

Like Amazon, you have to spend money to save money with these retailers.
Best Buy has the best offer of the bunch, offering free, four to eight business day shipping year-round on orders of $25 or more. That's a pretty easy threshold to reach at Best Buy. A movie on Blu-ray (or two) should bump your shopping total over the necessary $25 limit.

Target offers free shipping on orders of $50 or more. If you use your Red Card at Target — also known as your Target credit or debit card — your shipping is free on all purchases.
The free shipping includes pre-orders on items like Xbox One games, which will automatically put you over the $50 total.

L.L. Bean

L.L. Bean, which sells clothing and outdoor gear, offers free shipping all the time, with no minimum on how much your purchase costs. The company even ships to Canada for free, a rarity for any type of international shipping. Items shipped to the lower 48 take two to five business days, according to the website.

Zappos

Zappos, the e-commerce shoe retailer, also offers free shipping on all orders shipped to the United States, regardless of total cost. Delivery takes four to five business days, and if you don't like your item, the company also offers free shipping on returns.

Barnes and Noble

For those who still love to curl up with a good book that isn't on a tablet, Barnes and Noble offers free shipping on orders of $25 or more anywhere in the United States. Of course, you can still get your Nook, the e-reader developed by Barnes and Noble, shipped for free, too. Shipping takes two to six business days.

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Instagram Direct Messaging: What's In It for Brands

Whenever Facebook or Instagram introduce a product these days, there is an assumption that the monetization scheme can't be too far behind. But for Instagram Direct, a new set of private and group messaging features unveiled at a press event Thursday morning, making money off the feature may not be the ultimate goal.
A source familiar with Instagram's thinking told Mashable that the company isn't considering or even discussing the idea of bringing ads to Instagram Direct. Instead, Instagram is focused on testing and rolling out the sponsored posts that it debuted early last month.


Some analysts doubt that Instagram direct messages have much potential for advertising. "Is there a brand play for this? I don't see one," Brian Blau, an analyst with Gartner, told Mashable in an interview. Unlike Instagram's introduction of 15-second videos, which was very much geared towards marketers, Blau thinks the messaging feature are more about retaining and attracting users who might otherwise have been lured by apps like Snapchat, Path and Line. "It is really a user thing," he said. "It's a competitive move."
While Instagram may not be planning ad initiatives for Instagram Direct just yet, cofounder and CEO Kevin Systrom did note during the event that marketers can potentially use the messaging feature to college images for contests. Less than two hours later, Gap did just that, soliciting comments on an Instagram post and messaging the first 15 commenters with a limited edition Gap product.

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3 Things to Consider Before Launching a New Product

Whether you're launching a product for the first time or revealing a new collection, the process of getting the word out and driving conversion can be intimidating and overwhelming. Once you consider naming your product, financing, manufacturing and marketing, the prospect of launching a new product can create stress for even the most level-headed and accomplished entrepreneur.

See also: 4 Ways to Improve Your CRM

Below, we outline a few tips from industry experts about the important factors to bring into focus before launching a new product.

1. Determine What Customers Want

This may seem basic, but before you go through the trouble of developing and launching a new product, you should do considerable research to ensure that there is a place for your product in the market. You might have a revolutionary and awe-inspiring product in mind, but if no one is willing to pony up the cash for it, you're out of luck (and you've wasted the time and money you spent investing in your idea).
Alexis Ohanian addresses this issue in his book Without Their Permission, repeatedly emphasizing the importance of creating something people want.
"You've absolutely got to make something people actually want or they'll never stick around, let alone come back. So how do you make something people actually want? Start with a real problem. You've undoubtedly encountered products or services that have frustrated you.

Keep a notepad handy, and write down whatever is upsetting you. There's a good chance you'll find a business in those notes.

Keep a notepad handy, and write down whatever is upsetting you. There's a good chance you'll find a business in those notes." One way to ensure that your product is something people will actually purchase and use is to create a viable solution to a common problem that frustrates people. Mary Kate McGrath, editor-in-chief of PureWow, advises entrepreneurs and businesses to conduct thorough research before launching a new product.
"Do market research to make sure it’s actually a viable product for consumers, rather than just a cool idea that you think may work. Also, be very sure that you have the resources to sustain a new product launch before going to market. If you want your product to succeed, you have to give it legs — and being ready often takes more time than companies allow."

2. Be Discussion-Worthy

Image: Mashable composite: iStock, VasjaKomanGetting press coverage is essential in raising awareness for your new product — and with thousands of new products launching every year, you have to make sure yours stands out.
We spoke with Shannon Malone, director of product strategy at Warby Parker, to get some insight on how to get people interested in (and talking about) your product.
"We try to develop new products around a story that is discussion-worthy.

We often ask ourselves, 'Would people want to talk about this over the dinner table?'

We often ask ourselves, 'Would people want to talk about this over the dinner table?' Creating that conversation could mean collaborating with an interesting and unexpected partner like Ghostly International, hosting a fun event with Leith Clark or creating really interesting and shareable content — for example, the Cat burglar, a film we used to launch our Auteur collection." Whether you are providing thought-provoking or entertaining content, make sure it goes beyond the basics of why your product is new and deserves attention. Captivate your consumers with something discussion-worthy, and you'll not only secure press, but you'll also foster organic word-of-mouth conversation about your brand.

3. Be Transparent

As more products flood the marketplace, consumers face tougher decisions about where to spend their money. One way to attract consumers to your product is to be completely transparent and show them exactly where their money is going.

"The key to converting non-believers has always been transparency,"

"The key to converting non-believers has always been transparency," says Malone. "We try to be as communicative as possible about why we offer particular frames and what materials we use, and emphasize that we’re listening to and incorporating our customers’ feedback. Everlane founder and CEO Michael Preysman built his business on transparency. Encouraging customers to know where their products are coming from — and why they are priced a certain way — gives power to the consumer, and helps them feel confident about their purchases.

Image: EverlaneWhen Everlane launched its new leather collection earlier this year, it faced the challenge of breaking into a new market with a higher price point and communicating the quality of its products online.
"We always face the challenge of conveying high-quality fabrics and materials online," says Preysman. "With our ‘Petra’ leather bag launch, we needed to convince our consumers that the leather being used from this particular factory is of the highest quality and construction. In this case, we increased the styling budget for the Petra’s photo shoot, and heavily educated our consumer on the Italian factory in which it was being produced."
Everlane has an entire page on their site dedicated to the factories where it manufactures its products. In the interactive map, you can click on the factories around the world and you'll get a detailed description of that factory, including pictures of the products in production, as well as background on the owner and materials.

Image: EverlaneWhen customers know where their products are coming from, they often feel a greater sense of ease about their purchases — and this sense of security helps foster brand advocates who will likely tell their friends about their positive experiences.
Launching a new product is complicated, and the process varies considerably depending on what you're creating — but whether you're manufacturing physical goods or offering services online, these tips may help ensure the success of your product launch and can potentially make your brand more attractive to consumers.

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