SEO & Competitive Intelligence

There are many tools available to help you with Search Engine Optimization as well as keeping tabs on your competition. Some of these are free, while others are by paid subscription. They can help you check inbound links, and analyze keywords, rankings and traffic on competitors' Websites, among other things.

For a list of the best, see Multichannel Merchant magazine.

opentaps Quarterly Update

Click HERE to see the Quarterly update for opentaps open source ERP/CRM solution.

Technical (framework) changes include:

• Integrated hibernate search for indexing and searching data. We will be developing a user interface for search next.
• Replaced AspectJ with AspectWerkz as the library to support Aspect Oriented Programming (AOP)
• Upgraded to the new version of Jasper reports, so that it is now compatible with the new version of iReport (3.5.2) as well.
• Incorporate customer and sales analysis reports from opentaps analytics back into opentaps, accessible under opentaps CRM. In the future, opentaps analytics will work as a stand-alone application, or as a part of opentaps

Application changes include:

• New splash page.
• Converted invoices, orders, and quote PDF's to Jasper reports. These documents can now also be e-mailed with our Ajax browser email.
• Financial reports have been migrated to Jasper reports as well. This means trial balances, income statements, balance sheets, etc. can now be exported to PDF and Excel.
• New screens for creating and managing quotes.
• New screens for creating purchase orders.
• New Google Web Toolkit (GWT) grid for entering both invoices and orders.
• Support for keyboard shortcuts. For example, you can now configure keystrokes to perform tasks in opentaps, such as "F2" to create a new order.
• Supports calculating encumbrances from outstanding purchase orders, so you can use it as a budgeting tool.

MIT's Bokode Bar Code

Another bar code post, thanks to StorefrontBacktalk -- MIT's Media Lab is readying the next technology that will try to challenge the barcode. It's a 3-millimeter optical tag called a "Bokode" that can store roughly a million times more data than today's typical barcode (at the same size) and claims some key advantages compared with RFID tags.

At a per-tag price of about $5 for the bokode, however, it will still need huge volumes to become practical.

Click HERE for MIT's own report on the Bokode (PDF format).

FKI Logistex - RFID Bar Codes

FKI Logistex. which designed the material handling/fulfillment system for online shoe retailer Zappos (recently acquired by Amazon - see link for the logistics impact) is one of the leaders in creating RFID solutions for airports. Recently it launched the industry's first combined RFID and barcode unit.

Difficulties with Outsourcing

According to Outsourcing Journal, "Even highly successful outsourcing relationships encounter hurdles. Despite their best efforts in planning, due diligence, contract negotiation, and other pre-signing activities, buyers of outsourced services can experience situations that fall short of their hopes and fail to fulfill their expectations. While these disappointments may not cause an already-successful relationship to fail, they can lead to frustration, reduced confidence, and sometimes to costly renegotiations.

"Outsourcing Center studied the findings around relationship disappointments among the buyers in the relationships nominated for the 2009 Outsourcing Excellence Awards. Our study asked buyers about their 'biggest disappointment' in the relationship. Though many buyers stated they had no disappointments or only small disappointments from time to time, 36 referred to factors that did, or could, lead to significant issues for both parties."

Click HERE for more details.

Search Marketing Guide

The Search Marketing Guide: The Sites, Keywords, Managers and Resources That Drive U.S. Retail Web Marketing, is now available from Internet Retailer.

Map of Amazon Acquisitions

Check out meettheboss.com for a map of Amazon's acquisitions since 1998: