Weekend Reading, 11/21/14

November 21, 2014

CensusBureau-Service-Sector-Revenue-Increases-in-2013-Nov2014Revenues grew last year in each of the nation’s 11 service sectors for employer firms, reports the US Census Bureau in new data from the 2013 Service Annual Survey. The information sector saw revenue growth of 3.4% to $1.3 trillion, with the sub-sector of internet publishing and broadcasting and web search portals seeing the fastest growth, of 10.3%. The fastest-growing of the 11 service sectors examined was real estate and rental and leasing, with a 7% rise.

Here are some other pieces of research data to get you through the weekend:

  • What are customers looking for from software and online services companies? About 7 in 10 want recurring subscriptions without monthly reminders, says Avangate. But, they also want options: 46% refuse to purchase online subscriptions without a freemium option, and one-quarter are more willing to purchase an online service subscription when add-on features are available.
  • In an analysis of 50 million shopping sessions that were exposed to product recommendations, Barilliance finds that the most engaging product recommendation types are “customers ultimately buy” and “customers also viewed on product pages.” These had roughly double the click-through rate of “you might also like” recommendations.
  • Mothers are this year more likely to be using mobile devices throughout the purchase journey than in years past, a fairly unsurprising development. BabyCenter’s study notes that mobile use is widest when it comes to comparing prices (68%) and features (62%), and lowest when deciding where to buy (49%).
  • Tablets have 2.7 times higher conversion rates than handsets, details Medialets [download page] in an analysis of Q3 data pulled from its mobile and tablet ad serving platform. According to the report, conversion rates for both handsets and tablets are higher in-app than on the mobile web. Interestingly, the majority of handset (58%) and tablet (72%) conversions are from view-throughs rather than click-throughs, an indication that measurement based on click-throughs alone misses the broader picture. In other words “mobile ads are far more effective than ever advertisers realize.”
  • More than 60% of all global emails come from IPs with sender scores of 20 or below (on a 100-point scale), and less than 3% of these emails ever reach the inbox, per a Return Path report [download page]. Among those with a sender score greater than 90, though, 92% of emails reach the inbox, illustrating the significance of the sender’s reputation.
  • Social care is concentrated among a small subset of brands, as 10% of brands get asked 65% of all questions posed on Facebook and Twitter, according to Socialbakers data.
  • 35% of consumers around the world have not bought a product specifically because they didn’t agree with the company’s practices, finds APCO Worldwide in its Champion Brands survey.
  • In a survey of 81 media buying agencies, STRATA reveals that the majority (61% share) of respondents indicate that targeting videos towards viewers’ interest is the most effective technique for attracting viewers to watch online video ads. By comparison, only 5% felt that using comedy or humor is the most effective technique.
  • What challenges are being faced by B2B sales training teams? Brainshark has some answers based on a survey [download page] of more than 160 sales trainers and managers. The top-cited challenge is content creation being too time-consuming (50%), closely followed by content not being engaging enough (48%).

Have a great weekend!

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