Category: Portable Trust & Reputation Signals Page 1 of 2

Shopping Advisor approved by Mozilla for Firefox

On January 8, 2009

In buySAFE, Comparison Shopping, eBay, eCommerce, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

After two months of testing in Mozilla’s developmental sandbox,
Mozilla approved the buySAFE Shopping Advisor for public distribution
via the Firefox Add-on site starting this week.

If you aren’t already using Shopping Advisor with your Firefox
browser, you should install it as an add-on today. You can check it
out on the official Mozilla Firefox Add-on site here… https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/9009

I am obviously excited about this big milestone, and as always, I hope you will continue to provide us with your feedback, insights and ideas on
Shopping Advisor over the coming weeks and months.

Have fun, and happy new year!

Steve

The eMarket for Lemons at The Wharton School

By stevewoda

On February 14, 2008

In buySAFE, Counterfeits, eBay, eCommerce, Economics, Entrepreneurship, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Steve Woda, Surety Bonds, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

I had the opportunity to speak at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania last week about an article that Dr. Eric Clemons recently authored for the Journal of Management Information Systems, "An Empirical Investigation of Third-Party Seller Rating Systems in E-Commerce: The Case of buySAFE". My presentation was focused on marketplace economics and specifically about information asymmetry, signaling, the "Market for Lemons" concept, and buySAFE. In addition, I was able to share a few thoughts about my entrepreneurial experience with buySAFE.

As always, I had a great time as the guest of Dr. Eric Clemons, and I enjoyed hearing the passionate questions, insights and feedback from the students. One of the students posted an article about my visit on his blog, The Un-Wharton.

The eMarket for Lemons and The University of Maryland

By golf

On December 5, 2007

In buySAFE, eBay, eCommerce, Economics, Entrepreneurship, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Web/Tech

Last week, I had the opportunity to speak to a few hundred business school students at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland. Michael Beveridge, buySAFE’s VP of Business Intelligence, joined me in speaking at the invitation of Professors Guodong (Gordon) Gao, Peter Weiss, and Mingfeng Lin. The students had previously read “buySAFE – Creating and Profiting From the Bonded Seller Advantage“, a case study on buySAFE authored by Wharton professor, Dr. Eric Clemons. Here is the presentation that Michael and I shared with the students… “eMarket for Lemons – The Economics of an Evolving eCommerce Marketplace“.

As always, it was a terrific experience for me. The students were extremely prepared, and they had definitely done their homework on buySAFE, information asymmetry, and the ecommerce marketplace in general. If you ever want to get an excellent sense of how well your marketing efforts are working or how well you are educating the market about your solution, I highly recommend inviting a couple hundred college students to study your product or service and let them give you feedback. I loved it!

Build Buyer Trust to Drive Holiday Revenue

By golf

On October 22, 2007

In buySAFE, eCommerce, Marketing, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

How can you drive up your holiday revenue? Build trust with your buyers!
That’s right. By simply spending a bit of time and energy thinking about how your consumers do their searching, shopping, and decision-making, you can increase your holiday revenues in a material fashion.

On Wednesday, October 24, 2007 at 11:00-12:00 PM MDT, I will be giving an educational webinar sponsored by Infopia and buySAFE on the subject of building trust with your buyers to drive up your revenues and
profits.

If you can spare an hour of your time, I promise you that you will learn something
new and interesting. If you are serious about building your online business, this will be time well spent.

Space is limited, so please register for the webinar as soon as you get a moment. You can register at https://www.gotomeeting.com/register/890705170.

Related articles:
“Infopia Integrates with buySAFE” – Infopia Blog

buySAFE and ScanAlert (HACKER SAFE) Announce a Major Trust, Safety and Security Partnership

By golf

On June 3, 2007

In buySAFE, eCommerce, HackerSafe, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

This week, buySAFE and ScanAlert, the provider of the Hacker Safe service, announced a huge partnership, and in my opinion, this is a great development for e-commerce.

Under the terms of the deal, ScanAlert will provide buySAFE’s Certified Merchant solution for free to its merchants during the HACKER SAFE account activation process and from within the account management console. In addition, buySAFE will make ScanAlert’s PCI validation services available to its merchants for free as well. This is truly a terrific combination for merchants and buyers.

Obviously, buyers want to find the right product at the right price. Once that has been accomplished, buyers basically care about two things when considering whether or not to make a purchase online…

Am I going to get what I pay for?
Is my private information going to be safe?

buySAFE is the best in the world at making sure buyers will get what they paid for. buySAFE does this by rigorously inspecting its merchants’ sales experience, online reputation, identity, and financial stability. Then, buySAFE monitors the merchant’s transactional history, in real time, for any sign of transactional or business default. Finally and perhaps most importantly, buySAFE puts its money where its mouth is bonding the transactions of buySAFE merchants up to $25,000 per transaction if requested.

Hacker Safe is amongst the best in the world at ensuring that buyers’ private information is going to be safe. They accomplish this goal by performing daily vulnerability scanning of their merchants’ websites. This helps to make sure that the merchants’ websites are secure and difficult for bad guys to breach.

Both companies are industry leaders in the online trust, safety and security world, and both have thousands of merchant customers using their services.

Again, it important for merchants to understand that their shoppers are concerned with two things… and Will I get what I paid for, and is my private information going to be safe? Optimal web site conversion metrics can only be achieved by answering both of these questions credibly. Together, buySAFE and ScanAlert are a powerful combination that will benefit merchants, buyers, and the entire e-commerce industry.

Related articles:
"buySAFE & HACKER SAFE in a Ground Breaking Announcement – Enabling Risk-Free eCommerce" on the buySAFE blog
"BuySafe Partners with ScanAlert/Hackersafe and CRE Loaded" on AuctionBytes.com

Scam of the Month – Judge Judy Punishes an Idiotic eBay Fraudster!

By golf

On May 27, 2007

In buySAFE, Counterfeits, eBay, eCommerce, Online Fraud, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Surety Bonds, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

In this "scam of the month", Judge Judy takes on an eBay fraudster and ultimately hands out the maximum punishment. In spite of the fact that this scam seems audaciously ridiculous, it is actually quite common online. Bottom-line, there are a lot of folks out there that lack any semblance of a moral compass.

My inspiration for starting buySAFE was a similar scam that I fell victim to on eBay during the summer of 2000. The only major differences that I can point to are that I purchased a $400 PDA, and instead of taking the scammer to court with Judge Judy, I decided to instead start a company dedicated to making every online transaction trusted, reliable and risk-free… buySAFE!

Next time, I hope these two innocent victims limit their purchases to buySAFE merchants. It will save them a whole lot of anguish and effort!

Watch this video. It is quite enlightening.

Related articles:
"Judge Judy Episode on eBay Trust & Safety" on Psychohistory blog

eBay Merchant Economics

By golf

On May 14, 2007

In buySAFE, eBay, eCommerce, Economics, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Trust and Safety, Venture Capital

I recently asked Michael Beveridge, buySAFE’s Sr. Director of Business Intelligence, to share with us some of the interesting eCommerce data that buySAFE has developed over the last eighteen months. We consider data and analytics to be critical to buySAFE and our merchant customers’ businesses, and obviously, every merchant is interested in having solid, reliable data on the ROI associated with buySAFE. At the request of hundreds of our merchant customers, buySAFE has invested heavily into developing an amazing data and analytics platform that can deliver incredible insights beneficial to buySAFE Merchants. We will be sharing some of our new insights with you over the coming months, and I hope you enjoy the content. With that intro, here is Michael Beveridge’s first contribution to this blog…

Important eCommerce Trust and Safety Statistics

By golf

On May 8, 2007

In buySAFE, Counterfeits, eCommerce, Economics, Online Fraud, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

At the PESA Summit this past week, there was a lot of talk about how to improve e-commerce conversion rates. I believe there are three critical drivers for conversion: product selection, price, and trust. Each of these issues would provide substantial content for an article, but I thought I would dedicate today’s post to a number of very important trust-related statistics.

If you have any doubt about the role of trust and buyer confidence in your e-commerce business success, please take a quick look at these stats.

55% of online shoppers say trustworthiness of the merchant is most important (vs. price, convenience, pleasure, other)
(Source: Online Shopper Research Report, 959 respondents, August 2006)

65% of online shoppers buy only from sites they know and trust
(Source: VeriSign Secured Seal Research Review 08/06)

72% of online shoppers are becoming more cautious when buying online
(Source: Gartner Research, 5000 respondents, May 2005 survey)

73% of online shoppers are concerned about the item being misrepresented (inaccurately described, counterfeit)
(Source: Online Shopper Research Report, 959 respondents, 08/06)

76% of online shoppers are worried about never getting their purchase
(Source: Online Shopper Research Report, 959 respondents, 08/06)

81% of online shoppers are concerned about merchant return/refund policies not being honored
(Source: Online Shopper Research Report, 959 respondents, 08/06)

84% of online shoppers are concerned about merchants not treating them fairly
(Source: Online Shopper Research Report, 959 respondents, 08/06)

85% of online shoppers are concerned about identity theft
(Source: TNS Research, 08/06)

And, amazingly, over 50% of all U.S. internet users still don’t buy online (even from Amazon.com!).
(Source: Bear Stearns, September 2006)

With respect to this last statistic, "trust" issues are the primary
driver of e-commerce non-participation. Amazingly, more than 50% of
your potential customers will not buy online because they are nervous!
Are you kidding me? That is a huge number, and obviously, the time has
come for the e-commerce industry to take this issue seriously.

eMarket for Lemons at Baruch College

By golf

On April 11, 2007

In buySAFE, eCommerce, Economics, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Steve Woda, Trust and Safety

I was recently invited by Dr. Karl Lang to be a guest lecturer at Baruch College on the subject of buySAFE and my experience starting an e-commerce business. I always love speaking to folks about buySAFE and its important value proposition (Making sure that buyers get what they pay for, and that merchants get paid what they deserve.), but I especially enjoy speaking with college students (in this case they were MBAs) about what I believe is happening with e-commerce today.

As many of you know, I believe there is a fundamental problem emerging with e-commerce. Specifically, the problem is that buyers have a very difficult time reliably telling the difference between good sellers/product and bad sellers/product. In economic terms, this is called "information asymmetry". Sure, if you are large, recognizable brand, buyers know they can trust you. However, if a merchant is unknown to a buyer, how in the world can that buyer reliably figure out if everything is going to be 100% okay? The answer is that it is very difficult for them to do so confidently.

When a marketplace suffers from information asymmetry, it inevitably develops into a "Market for Lemons". You can read my previous blog post on the subject at "What is a Market for Lemons?"

Obviously, buySAFE solves this major e-commerce problem, and as of Q2 2007, there are thousands of online merchants that have signed-up for the buySAFE service in order to help mitigate this issue for shoppers.

I thought you might like to see the presentation I gave the MBA students at Baruch. You can download the "eMarket for Lemons" presentation here, or you can view the presentation below.

I want to thank give a special thanks to Dr. Lang for inviting me to speak at Baruch College, and I especially want to thank the MBA students for their fascinating questions and additional insights.

buySAFE on The Today Show!

By golf

On April 4, 2007

In buySAFE, Counterfeits, eBay, eCommerce, Google, Online Fraud, Portable Trust & Reputation Signals, Surety Bonds, Trust and Safety, Web/Tech

The past few days have been quite exciting here at buySAFE. Last week, buySAFE was featured on The Today Show. The "Designer Duds: Fake or Real?" segment, reported by Today’s consumer affairs reporter Janice Lieberman, discussed the growing e-commerce problem of counterfeit luxury goods. As expected, buySAFE was showcased as a terrific solution to the counterfeit goods problem.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3lCsN3YzJs]

Counterfeit/fake/stolen goods are obviously becoming a major issue for e-commerce, but in my opinion, this problem is actually a symptom of a much larger, more important, fundamental problem… Online, buyers have a very difficult time discriminating good sellers/product from bad sellers/product. The REAL problem is that the Web suffers from major information asymmetry issues. That is why bad guys are successful at defrauding consumers.

Please think about my diagnosis for a moment… If consumers could tell the difference from the good guys and the bad guys, would shoppers ever unknowingly buy a counterfeit item? Of course not! Fraud happens because of information asymmetry.

I think you will find the "Designer Duds: Fake or Real?" news segment very interesting. However, as you watch this clip, please understand that the counterfeit/fake/stolen goods fraud problem is due to a more fundamental e-commerce problem… Buyers can’t reliably tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys! In economic terms, this is called information asymmetry, and it is causing legitimate, professional merchants millions of dollars each and every day.

Kudos to Jeff Grass, buySAFE’s CEO, for a job well done!

Related blog posts and e-commerce articles:
"Designer Duds: Fake or Real?" by Janice Lieberman on The Today Show and iVillage.com
"buySAFE Invited By the French Government to Help Stop Online Sales of Counterfeit Luxury Goods" by Travis Brown on the buySAFE blog
"eBay Bonding Service buySAFE Featured on Today Show" by Ina Steiner on AuctionBytes.com
"buySAFE Appearance on 3/20/2007 Today Show" on AuctionBytes.tv