We spell it D. E. T. R. O. I. T!
Clicking on the ad link leads to a site representing METRO DETROIT AREA VOLVO RETAILERS
The PayPal Opportunity: Tax Refund + Direct Deposit = Big Win
in regards to how people get their tax refund checks from the government. If PayPal created a system that is nearly 100% safe in regards to setting up direct deposits, they could get a ton of assets in user accounts. Once the money is in those accounts, people will generate more transactions, which in turn, will generate more income for PayPal.
If PayPal was smart, they would create a program that has the attributes below.
- Peace of mind for the account holder
- Ease of use for the account holder
- Easy to understand for the account holder
- Safe for the account holder
Suggestion
PayPal should generate an account number that can only be used to move money into an account, but cannot be exploited in a way to move money out.
Questions:
- How many tax refund checks are issued per year?
- Including people that had direct deposit set up previously?
- These people may find PayPal to be an easier and safer way to get their money back this year.
- Including people that had direct deposit set up previously?
- How many PayPal users are there?
- Assuming that this market is mature and that increasing business and value delivered to current customers is more important than new customer acquisition.
- Does PayPal effectively communicate with their users?
- Mail (USPS)
- Digital ads
- Blog
Note: Perhaps I am playing it too safe, but sharing my banking info with too many entities seems increasingly risky that a someone may exploit my account.
Google Doodle – 3/31/2011
Cool Google Doodle
Clicking on the logo leads to
Google Pursues Role in Mobile Payments – WSJ.com
The project, which is in its early stages, would allow holders of Citigroup-issued debit and credit cards to pay for purchases by activating a mobile-payment application developed for one current model and many coming models of Android phones. The idea is to turn the phones into a kind of electronic wallet.
via Google Pursues Role in Mobile Payments – WSJ.com.
When will a phone be able hold a copy of your valid drivers licence and be legal?
Startup Weekend Kalamazoo – BeerForTextbooks – #swkzoo
Out in Kalamazoo this weekend there is a Startup Weekend event.
One of the more interesting ideas from this event that became a website is beerfortextbooks. It is also sometimes seen as beer4textbooks. It appears that the idea is to create a marketplace where people can find what buyers, usually large book sellers, are paying for the book the student is done with and selling.
College students understand beer and the price of it. This website converts the used book marketplace price into units of beer. It’s my assumption that is to make the site fun, unique and or different from similar websites. There was some chatter from at least one ad person that I consider to be knowledgeable and respected in the industry. They acknowledged the idea and expressed interest in it. One never knows where that will lead.
Below is a partial screen shot of the results for a book I found on Amazon and submitted to see if and how the system worked. Results were Google like. The result below seemed to appear in just a second or two.
Book used: Campbell Biology (9th Edition) [Hardcover]
90% Off?
Don’t recall ever seeing a 90% off Groupon. In my mind, it’s usually around 50% off. Saying “It’s like doing Detroit at 90% off!” seems to be a stretch of the truth.
*The image above was taken from Gmail.
Build And Analyze – The Podcast
In just around two weeks, I’ve listened to all the available episodes of the Build And Analyze podcast. As a result of the great content, I’ve found three other shows from the 5BY5 network. Really great content.
Facebook Ad in Gmail
Clicking leads to this URL.
Full URL is below.
*This was seen in the Foursquare notification email filter page of Gmail.
Questions for thought
How many people in the US over the age of 13 do not yet have a Facebook account?
Is this still a market big enough for Facebook to place ads against?
Is Facebook finding people who join via Gmail ads to be profitable?
Are they using a lifetime customer value as part of their customer acquisition strategy?
- If so, what is the time frame they are looking at?
Netflix – Search Temporarily Unavailable
All I wanted to know was if “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” was available for steaming. Have tried this search a few times in the past hour. Same error each time.
Useful Operator for Google Search
See how “Visited pages” is in black text in the graphic to the left? Just found it tonight. It performs searches with only pages you have previously visited. Ever read a story about Apple, Twitter or Facebook but forgot how you found it? This feature, or is it a function, should enable you to track down what you are looking for rather quickly.
It looks like you must perform a search on Google to see this. The Advanced Search page doesn’t have what I was looking for. Go to Google and perform a search. Then look for something like “All results” to see the “Visited pages” option if it’s hidden. You might need to be logged in to your Google Account too.
D.L. Damore 