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| reply to haroldo
Re: On Orbitz, Mac Users Steered to Pricier Hotels said by haroldo:What happens to people who use BootCamp? From the technical perspective, web browsers identify themselves by name, version and the OS that they are running on. So they will identify that as a Windows user. The same would probably apply for those with VMware Fusion/Parallels VM.
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Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies...
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| reply to Michail
said by Michail:We made an interesting discovery when looking at metrics at my old company. The ratio of user feedback/surveys was higher for Mac users compared to that of other platforms.
Also, they submitted more tech complaints by a higher ratio and the most common solution/fix was for them to update their end of the software. When I did tech support back in 1999-2000, I could say the same for AOL users. They were the ones with dumbest problems, issues and questions, most of which were a result of not following simple directions. If things didn't magically just work as "AOL said they would", you were considered a devil in their eyes. Not sure if today's Mac users are nearly as bad as these individuals were back in the day.
said by Michail:Also, I've read that apps tend to be more profitable for iOS than they are for Android. Not sure if this still holds true, but allegedly, there are a lot more apps in iOS AppStore compared to Android Market (or is it called Google Play these days?), so no surprise there.
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Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies...
A MESSAGE to the RIAA and the MPAA: You shouldn't wound what you can't kill... | |
| reply to Octavean
said by Octavean:I suppose there are a lot of different ways to look at this. I think most would consider this a negative though.
Agreed.
Obitz, in a nutshell, advertises itself has offering its customers or users the best deals. The same offerings should be offered to all. Customers regardless of who they are deserve equal treatment and service. | |
 haroldo
join:2004-01-16
united state
kudos:1
 ·Comcast
4 edits | said by Hotch:... The same offerings should be offered to all. Customers regardless of who they are deserve equal treatment and service.... As to your first point, they are the same offerings, they're just presentd differently.
As to your second point, no one really wants equal treatment nor service, nor is there any merchant that treats every customer exactly the same. Every consumer is different. Nothing wrong with identifying the customer and selling him what he wants. Ever log into amazon.com? You ever notice what they show you as suggestions? Same goes for eBay.
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Take Apple, for example...
*Apple.com, has many different ways of buying the exact same product. They have a main online store, they also have a refurb store (which sells many of the exact same offerings as the main store), they have a corporate store, a military store and an education store all selling the exact same product at various different prices (discounts). Each online store shows a slightly different configuration of computer as the default offering and in some cases, I believe, may not offer a specific build as offered at a different online store (I noticed this once, but don't recall the difference).
*Apple also typically offers summer time purchases, largely education shoppers buying for "back to school", different discounts than the shoppers who show up in February...for the exact same item. Finally there as a vast array of international stores (Canadians complain that it's pricier than the US store, currency notwithstanding).
*When you show up at the physical store in the malls, there are guys in red T-shirts selling to regular folk and then there are a separate team of guys in black shirts that cater to corporate customers. These guys never sport the nose ring, ripped jeans, tattoo, open toe sandals or the three day old beard that the "cool" salesmen have, but rather are clean shaven, wear slacks and look like, well, they don't look as cool as the red t-shirt guys. While I can't say for sure, I'll guess that if an older guy or a man in a suit shows up, a black shirt might greet him as opposed to a young woman shopping who might be met by a red shirt.
*The stores permit the salespeople to offer discounts in certain situations (that's a secret...oops, not anymore)
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In marketing 101 the first thing they teach is how to sell the same product at a wide variety of price points and selling methods since if you have everything sold in the same fashion, you will lose sales by offering the wrong product at the wrong price to the wrong consumer.
Think about Coca Cola, you can buy it in a can, a glass bottle, a plastic bottle or in a cup. You can buy the cans individually, in six packs, in twelve packs or larger configurations. The bottles come in 8, 12, 16 or 32 ounce sizes. We're they to offer only one size, say the 32 ounce bottle, their overall sales would suffer, much as if the only sold it on a per can basis. But the product, fizzy sweetened water, is the same across all of these offerings.
The whole point of the Internet and (the dark side) cookies is to allow sites to cater to your interest. It's foolish to have any business, be it a store, a manufacturer, an online merchant or a service provider offering the exact same product and price to every customer. So web sites subtly gather information about you and then show you what they think you want to see. When I visit Facebook or any other site, for that matter, there are ads for products that are relevant to me. It's impossible for two people to surf the web and using the same keystrokes on different machines and get the same experience.
My point is orbitz.com is doing nothing different from what everyone else does, it's more obvious when it's highlighted at wsj.com, but can you tell me any business that sells to everyone the exact same way? Even Walmart treats customers differently...ever notice the express lanes at checkout? Walmart's product (and every other suprrmarket, for that matter) is the shopping experience, they offer the "grab it and go' (more likely a higher end customer, probably a guy, who places a high value on convenience) patrons a quicker checkout than the "load up the cart" customers (more likely a lower end shopper, probably a woman who is doing the weekly run and values price over convenience). Many guys, seeing a long line will leave the cart and walk out of the store without making the purchase, I've done that, a woman with a full cart would never do that....LOL! Two customers buying a pack of gum, one is out of the store in two minutes (no other items), one has to wait ten minutes (if they have a cart loaded up) just to get to the register. But they're buying the exact same product, a pack of gum.
Ever notice that no two people on an airplane pay the same price.
Kudos to orbitz for bringing smart business sense to the Internet. If customers like it, they'll thrive, if not they'll fail.
Product differntiation is the hallmark of our competitice marketplace, it allows for innovation and creativity yielding growth. It is what set us apart from our good friends in the former Soviet Union that treated all customers the same. Do you really want every offering to be sold the same way at the same price, really? Ma Bell used to offer only one telephone, the black rotary dial. No thanks! Long live competition! | |
 OctaveanPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-31
New York, NY
kudos:1 | If the results are simply displayed in a “different way” but are the same then I don’t see a problem with that. However I was under the impression that not all displayed options were the same but rather some were “different” altogether. I didn’t read the article but that was my interpretation of your quote.
quote:
On Orbitz, Mac Users Steered to Pricier Hotels
Orbitz Worldwide Inc. has found that people who use Apple Inc.'s Mac computers spend as much as 30% more a night on hotels, so the online travel agency is starting to show them different, and sometimes costlier, travel options than Windows visitors see.
The Orbitz effort, which is in its early stages, demonstrates how tracking people's online activities can use even seemingly innocuous information—in this case, the fact that customers are visiting Orbitz.com from a Mac—to start predicting their tastes and spending habits.
Orbitz executives confirmed that the company is experimenting with showing different hotel offers to Mac and PC visitors, but said the company isn't showing the same room to different users at different prices. They also pointed out that users can opt to rank results by price...
For what its worth my Wife was telling me this morning that she found the opposite to be true. That her Mac Pro inquires were yielding cheaper options then her PC queries. | |
haroldo
join:2004-01-16
united state
kudos:1 Reviews:
·Comcast
| said by Octavean:If the results are simply displayed in a “different way” but are the same then I don’t see a problem with that. However I was under the impression that not all displayed options were the same but rather some were ....
quote:
Orbitz executives confirmed that the company is experimenting with showing different hotel offers to Mac and PC visitors, but said the company isn't showing the same room to different users at different prices. They also pointed out that users can opt to rank results by price.
They might default to showing Ritz Carleton's on one platform at the top of the list versus Sheraton's on the other...but, presumably once they click the "rank by price" dropdown, I guess they'd see the same. | |
 MichailPremium
join:2000-08-02
Boynton Beach, FL
kudos:1 | reply to Pirate515
said by Pirate515:said by Michail:We made an interesting discovery when looking at metrics at my old company. The ratio of user feedback/surveys was higher for Mac users compared to that of other platforms.
Also, they submitted more tech complaints by a higher ratio and the most common solution/fix was for them to update their end of the software. When I did tech support back in 1999-2000, I could say the same for AOL users. They were the ones with dumbest problems, issues and questions, most of which were a result of not following simple directions. If things didn't magically just work as "AOL said they would", you were considered a devil in their eyes. Not sure if today's Mac users are nearly as bad as these individuals were back in the day. said by Michail:Also, I've read that apps tend to be more profitable for iOS than they are for Android. Not sure if this still holds true, but allegedly, there are a lot more apps in iOS AppStore compared to Android Market (or is it called Google Play these days?), so no surprise there. It wasn't that they were bad users. They just seemed more likely to initiate contact. Sometimes it was a militant "you aren't supporting macs" stance but the irony was it was typically an apple bug. | |
| reply to haroldo
said by haroldo:said by Hotch:... The same offerings should be offered to all. Customers regardless of who they are deserve equal treatment and service.... As to your first point, they are the same offerings, they're just presentd differently. As to your second point, no one really wants equal treatment nor service, nor is there any merchant that treats every customer exactly the same. What does the OP and the linked article say?
The article:
quote:
Orbitz Worldwide Inc. OWW -0.29% has found that people who use Apple Inc.'s AAPL +0.44% Mac computers spend as much as 30% more a night on hotels, so the online travel agency is starting to show them different, and sometimes costlier, travel options than Windows visitors see.
The sort of targeting undertaken by Orbitz is likely to become more commonplace as online retailers scramble to identify new ways in which people's browsing data can be used to boost online sales.
(Emphasis added)
Each customer is the same in the context that they want the best service and deals. For customers using Orbitz that means simply getting the best deal available from Orbitz. The article and the OP state that by default Mac users are not shown the same deals as Windows users.
»online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142···ageone_0 | |
 MikePremium,Mod
join:2000-09-17
Pittsburgh, PA
kudos:1
 ·Verizon FiOS
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| reply to haroldo
If this magic space voodoo science, here is my user ID string passed on to website;
Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_7_3) AppleWebKit/535.19 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome
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What this country needs is a good five dollar plasma weapon. | |
| reply to haroldo
Clearing your cookies can also sometimes drop prices. Don't recall where I saw it, but one person checked out a flight on one bulk search site and saw a price. Came back the next day - after searching other sites in between - and the price was higher. Cleared cookies and it was back to the cheaper price.
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When the ship lifts, all bills are paid. No regrets. | |
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