Consumer Analytics

Rockville, Md. - American prepaid card users are the leading users of mobile payments. According to Prepaid and Gift Cards in the U.S., 4th Edition, a recent report by market research publisher Packaged Facts, smartphone penetration is actually higher among groups underrepresented by traditional banking products and services.

Menlo Park, Calif. – Women’s online shopping marketplace Poshmark is launching PoshMatch, a social merchandising engine that combines community curation and algorithmic technology to match shoppers to merchandise based on their social activity in the app. With PoshMatch, each shopper is greeted with their own real-time storefront built from their personal fashion shopping network and their style preferences.

Houston - Luby’s, operator of the Luby’s and Fuddruckers casual dining brands, is expanding its use of the EyeQinsights system. The EyeQ solution learns about in-store shoppers and uses customer activity, demographics and preferences to enable retailers to instantly customize each shopper’s experience.

Minneapolis -- Best Buy Co. earned $146 million in the second quarter, down from $266 million in the year-ago period, topping analysts earnings estimates even as its revenue fell short. Its results were helped by ongoing cost reductions. Best Buy cut $40 million in annual costs last quarter, bringing the total to $900 million.

For the quarter ended Aug. 3, revenue dropped to $8.89 billion from $9.27 billion. Analysts had expected $8.99 billion. Same-store sales fell 2.7%, which was more than analysts had expected.

New York -- Poor data collection and linkage practices are leaving organizations unable to move forward with key business goals, according to a new study by Experian Data Quality, a part of Experian Marketing Services.

The report, “Finding insight through data collection and linkage,” finds that while most organizations are looking to leverage data better to drive consumer insight, they are hindered by a lack of reliable and consolidated data sources.

Necessity is the predominant motivation behind shoe purchasing for men, and their brand loyalty is strong and steady, according to Men’s Footwear Brand Focus Study 2014, the latest report from global information provider, The NPD Group.

This attitude, however, shows signs of evolving, given that men are increasingly embracing fashion and newness in their footwear.

Nordstrom is partnering with Curalate to launch Like2Buy, a platform that aims to offer consumers a more seamless shopping experience via Instagram.

New York -- Amazon.com announced Monday that it had agreed to acquire video game streaming site Twitch for $970 million in cash.

The deal comes after reports that Google was set to acquire the streaming site.

Walldorf, Germany – Retailers should consider waiting until August to launch back-to-school promotions and focus them heavily on online shoppers. According to new data from SAP, consumer sentiment toward back-to-school advertising doesn’t become positive till the end of July.

Chicago – QVC received top ranking in the Mobile Customer Experience Index from The E-tailing Group. QVC scored 84.17 on a 100-point scale, with the average score being 71.5.