When You're Competing Against Free, 'Usability Problems' Won't Help

Fewer Than Half Of People Surveyed Shop Online At Work

from the or-flip-that-around dept

Mon, Dec 4th 2006 5:10pm — Mike Masnick

Perhaps part of the reason that Cyber Monday remains a myth is that it's very premise is flawed. The idea is that on that first Monday after Thanksgiving, as everyone goes back to work from their four day vacation, they hit the online mall via their work computers. Except... 54% of people surveyed say they would never shop online at work. Of course, depending on your point of view, this could be a lot or a little. It wouldn't be surprising to see someone else flip this story around and say that 46% of people would shop at work, and talk about how this is a big productivity waster (and then turn it into a story about lost productivity and how bosses need to stop people from shopping at work). Either way, it seems like it's not yet enough people to make the idea of Cyber Monday all that interesting to most people who tend to use the Monday after Thanksgiving to actually do some work.

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9 Comments

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Stu, 4 Dec 2006 @ 5:29pm

The shopping at work issue aside . . . .

Who cares how company A or B did on Black Friday or Cyber Monday or any other day?

When did that sort of thing become a spectator sport?
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- Matt, 4 Dec 2006 @ 10:15pm
  
  Re:
  Can I please extend this sentiment outward towards many many other media-triggered events???
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a man, 4 Dec 2006 @ 6:03pm

My name is a man. I'm a tool. Please ban me.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Dec 2006 @ 6:26pm

How much of this "Cyber Monday" shopping is from online retailers returning to work on Monday, to find that plenty of people had purchased goods on Sunday evening -- or through any part of the weekend that the online store's employees were "on holiday"?

Could many of these "Monday Purchases" actually just be orders that were placed over the holiday weekend (Sunday) and were only noted as orders that needed to be filled on Monday?

Just because an Online Retailer is available 24/7, doesn't mean that there is actually a person in that retailer's location 24/7.
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William, 4 Dec 2006 @ 6:44pm

Shopping
Shame on you people shopping while at work. Don't you have work to do?

Of course I'm at work right now.
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Blue, 4 Dec 2006 @ 7:23pm

Cyber Monday
Cyber Monday is a hoax created by Shop.org as a marketing ploy.... people picked it up and thought it was actually like Black Friday.
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just kill me now, 5 Dec 2006 @ 6:18am

still on this BS?
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RJD, 5 Dec 2006 @ 6:52am

Some reality to the hype
Okay, small sample of data at my company. Our typical number of web pages hit each data associated with shopping is 800+. On cyber Monday the number was 1892 ... so some folks here bought in to it.
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|333173|3|_||3, 5 Dec 2006 @ 6:10pm

Well, I for one wouldn't tell some servey that I was shopping at work, unless my boss was fine with it (or, like one of my friends bosses, finds it a necessary evil for when he cannot just pirate the item [he works in a computer shop, what they sell is legit, what they give out for free is another matter]). On a day when there is a lot of hype abput online shopping, I would make a point of not shopping then, just in case.
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