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The Reserve Bank of Australia has cut interest rates by 50 basis points in an unexpected move that should provide welcome relief to many homeowners.

The reduction takes the official cash rate to 3.75 percent.

Damian Smith CEO of financial comparison site RateCity called the RBA’s decision "a very big move".

"They haven’t moved rates this far since the depths of the Global Financial Crisis," Mr Smith told ninemsn.

"This cut will help thousands of households, with people on a $300,000 mortgage potentially saving around $1000 per year."

But he warns that some banks may be unwilling to pass on the rate cut in full.

"It’s unlikely that all lenders will pass on the full rate cut," Mr Smith said.

"The signals from the big four banks suggest that they will try to hold on to part of this rate cut."

Mr Smith points out that while the central bank has lowered the cash rate by 50 basis points since November, "the big four banks have only passed on around 40 basis points to variable rate home loan customers".

It is the largest cut to the cash rate since a 100 basis point reduction in February 2009, and the first time the RBA has lowered the cash rate since it cut it by 25 basis points at its December board meeting.

Business lobby groups, trade unionists and some economists had called for the board of the RBA to cut rates by 50 basis points to help ailing retailers, manufacturers and the stubborn housing market.

Story source: www.ninemsn.com.au

Social media and search advertising are projected to be the most popular advertising tools this year, each cited by 24% of respondents to a PointRoll survey [pdf] of US marketing professionals, conducted by Kelton Research and released in March 2012. Display advertising followed closely, chosen by 22% of respondents. There was then a significant drop-off to online video (11%), mobile or tablet ads (7%), and mobile or tablet apps (6%). Just 1% chose email, text/SMS, or social gaming. Search advertising is more popular among respondents at director level or above, compared to those in supervisory or managerial positions (30% vs. 19%).

Most Will Increase Spend on Digital Channels

In fact, a majority of respondents are planning to up their spend on a variety of digital channels, a position that traditional channels are not slated to share. Among digital channels, the largest proportion say they will increase their spending on social media marketing or ads (79%), closely followed by those who will increase their budgets for mobile marketing or ads (75%). A comparatively fewer 55% say they will increase spending on search advertising, though this compares favorably to just 7% who will either decrease spending (3%) or not use this tool (4%).

Conversely, out-of-home marketing or ads will get an increase from just 16% of marketing professionals, on par with the proportion who will decrease spending in this area. And while 15% will budget more for traditional marketing or ads, 21% will scale back their budgets. Even so, traditional marketing channels still get a big chunk of budgets: 57% of marketing and advertising executives in organizations with revenues of $10 million or more said that most of their spending in 2011 went to traditional efforts.

Audience Targeting Proves Exciting

Meanwhile, audience targeting (49%) tops the list of industry trends that respondents are excited about, ahead of other movements including cross-screen media (40%), web TV (30%), Facebook marketing (37%), social gaming (22%) and digital out-of-home marketing or ads (19%). Excitement about audience targeting is higher at the directorial level and above than at the supervisory or managerial level (56% vs. 44%).

Some of that excitement may be related to necessity: 17% of respondents said that identifying the right audience has been holding them back from doing their job more successfully. According to March 2012 survey results from Acxiom and Loyalty 360, just 49% of company executives agree that they know who their most loyal customers are, and the best way to reach out to them and get them to engage with their brand. In fact, just 10% of respondents strongly agreed with the statement, while about one-third were neutral and roughly 1 in 5 disagreed.

Marketers Using Numerous Tools and Partners

Data from PointRoll’s “Marketing Tools Study 2012? indicates that 28% of marketing and advertising professionals use at least 7 tools during a single campaign to reach their target market, while 62% use between 3 and 6 tools. To help with their efforts, roughly 3 in 10 respondents call on at least 10 partners to help them during a campaign. Even so, this sometimes has the opposite effect than intended: about one-third say that managing multiple vendors typically prevents them from doing their job better, and 1 in 10 say that working more efficiently with vendors is their biggest goal this year.

Other Findings:

• Marketing professionals would pay a company an average of $107,500 to manage an integrated digital campaign.
• Increasing sales (31%) and ROI (28%) are the goals most commonly cited as marketers’ most important for this year.
• Slightly more than half of respondents say that inefficient ROI tracking and measurement has hindered their success at work.
• Almost all respondents predict they will use online video this year. The most popular formats are in-banner (60%), in-stream (49%) and dynamic or customized video ads (42%).
• Roughly 2 in 5 respondents believe that they are behind the curve when it comes to digital marketing.

About the Data: The PointRoll data is based on a survey of more than 250 marketing professionals from across the US at supervisor level and above, conducted in January 2012.

Story source: www.mikeandrewconsulting.com/blog

The board of the Reserve Bank of Australia has left the official cash rate at 4.25 percent for the second month in a row.

The move was widely expected with inflation at the bottom of the RBA’s target band of 2-3 percent and global economic conditions improving.

However, the news may not be met with the rapturous receptions of the past with many lenders now lifting their rates independently of the RBA.

"The rates that borrowers pay have been creeping away from the Reserve Bank’s cash rate movements since the global financial crisis," RateCity CEO Damian Smith said.

"Last month proves that all variable rate mortgage holders are vulnerable to rate hikes, regardless of what the RBA does."

The central bank left rates on hold last month but that didn’t stop the big four, ANZ, Commonwealth Bank, NAB and Westpac from lifting their standard variable mortgage rates between 0.06 and 0.10 percent.

Westpac-owned St George went even further by hiking their rates by 0.12 percent.

The RBA was expected to ease rates last month but shocked observers when it left the rate unchanged, citing the resilient domestic economy and improved global outlook.

The decision not to move rates suggested the RBA had confidence in the local economy, buoyed by low unemployment and continued demand for labour.

However, the new dynamic the banks have set up by raising rates independently of the RBA mean borrowers could be hit by a rate rise at any time.

"Borrowers should expect frequent small changes in rates, perhaps as often as every month," Mr Smith said.

Source: www.ninemsn.com.au

Google has been accused of bypassing the privacy settings of users of the Safari web-browser.

The Wall Street Journal said Google and other companies had worked around privacy settings designed to restrict cookies.

Cookies are small text files stored by browsers which can record information about online activity, and help some online services work.

However Google says the story "mischaracterises" what happened.

Advertisers can use cookies to track online behaviour, helping them to target the commercials they show to internet users.

Some think this use of cookies erodes online privacy. In May, European Union laws are due to come into force which will restrict the use of advertising cookies.

But cookies are also essential to some web services like those Google offers.

Cookie control

The Safari browser is produced by Apple, and is the browser used by the iPhone.

By default Safari only allows cookies to be stored by the web page a user is visiting, not from third parties such as advertisers.

However, Stanford University researcher Jonathan Mayer found that advertisers were still able to store cookies on the computers of internet users browsing with Safari.

It was his discovery that formed the basis of the Wall Street Journal’s story.

Many Google services use cookies, for example to remember when someone is signed in to a service, but they are also used by the firm to help personalise advertising.

It was when Google attempted to find a way to enable some of its services and personalised advertising to work on Safari that, Google says, it inadvertently stored cookies.

Side-stepping Safari

In a statement, senior vice president Rachel Whetstone said that last year the company had decided to "enable features for signed-in Google users on Safari who had opted to see personalised ads and other content".

She added: "To enable these features, we created a temporary communication link between Safari browsers and Google’s servers, so that we could ascertain whether Safari users were also signed into Google, and had opted for this type of personalisation."

Ms Whetsone said the company had created new systems to make sure the information it collected was anonymous, but this had led to unintended consequences:

"The Safari browser contained functionality that then enabled other Google advertising cookies to be set on the browser.

"We didn’t anticipate that this would happen, and we have now started removing these advertising cookies from Safari browsers. It’s important to stress that, just as on other browsers, these advertising cookies do not collect personal information."

The Wall Street Journal reported that Google "disabled the code after being contacted by the paper".

Google declined to provide further comment to the BBC.

Privacy warning

Online privacy advocates were highly critical of Google’s actions.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation wrote: "It’s time for Google to acknowledge that it can do a better job of respecting the privacy of web users."

Although much of the criticism has been directed at the search giant, the Wall Street Journal said that in addition to Google, a number of advertising companies had been using the work-around which had been known about for some time.

An Apple spokesman said in a statement: "We are aware that some third parties are circumventing Safari’s privacy features and we are working to put a stop to it."

Story source: www.bbc.co.uk

Although roughly 3 in 4 SMBs use email marketing tactics such as organic list growth and web-based sign-up forms to generate leads, just 41% include a sign-up form on their Facebook fan pages, according to a survey released in February 2012 by GetResponse. And while a majority optimize their newsletters with clear, recognizable, branded from field names and addresses, less than half include social sharing icons in their newsletters.
SMBs appear to be behind the curve in this regard: according to a survey released in February 2012 by Econsultancy, in partnership with the Email Experience Council of the DMA, 69% of US organizations are including social sharing icons in their emails, while a further 13% have a plan in place to do so.

Segmentation Also Not Widespread

Data from GetResponse’s “The State of Email Marketing in SMBs” indicates that only 42% of the SMBs surveyed segment their lists based on either subscriber personal data or subscriber actions, such as opens and clicks. List hygiene is poor, too: just 38% report removing inactive contacts, and only 36% try to re-engage them through re-activation campaigns. SMBs also seem to be ignoring the risks posed by bad addresses: only 53% use mailing systems that automatically process soft and hard bounces and take appropriate actions to the addresses.

Legal Compliance Better, Though

72% of respondents indicate that they use a confirmed opt-in email model, and 71% provide unsubscribe links in their emails. Overall, the marketers surveyed cited an average deliverability rate of about 97%, with the vast majority reporting no problems with delivery to most major client inboxes.

Largest SMBs Not as Socially Integrated

SMBs with more than 500 employees tended to report higher adoption of various list building and sign-up form optimization strategies, such as using sign-up forms to grow lists, collecting contacts offline using paper sign-up forms, and telling subscribers specifically what they will receive. However, these larger companies were far less likely than companies with 11-250 employees to run a Facebook page with a newsletter sign-up form (57% vs. 82%), indicating that they may be underestimating the power of social media integration. Similarly, they were less likely than companies with 11-250 employees or 251-500 employees to use social sharing icons.

Other Findings:

• Most SMBs have adopted measures such as regular mailings (70%), personalization (58%), compelling subject line (68%), and stats analysis (61%).
• 69% of respondents indicated that they have a complaint ratio below 0.2%.

For more on email and social integration, visit MarketingVox.

About the Data: The GetResponse data was collected from November 14-28, 2011 from approximately 600 respondents classified in 4 groups based on the business unit size.

The Reserve Bank of Australia board has kept interest rates on hold, leaving the official cash rate at 4.25 percent.

The shock move comes as many parts of the economy continue to struggle with the side effects of the mining boom.

Data published yesterday showed retail trade contracted 0.1 percent in December, traditionally the sector’s strongest month.

In anticipation of a rate cut, the Prime Minister and Treasurer earlier urged banks to pass on the cut in full.

But the board’s decision means mortgage holders and borrowers will have to wait another month in hope of further interest rate relief.

The CEO of mortgage comparison company RateCity, Damian Smith, told ninemsn the surprise announcement does not spell impending doom for mortgagees.

"Borrowers shouldn’t be disheartened that the Reserve Bank kept the cash rate at 4.25 percent today because the sluggish home loans market means the ball is in your court," Mr Smith said.

"We’re seeing lenders offering discounts of up to one percent off their standard variable rates for basic home loans and many lenders — including the big four banks — have said they are willing to negotiate to retain their share of the home loan market."

The Australian dollar rose sharply immediately after the news, up more than 0.7 of a US cent.

At 1432 (AEDT), the currency was at 107.79 US cents, compared with 107.06 US cents just before the RBA announced its decision at 1430 (AEST) today.

Source: www.ninemsn.com.au

Five days before a critical vote, US senators are abandoning an anti-piracy bill after an outpouring of online opposition to tinkering with internet freedoms.

Senate Democratic leaders still plan to vote on Tuesday on taking up the Protect International Property Act and supporters are scrambling to make changes before then to answer some of the critics, but it is questionable whether they have the 60 votes needed.

Half-a-dozen of the 40 original co-sponsors of what is known as the PIPA bill withdrew their support on Wednesday amid a one-day protest blackout by Wikipedia and other web giants and a flood of emails to Capitol Hill offices that at times doubled normal volumes.

More than 7 million signed a petition on Google saying the Senate bill and its counterpart in the House would censor the web and impose burdensome regulations on US businesses.

"The overwhelming input I’ve received from New Hampshire citizens makes it clear there are many legitimate concerns that deserve further consideration before Congress moves forward with this legislation," said Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte, one of the politicians who pulled back her support of the bill.

Others included Republicans Orrin Hatch of Utah, Marco Rubio of Florida, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Roy Blunt of Missouri and John Boozman of Arkansas.

Nearly all cited the earful they were getting from constituents.

"I can say, with all honesty, that the feedback I received from Arkansans has been overwhelmingly in opposition to the Senate bill in its current form," Boozman said.

Several Democratic co-sponsors also now say they oppose the bill as it is written.

Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has resisted suggestions he put off the Tuesday vote.

Reid and the bill’s main sponsor, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy said it was too important to delay action on legislation aimed at combating the billions of dollars US content creators and companies lose to foreign copyright violators and counterfeiters every year.

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky on Thursday urged Democrats to shelve the bill for now, saying serious issues with the measure should be resolved before "prematurely" bringing it to the floor.

The Senate bill, and the parallel Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House, would allow the Justice Department and copyright holders to seek court orders against foreign websites that steal from American content creators.

It would bar advertising networks and payment facilitators such as credit card companies from doing business with the offending websites.

The bills have the strong support of the entertainment industry which loses billions every year to foreign copyright violators and from industries such as pharmaceuticals battling fake and sometimes harmful alternatives sold on the internet.

The opposition, as demonstrated by Wednesday’s protest, is led by internet-related industries that say the bills will lead to censorship of the internet and a surge in lawsuits that will discourage budding internet entrepreneurs.

Story source: www.ninemsn.com.au

In case you missed all the news on the proposed bill to Stop On Line Piracy, or SOPA as it has become known, is a bill that was introduced into the  US house of representatives in October last year. 

The bill, if made law, would expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.^[2] Presented to the House Judiciary Committee, it builds on the similar PRO-IP Act of 2008 and the corresponding Senate bill, the PROTECT IP Act.

The originally proposed bill would allow the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as copyright holders, to seek court orders against websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement. Depending on who makes the request, the court order could include barring online advertising networks and payment facilitators from doing business with the allegedly infringing website, barring search engines from linking to such sites, and requiring Internet service providers to block access to such sites. The bill would make unauthorized streaming of copyrighted content a crime, with a maximum penalty of five years in prison for ten such infringements within six months. The bill also gives immunity to Internet services that voluntarily take action against websites dedicated to infringement, while making liable for damages any copyright holder who knowingly misrepresents that a website is dedicated to infringement.

In an update of this story, below is a article from the Los Angeles Times:

“Three co-sponsors of the SOPA and PIPA antipiracy bills have publicly withdrawn their support as Wikipedia and thousands of other websites blacked out their pages Wednesday to protest the legislation.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) withdrew as a co-sponsor of the Protect IP Act in the Senate, while Reps. Lee Terry (R-Neb.) and Ben Quayle (R-Ariz.) said they were pulling their names from the companion House bill, the Stop Online Piracy Act. Opponents of the legislation, led by large Internet companies, say its broad definitions could lead to censorship of online content and force some websites to shut down.

In a posting on his Facebook page, Rubio noted that after the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously passed its bill last year, he has "heard legitimate concerns about the impact the bill could have on access to the Internet and about a potentially unreasonable expansion of the federal government’s power to impact the Internet."

"Congress should listen and avoid rushing through a bill that could have many unintended consequences," Rubio said in announcing he was withdrawing his support. While he’s committed to stopping online piracy, Rubio called for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to back off plans to hold a key procedural vote on the bill on Tuesday.

Rubio’s withdrawal will reduce the number of co-sponsors to 39. Last week, two other co-sponsors, Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), joined four other Senate Republicans in a letter to Reid also urging him delay the vote. But Grassley and Hatch have not withdrawn their support.

Terry and Quayle were among the 31 sponsors of the House legislation before they withdrew their support Tuesday.

Quayle still strongly supports the goal of the House bill to crack down on foreign websites that traffic in pirated movies, music, medicine and other goods.

"The bill could have some unintended consequences that need to be addressed," said Quayle spokesman Zach Howell. "Basically it needs more work before he can support it."

Terry said that he also had problems with the House bill in its current form and would no longer support it.

Wikipedia, Reddit and about 10,000 other websites blacked out their pages Wednesday with messages warning of the dangers of the legislation and urging people to contact their congressional representatives. Howell said Quayle’s office had not seen a major increase in calls or emails Wednesday, but that the piracy bills have been the main issue in recent weeks for people contacting the office.

There has been a "manageable increase" in visits to House member websites Wednesday, said Dan Weiser, a spokesman for the House office of the chief administrative officer.

"It’s possible some users will see a short delay or slow loading of a member’s web page," he said.”

Original story from The Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com/

If you would like to read more on how this bill, if passed, would affect how you use and research on the Internet, please read this link to Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act.

Anything we can do to stop this bill becoming law, lets do it now, and protest what is essentially an act of total censorship.

Ongoing discount loans lose momentum

Borrowers’ preference for fixed rate home loans is continuing at an unrelenting pace regardless of recent cash rate cuts, national loan approval data from Mortgage Choice has revealed.

Fixed rate loans accounted for 24% of all new home loan approvals during December 2011, up from 21% in November and well above the 12-month average of 15%. Demand for this loan type has risen for seven consecutive months, increasing 13 percentage points since May 2011.

Company spokesperson Belinda Williamson said, “Consecutive cash rate cuts in November and December 2011 have not swayed Australian borrowers’ desire for fixed rate loans.”

“It is possible borrowers’ need for certainty around their home loan repayments, coupled with the affordability of fixed rate loans are the driving forces behind demand for this loan type.

“During December fixed rates were significantly lower than variable rates, in some cases the difference was one percentage point or more.

“Our loan data shows fixed rates are now more in demand than they have been in over three and a half years at the expense of variable rates, which have lost popularity among new borrowers.

“Customer demand for variable rate loans fell from 79% to 76%, well down on the 12-month average of 85%. The most popular variable rate home loan with new borrowers, ongoing discount rate loans, slipped from 44% to 41%, also well below the 12-month average of 35%.”

Basic variable loan demand rose marginally to 15% of all approvals in December, up from 14% in November while standard variable loan demand fell slightly to 16% from 17%. Interest in line of credit loans dropped to 3% from 4% and the uptake of introductory rate loans was steady at 1%.

For more information visit: www.mortgagechoice.com.au

Home loans by value fell in October and remained flat over the year, suggesting the housing sector remains stagnant.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) said on Monday that total housing finance by value fell 2.5 per cent in October, seasonally adjusted, to $20.458 billion.

The ABS data also showed that the value of home loans was largely unchanged from October 2010, when it was reported at $20.593 billion.

The number of home loans approved in October 2011 rose 0.7 per cent.

National Australia Bank chief economist Robert Henderson said Monday’s data showed the housing market was still deteriorating.

Mr Henderson said it was a fairly dismal report on the housing market, with falling lending in value terms and construction and investment lending both weak.

Recent data, including the national accounts figures released last week, have highlighted the weakness of the housing sector.

"It is clear that over the foreseeable future Australia will fall well short of building the number of new homes required for both owner-occupiers and renters," Housing Industry Association chief economist Harley Dale said.

"Amidst the growing risks to our economy from the situation in Europe, now is the time to be providing stimulus to the new home building sector while at the same time reinvigorating the housing supply reform process, which currently lies dormant."

Commonwealth Bank of Australia senior economist Michael Workman said Monday’s ABS figures were a little softer than he expected.

"If you go back and look at the data over the last 15 years or so, housing credit growth still remains exceptionally weak.

"So, for the housing market, it’s strongly biased towards the buyers rather than sellers and it looks like it’s going to stay that way."

Mr Workman said the Australian dollar and local bond futures were largely unaffected by the data.

RBC Capital Markets fixed income and currency strategist Michael Turner said the October housing figures were a little dated.

"China has already reported trade data for November, and the finance data do not reflect the November and December (monetary) policy easing (in Australia)," he said.

"As such, there are limited implications for markets.

"We expect more timely domestic data to better reflect the softening in global growth in coming months, which should justify further easing (of interest rates) and a move to accommodative territory in 2012."

ICAP senior economist Adam Carr said the housing data showed the Australian lending market was recovering even before the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) cut interest rates.

The cash rate is now at 4.25 per cent after two consecutive 25-basis point cuts in November and December.

"The 50-basis points worth of cuts we’ve seen will likely see lending growth accelerate over coming months, which will start to add to the strong private demand numbers we’ve seen to date," Mr Carr said.

Story source: www.ninemsn.com.au