We released ShopSavvy in the US and UK in October.  The rest of the world started complaining soon after, “Why can’t we get ShopSavvy?”  We have heard you and we are doing something about it.  Soon ShopSavvy will be available worldwide in localized format (i.e. translated with support for local currency).  In the meantime, ANYONE-ANYWHERE, can download the beta and load it on their phone.  Jailbroke G1? No problem.  No SIM? No problem. ShopSavvy for everyone:

http://www.biggu.com/jason/shopsavvy-beta-program/

Who goes to a restaurant and says, “Just give me something to stop my hunger?”  Eating out is more about the experience than it is about the food.  Hell, why else would my sister pay $46 for 12 cupcakes?  And they were the biggest hit at my wife’s baby shower.  “They’re gourmet!” she explains.

With software, User Experience is king, especially in the mobile space.  Look how users use their phones.  They pull it out of their pocket, do something real quick and then quickly put it away.  In a mobile setting, people’s patience is at a record low.  Most of the possible actions they may do are so trivial that it’s not worth their time to endure a slow connection or scroll through a bunch of garbage.  They’re not writing a paper or conducting research.  They’re just looking up sport scores or just checking up on their friends.  It their app doesn’t perform well, not a whole lot is lost by just giving up.

Here are a few philosophies we try to adhere to when building our mobile apps. 

• Trim the Fat
  Show the user just enough information to get the job done and nothing extra.  In a mobile setting, less is more.  If they needed the whole story, they wouldn’t be using a three inch screen.  Everything else is clutter.
• The 80/20 Rule
  Aim to serve 80% of your customers very well and ignore the cries of the other 20%.  “I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody” - Bill Cosby.  We’ve gotten multiple requests to support scanning lotto tickets.  Suddenly our elevator pitch would become unnecessarily complex.
• Responsiveness
  Every millisecond counts.  It’s amazing what small amounts of lag can do towards killing the User Experience.  Whether it’s lag in a network response or lag in an animation, immediate feedback keeps the user engaged and feeling in control.  After scanning a barcode, ShopSavvy will start showing you prices before it’s finished searching for them.  This approach prevents us from having to disengage the user for 10 seconds with a “Please Wait” screen.  As it turns out, users don’t mind watching the price gradually drop over a few seconds.  It’s even kind of fun.
• Fun is a Requirement
  Users’ attention spans are at an all time low on a mobile device.  But I’ve seen people flick their home screen from left to right for minutes at a time.  This accomplishes nothing!  Why would someone choose to do that instead of interacting with some useful apps?  Same reason eating out isn’t about feeding your body.  It’s about how it’s done and why is it special.  Users have told us that they can’t help but scan every barcode in sight.  Scanning a barcode and hearing that beep is surprisingly gratifying.  The “fun” aspect encourages continued-use.

The next time you select a restaurant, try to decipher why you chose it.  Does it have the cheapest food?  Probably not.  Is the food the best tasting?  Maybe, but I doubt that’s the whole story.  Sprinkles Cupcakes puts a 30 cent cupcake on a fancy doily and calls it gourmet, “that’ll be $3.25.”  You’re not paying for food, you’re paying for the experience.  The best way to add value to your mobile app is by enhancing the User Experience.  Write Gourmet Software (TM).

We have talked about UPC spam before.  Retailers aren’t perfect.  Sometimes they will enter the UPC of one item in exchange for another and as a result we will show the wrong item and price for that UPC.  Instead of sending us an email saying, “I scanned chips and got a DVD!” How about pulling up the history tab and email us the UPC that you scanned as well as what you thought you were scanning and what actually came up.  If you do this we will be able to ‘fix’ the data - i.e. exclude the wrong result and ban the bad actor from our system.

So please, help us keep ShopSavvy accurate - report bad UPCs immediately.  We WILL get the out of the system ASAP.

For those of you who are brave we have released ShopSavvy Beta 3.0.4.  This release resolves a number of problems/bugs/issues our users have uncovered.  Sign-up here (again, the Beta is not for novice users):

http://www.biggu.com/jason/shopsavvy-beta-program/

The main problem this version fixes is the wishlist overload issue.  We had NO idea users would add more than 100 items to a wishlist.  We assumed 5-10-15 items at most and as a result we never tested how the application would behave if you added more than 100.  Now, you can add as many items as you like (well at least 120 items - we didn’t test over that number).  Good luck.

I was reading Fast Company’s post titled, ‘Most Popular Android Apps for November 2008‘.  Medialets created their own ordering (i.e. not the order of popularity Google uses):

So, if you look at applications by popularity in the Android Market you will find that The Weather Channel is the MOST popular application.  MySpace comes in third and Pac Man isnt near the top.  ShopSavvy (our application and why I care) is second.  Medialets wont’ return our calls and I have confirmed they are not getting any inside intel from Google or T-Mobile.  Their numbers are bunk.  Anyone from Medialets care to comment?  Love to chat further!

UPDATE: So Eric Litman the CEO from Medialets called me no less than 24 minutes after I posted this (Woot to Eric and Medialets).  He explained that they are pulling numbers from the ‘download range’ instead of the application popularity page from the Market.  I can understand how his team came up with the rankings - i.e. Pac-Man on top, but I think this has more to do with quirks in the market.  I didn’t pull my punches with the title of this post, maybe I should chill out a little - sorry Eric.  Application popularity as defined by downloads can be easily pulled up by selecting Market, then All Applications and then Sort by Popularity.  Here is the list:

1. The Weather Channel
2. ShopSavvy
3. MySpace Mobile
4. US Yellow Pages (really?)
5. Free Dictionary
6. Ringdroid
7. DailyHoroscope
8. CompareEverywhere
9. Backgrounds and
10. Imeem Music
11. Movies and Shoptimes
12. Barcode Scanner
13. Shazam
14. WikiMobile Encyclopedia
15. Pro Basketball
16. VIdeo Player
17. Pro Footbal Live
18. AK Notepad
19. PicSay
20. AccuWeather.com
21. Bartender
22. Flashlight
23. Tanslate
24. fBook - Facebook
25. Power Manager
26. Stopwatch
27. T-Mobile HotSpot
28. Mobile Banking
29. Restaurant Guide
30. Note Pad
31. Weather Bug
32. Pkt Auctions eBay
33. OI Notepad
34. College Football Live
35. Voice Recoder
36. Tip Calculator
37. Rings Extended
38. Magic 8-Ball

and so on…

Just to be clear, I did not try to contact Medialets today.  When I said, “Medialets won’t return our calls…” I was referring to calls I made to the company back in October when they wrote a post titled, “Android Market Unleshed“.  The post talked about the ‘Drivers of Android Market’ relative to downloads and popularity, but failed to mention our application at all.  I was annoyed and called the company - calls that we were never returned.  Here was the graphic that failed to include ShopSavvy despite the fact that we were number 2:

I even posted a comment to their post, but they did not moderate it (i.e. it never appeared).  So when I saw that they had another ‘popularity post’ that didn’t accurately reflect the current standings in the market I felt like I had to post my thoughts.

We do interviews about ShopSavvy and our company almost daily and the most common question is, “Why is your company called Big in Japan”. I figured it was worth a post.

The phrase ‘Big in Japan’, according to Wikipedia, “was originally a scornful phrase applied to rock bands that failed to sell many records in the US and the UK. During the 1960s and 70s, Japanese pop culture was not yet considered very cool in the English-speaking world. Thus, though a band might have tens of thousands of Japanese fans, it was not considered truly successful: the band was only big in Japan.”  Of course, by the early 90’s Japan had become cool and everyone wanted to be big in japan so the phrase lost its original meaning.

Now that we have the origin covered, I will give you some of the reasons that had nothing to do with the name.  First, some of you have asked, “was the name inspired by Tom Waits…?”  Nope David, I had no idea Tom even sang a song called Big in Japan, but thanks for the new reference:

Others have asked how long ShopSavvy has been available in Japan; I assume they think our company is Japanese.  Our application is only available in the US and the UK currently and none of us have even been to Japan.  However, we will be in Tokyo meeting with NTT DoCoMo for our Japanese rollout in a month or so.

The next favorite question is whether not we named the company after the Alphaville song - Big in Japan.  Of course, the song is burned into my subconscious; becoming popular in the U.S. in the late 80’s.  But, no we didn’t really think about the song when we named the company.

Fewer people remember the punk band from Liverpool called Big in Japan, but no, we didn’t name it after them either.

The real reason is rather silly.  A colleague and I were sitting in a hotel in San Francisco during the Web 2.0 conference a few years ago after listening to Sky Dayton talk about how everything related to cell phones was “Big in Korea”.  We had an interview with INC magazine later that day and needed a name for our tool business.  I said, “how about Big in Japan?”  Thinking that it would look cool on t-shirts we went with it.  More than a year later we combined our consulting (WeblogsWork) and our tool business (Big in Japan) and during a conversation with new hire he said something that convinced me we should dump WeblogsWork in favor of Big in Japan.  He said, “Whenever I tell anyone that I work for Big in Japan they smile” I thought, ‘what better reason could we possibly have for choosing a name?’

Earlier this year we refocused our business for a third time and the name seemed to make even more sense - i.e. since mobile phones are so much bigger in Japan than they are here in the US.  I wish I had a better reason, but that is it.  It was a split second decision that stuck.

P.S. The domain we use ‘biggu’.com is the Japanese word for Big.  Of course I wish we had biginjapan.com, but I have never been able to get the owners to call me back.

We are planning to launch in Europe early next year.  We are adding retailers as quickly as possible, but we need some help.  Our launch plans include UK, Germany, Austria, Poland, Czech Republic and Holland.  What do you think?  Give us a hand?

Powered by Big in Japan

ShopSavvy generates lots of interesting data.  For example, someone asked us if we could produce two reports a) what items are available through ShopSavvy (i.e. distribution based on product category) and b) what items are users actually scanning based on product category.  Here are the results:

According to Brandon, a ShopSavvy user from Detroit, tells this story:

I saved money using shop savvy. I used shop savvy to search for an item and used the mapping to locate sam’s club and go! when i got there i found the items was priced higher. so i took it up to the counter and scanned it in front of the manager. confounded that such technology even existed he matched the price and i saved ten dollars. target on the other hand wasn’t so friendly. they said it was against the rules for customers to scan items with their phones. (once they found out what i was doing) if they would’ve cooperated instead of making up new policies i would’ve saved more money.

I called the Target he visited (27300 Dequindre Rd. Warren, MI 586-573-4200) and talked to the store manager, Debbie, who indicated that she wasn’t aware of the policy.  I asked her if she could check as I wanted to let our users know if they weren’t allowed to scan items in her store.  She put me on hold for several minutes as she called her manager who indicated that whoever told Brandon he couldn’t use ShopSavvy was simply wrong.

Note: Everyone writes Shop Savvy instead of ShopSavvy.  Should we just give up and go with the flow or stick with ShopSavvy?

Matt Buchanan put together this list of ‘Black Friday Deals‘ - wow! These look pretty good (make sure to use ShopSavvy when you get to the store to be sure)  If any of these AREN’T a good, deal please comment indicating what ShopSavvy returned instead:

Cameras and Camcorders
Staples
Kodak EasyShare C913 9MP Digital Camera w/ 1GB Card (Free Canon photo printer with any purchase of an advertised camera)
Price: $79.99
Savings: $20

Walmart
Samsung 10.2MP Digital Camera with 3x Zoom
Price: $69
Savings: $100

Pure Digital Flip 30-minute Camcorder
Price: $79
Savings: $70

Sears
Kodak CD93 9.2 MP Digital Camera (doorbuster)
Price: $79.99
Savings: $40

Samsung 8.2MP I85 Digital Camera
Price: $129.99
Savings: $311

Sam’s Club
Samsung SC-DX103 DVD Camcorder
Price: $179.92
Savings: $120

Cellphones (Unlocked)
CompUSA
HTC Touch Diamond
Price: $299.99
Savings: $300

Nokia E65
Price: $149.99
Savings: $180

Computing Peripherals
Best Buy
Western Digital 1TB My Book Home Edition External Hard Drive
Price: $150
Savings: $100

CompUSA
Hanns-G 19” LCD Monitor
Price: $59.99
Savings: $140

Kabling 4-Port USB 2.0 Hub
Price: $4.99
Savings: $15

Amazon
Logitech MX Revolution Cordless Laser Mouse
Price: $46.99
Savings: $53

LaCie Hard Disk 1 TB USB 2.0 External Hard Drive
Price: $120
Savings: $51

Samsung 2233BW 22-Inch LCD Monitor
Price: $214.31 (w/ $30 mail-in rebate)
Savings: $230

Western Digital Velociraptor 300GB 10,000RPM SATA Hard Drive
Price: $199.99 (w/ $30 mail-in rebate)
Savings: $150

Newegg
ASUS 22” Widescreen LCD Monitor
Price: $129.99
Savings: $90

Rechargeable Wireless Optical Mouse
Price: $6.99
Savings: $23

LG Blu-ray HD DVD Combo Drive
Price: $94.99
Savings: $55

Office Max
Simpletech 640GB Mini Hard Drive
Price: $89.99
Savings: $50

Staples
eMachines 19” Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor
Price: $99.98
Savings: $300

Western Digital My Book Essential 640GB External Hard Drive
Price: $69.99
Savings: $80

Walmart
Seagate 500GB USB 2.0 Hard Drive
Price: $69
Savings: $70

HP A526 Photo Printer
Price: $60
Savings: $65

Target
Western Digital 750GB USB 2.0 External Hard Drive
Price: $88.88
Savings: $170

Gaming
CompUSA
Xbox 360 Halo 3 Special Edition
Price: $99.99
Savings: $200

Project Gotham: Racing (Xbox 360)
Price: FREE
Savings: $50

Xbox 360 Controller
Price: $19.99
Savings: $40

GameStop
Rock Band Track Pack Vol. 2 (after buying Rock Band or a bundle over $50)
Price: $.99
Savings: $29

Dell
XBOX 360 Arcade With 7 Games Including Rock Band 2
Price: $199
Savings: $200

Target
Guitar Hero World Tour with Guitar Kit for Wii
Price: $60
Savings: $40

Circuit City
Xbox 360 Arcade Holiday Bundle with Refurbished 20GB Hard Drive and Free Wireless Controller
Price: $200
Savings: $50

Lumisource Stingray Sound Gaming Chair
Price: $39.99
Savings: $30

Walmart
Xbox 360 Arcade Bundle with Guitar Hero III with Guitar
Price: $199
Savings: $80

GPS Systems
Best Buy
Garmin Nuvi 260W GPS System
Price: $190
Savings: $110

Amazon
Garmin Nuvi 350 GPS Navigator
Price: $150
Savings $180

Office Depot
Garmin Nuvi 205W GPS Navigation System
Price: $149.99
Savings: $100

NewEgg
Garmin Nuvi 250 3.5” GPS
Price: $99.99
Savings: $90

Sears
Magellan Roadmate 1412 GPS System
Price: $149.99
Savings: $99

Walmart
Garmin Nuvi 200 3.5” GPS Navigation System
Price: $97
Savings: $323

K-Mart
Nextar X3-03 Text-To-Speech GPS System
Price: $79.99
Savings: $190

HDTVs: Small & Medium
Best Buy
Samsung 40″ Class 1080P LCD HDTV
Price: $799.99
Savings: $800

Circuit City
Toshiba 32″ 720p LCD HDTV (Doorbuster)
Price: $449.99
Savings: $180

K-Mart
Element 32″ LCD HDTV
Price: $399.99
Savings: $250

Office Depot
Samsung 23? LCD HDTV Model 2333HD
Price: $279.99

NewEgg
Toshiba 32” 1080p HDTV
Price: $579.99
Savings: $320

Target
Westinghouse 26” 720p HDTV
Price: $300
Savings: $700

HDTVs: Big (42” and up)
Best Buy
Mitsubishi 60″ 1080p DLP
Price: $999.99
Savings: $500

Samsung 42″ 720P Plasma HDTV
Price: $699.99
Savings: $300

Samsung 46″ Class 1080P LCD HDTV
Price: $1,099.99
Savings: $1,200

LG 47” Class 1080p LCD HDTV
Price: $1,499
Savings: $400

Panasonic Viera 50″ 720p Plasma HDTV
Price: $900
Savings: $500

Circuit City
Samsung 42″ 720p Plasma HDTV (Doorbuster)
Price: $699.99
Savings: $300

Samsung 46″ 1080p LCD HDTV (Doorbuster)
Price: $1099.99
Savings: $500

Samsung 50-inch Plasma
Price: $899.99
Savings: $500

Sharp Aquos 52″ 1080p LCD HDTV
Price: $1499.99
Savings: $800

NewEgg
Sharp Aquos 46” 1080p HDTV
Price: $999.99
Savings: $1,300

Corion Digital Lifestyles 42” 720p HDTV
Price: $499.99
Savings: $500

Walmart
Polaroid 42” 1080p LCD HDTV
Price: $598
Savings: $602

Samsung 46” 1080p HDTV
Price: $1,098
Savings: $800

Samsung 50” Widescreen 720p Plasma HDTV
Price: $798
Savings: $1,200

K-Mart
Samsung 42″ PN42A400 Plasma HDTV
Price: $699.99
Savings: $300

Amazon
Pioneer PDP-5020FD 50-Inch 1080p KURO Plasma HDTV
Price: $2,382.06
Savings: $1,618

Pioneer PDP-6020FD 60-Inch Class KURO Plasma HDTV
Price: $3899.93
Savings: $1600

Sharp 42″ 1080p LCD
Price: $1000
Savings: $500

Home Entertainment
Best Buy
Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player
Price: $200
Savings: $99

CompUSA
NEC NP200 Projector
Price: $299.99
Savings: $350

NewEgg
Onkyo 7.1-Channel A/V Receiver with HDMI 1.3
Price: $149.99
Savings: $150

Sears
Sony BDP-S350 Blu-Ray Disc Player (doorbuster)
Price: $179.99
Savings: $120

Samsung HT-Z310 1000-Watt Home Theater System
Price: $159.99
Savings: $70

Office Max
Epson PowerLite SF SVGA Projector
Price: $399.99
Savings: $200

Walmart
Magnavox Blu-ray Player
Price: $128
Savings: $107

Laptops
CompUSA
Sony Vaio TT, 256GB SSD, 11.1”, Blu-ray
Price: $999.99
Savings: $6,000

NewEgg
Acer Aspire One 8.9” Laptop
Price: $249.99
Savings: $50

Sony Vaio 14.1” Laptop
Price: $799.99
Savings: $200

Staples
HP Pavilion 15.4″ Dual-Core 2GB RAM 120GB HD Notebook (Free HP Printer included)
Price: $399.98

Office Depot
HP G50-112NR 15.4? 3 GB RAM 160 GB HD Notebook
Price: $349.99

Circuit City
HP Pavilion 15.4″ Laptop (Intel Dual Core T3200, 2GB, 160GB HD, Vista Home)
Price: $399.99

Macs
MacMall
Macbook 13”, 2GHZ
Price: $1,180
Savings: $119

Macbook Pro 15”, 2.4GHz
Price: $1,799
Savings: $200

Macbook Pro 15”, 2.5GHz
Price: $2,249
Savings: $250

Macbook Pro 17”, 2.5GHz
Price: $2,549
Savings: $250

Macbook Air, 1.8GHz SSD
Price: $2,320
Savings: $179

iMac 20”, 2.6GHz
Price: $1,370
Savings: $129

Memory (Flash Drives/Memory Cards)
CompUSA
Transcend V20 USB Flash Drive (64GB)
Price: $79.99
Savings: $100

Western Digital USB 2.0 (320GB)
Price: $69.99
Savings: $50

Circuit City
SanDisk 4GB SDHC Memory Card
Price: $12.99
Savings: $18

SanDisk 8GB SDHC Memory Card
Price: $19.99
Savings: $25

Office Max
SanDisk 4GB Cruzer Micro USB Readyboost
Price: $9.99
Savings: $70

SanDisk 16GB Cruzer Micro Jump Drive
Price: $39.99
Savings: $70

Networking
Amazon
Ooma Core VoIP Phone System with No Monthly Phone Service Bills
Price: $198
Savings: $52

Staples
Netgear Wireless-N Router
Price: $49.98
Savings: $58

Sears
Nextar 7″ Digital Photo Frame (doorbuster)
Price: $37.99
Savings: $62

Miscellaneous Goodies
Amazon
V-MODA Bass Freq Earbuds - Bling Bling Black
Price: $19.99
Savings: $30

NewEgg
Computer Tool Kit (90 pieces)
Price: $24.99
Savings: $25

Sears
Sony Earbuds Headphones
Price: $4.99
Savings: $5

Sony Wireless Stereo Headphones with Transmitter (doorbuster)
Price: $29.99
Savings: $30

PCs
Best Buy
Toshiba AMD Turion 64 X2 Dual-Core Notebook Computer (3GB Memory, 160GB Hard Drive)
Price: $380
Savings: $200

CompUSA
Allio 32” All-in-One HDTV PC
Price: FREE
Savings: $1,424

iBUYPOWER 524GT A64×2 Gaming Computer
Price: FREE
Savings: $659

iBUYPOWER 908TB C2B Gaming Computer
Price: FREE
Savings: $705

Walmart
HP Pavilion Desktop w/ 2GB RAM, 160GB HD, 19″ LCD Monitor
Price: $398
Savings: $692

Portable Players
Amazon
SanDisk Sansa View 32GB
Price: $199.99
Savings: $150

CompUSA
Microsoft Zune (4GB) MP3 Player
Price: $49.99
Savings: $150

Circuit City
Samsung 8GB MP3 Player
Price: $79.99
Savings: $80

Sony Walkman 8GB MP3 Player
Price: $79.99
Savings: $90

Belkin Tune Cast FM Transmitter for iPod
Price: $25
Savings: $25

Sears
Element 1GB MP3 Player (doorbuster)
Price: $9.99
Savings: $10

Element 2GB MP3 Player (doorbuster)
Price: $14.99
Savings: $15

Venturer 7″ Portable DVD Player (doorbuster)
Price: $49.99
Savings: $50

Walmart
RCA 8GB MP3 Player
Price: $49.99
Savings: $70

Venturer 8” Portable DVD Player
Price: $49
Savings: $40

Printers
CompUSA
HP OfficeJet Bluetooth All-In-One
Price: $59.99
Savings: $90

Office Max
HP Photosmart C4480 3-in-1 Printer
Price: $99.99
Savings: $30

Samsung CLP315 Laser Printer
Price: $99.99
Savings: $250

Staples
Brother MFC3360C All-In-One Printer (requires rebate)
Price: $29.98
Savings: $100

Software
Office Depot
Microsoft Office Home & Student 2007
Price: $69.99
Savings: $80

Staples
Microsoft Office Home & Student 2007 (requires rebate)
Price: $59.99
Savings: $90

Dell
Norton 360 2.0 All-In-One Security Software
Price: $9.99
Savings: $60

Office Max
Dragon Naturally Speaking
Price: $39.99
Savings: $60

The team here at Big in Japan wants to wish you a Happy Thanksgiving. Many of you will be hitting the malls tomorrow and we wanted to remind you to use ShopSavvy to ensure you are getting the best deals. There are going to be some GREAT deals in stores this weekend, but you need to be vigilant - some deals won’t be as great as they seem. ShopSavvy can help.

After the dust has settled, please take a moment to let us know if you were able to save any money using ShopSavvy. The folks at Good Morning America and Oprah are VERY interested in hearing from real people who used ShopSavvy and ACTUALLY saved money. If you can describe your ShopSavvy experience in a sentence or two and either post to the ShopSavvy Facebook Group or email it to sales@biggu.com (make sure you include your name, address and phone number) we will pass along your experience to the producers (indicate if you would be willing to be interviewed on air in your message).

Nokia has announced they will stop selling handsets in Japan. Japan is the fourth largest mobile phone market, but the company has never been able to make inroads with the tech-savvy Japanese consumer. More from Sachi Izumi.  Good news, we are still… Big in Japan!