They monitored retailers in the following categories: flowers, jewelry, and clothing (categories that account for approximately half of all Mother’s Day revenues.) What did they find?

Average load time: 9.23 seconds! Significantly slower than the 2-second expectation.

For more detailed results, visit their blog: Consumers open their wallets for Mother’s Day. Do retailer websites open as fast?

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In his paper, India’s Experience with Mobile Number Portability [pdf], Dr. Allen examined the implementation of mobile number portability in India—the world’s second largest and fastest growing mobile market in the world. He also compared India’s number portability infrastructure with the one that exists in the United States and found that the two are significantly different.  It’s also worth noting that the paper finds that India’s MNP system, which launched in January of 2011, has sparked a high volume of consumer complaints related to porting delays and rejections.

Fundamentally, the differences in India’s market create different standards and consumer expectations for number portability there, as compared to the United States.

For example, India’s mobile subscribers are predominantly prepaid. They like to pay-as-they-go, are extremely price sensitive and have a high propensity to switch carriers at the first hint of financial benefit. In the United States the opposite is true. Our mobile market is predominantly postpaid and subscribers generally stay with a single carrier for longer once they choose it, resulting in lower churn and higher monthly revenues. Most critically, subscribers in the U.S. have a higher affinity for their telephone numbers when they do switch providers.

These factors combine to create a number portability system environment in India that is vastly different from that in the United States. In addition to supporting a best-in-world porting experience, the U.S. NPAC serves as a network management platform for the industry, an emergency preparedness vehicle, and the way to preserve numbering resources.

So, what is the bottom line according to Dr. Allen? The experience of administering number portability in the U.S. is unique – there’s nothing else like it.

You can download the white paper here.

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What did the paper find? Local number portability in the United States has been a great success since its introduction in 1997. And, given the complexity and the constant evolution of the U.S. telecommunications infrastructure, Neustar is able to meet the changing demands of its customers while ensuring reliable, effective number portability service.

Indeed, we have the largest and most ambitious LNP system in the world. Under our watchful eyes, the NPAC manages over 500 million numbers, connects to over 4,700 individual customers, and broadcasts over 1.2 million adds, changes or deletions in real time.

Every day.

The NPAC, in partnership with the industry and regulatory community that governs it, have created a high pace of innovation, with a heavy premium on the best consumer experience possible. Since its inception, the NPAC has had eight major software releases and three platform upgrades; lowered transaction pricing while increasing value to the industry; supported several major industry technology migrations, mergers & acquisitions, and product launches; and created one of the lowest porting duration periods worldwide for American subscribers.

At Neustar, we know how critical neutrality is to a successful LNP environment. We also know that true choice and competition in communications requires seamless transfers without interruptions in service. Neither consumers nor carriers would stand for anything less than stellar performance.  For these reasons, and more, this paper calls the NPAC an “essential infrastructure element in today’s network.”

You can download the full white paper here [pdf].

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Frankly, nothing! And the best part is–it’s all on video.

The folks behind .US had two film crews, six hidden cameras, 20 customers with $500 dollars to spend and four acappella singers descended on two small businesses to show their appreciation. “We are taking our appreciation to the streets. We decided to go local, think local, buy local and, ultimately, thank two small businesses for choosing .US.”

The targeted businesses included Park Florist in Takoma Park, Maryland and Bike Works, a bicycle shop in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Their reactions are priceless!

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The Top 6 Trends Shaping Local Search in 2012 and Beyond [comScore] – Mark your calendars, Localeze President Jeff Beard will join reps from comScore and 15 miles on Wednesday, April 18th to discuss trends in marketing and local search. If you’re a local small business, don’t miss it!

Women in Tech: Susan Buck Empowers Women in Tech [ZDNet] – An interview with Susan Buck, a developer, lecturer, designer and entrepreneur, who discusses how to get more girls involved in technology at an early age.

Neustar Launches .US Domain Campaign for Small Businesses [SiliconRepublic] – This week, we announced our campaign to spur small business innovation and get online.

National Database Aims to Catch Smartphone Thieves [GigaOm] – The Federal Communications Commission proposes to work with local law enforcement and the wireless industry to help curb the theft of cellphones.

9 College Scholarships for Women in STEM [US News] – US News rounds up resources and groups who not only encourage women to get an education in science, technology, engineering and math, but some who offer scholarships.

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This is not a profitable model for CSPs.

Uncollected debt and other types of fraud cost CSPs an estimated $40 billion last year, according to the Communications Fraud Control Association. In the U.S. alone, fraud can eat up as much as 13 percent of CSP’s annual revenue. These providers are more exposed than ever because of their up-front investments in hardware including modems, HD receivers and smartphones associated with triple play and quad-play services. All of this adds up to a single cold, hard fact: CSPs need to get smarter about how they sniff out and stop debt before it happens.

Fraud, of course, isn’t a new problem. Most CSPs have dedicated fraud teams in place to track, flag and prevent fraud activity. The sheer number of subscribers and the frequency of subscriber turnover make it difficult for fraud teams to catch fraud before it happens. So what can service providers do to become more proactive? Here are four ways that service providers are beating bad debt and fraud at the door:

• Match new subscribers against your own data. A change in name or address may not cause a red flag to trigger immediately. That’s why it’s a good idea to run new subscribers against the most complete and reliable data you have—your own customer database—and look for a match in a wider variety of fields including tax ID numbers, bank account numbers, driver’s license data and more. For example, our Risk Management Solution can do this in real-time and help providers catch potential repeat debtors before they sign up and help you meet the “red flag” regulations.
• Catch ‘em and collect at the door. An added benefit of a real-time debt detection system is the ability to turn a subscriber’s registration into an opportunity for debt collection. In one case, a Risk Management Solution customer used this approach to collect $9 million in bad debt in one year alone!
• Use “fingerprinting” to catch fraudulent calls. People who commit fraud may change their names often, but they don’t change their friends and habits so quickly. By matching calling patterns with a database of known fraudulent cases, service providers can catch new cases of fraud as they happen. (Given the volume of data to analyze, it’s best to let an analytics engine handle this.)
• Know your subscribers. It is impossible to know every subscriber, but you can know their calling patterns using pattern detection algorithms like those found in Neustar’s Risk Management Solution. Subscriber-based profiles give providers a standard by which to measure calling deviations which, when combined with alerts, can help fraud teams catch ID theft and fraud early and minimize the damage.

The growing popularity of bundled services means higher revenue per user, but it can also mean higher risk as more users try to cheat the system. Early detection is key to cutting what can be substantially higher losses, especially in a business model where CSPs don’t expect to break even until a year or more into the service contract. That’s why it’s more important now than ever for providers to catch bad debt at the door and protect their paying customers from paying more than their share.

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Helping STEM Grow: Knowledge to Fuel Innovation [USNews.com} - Our CEO Lisa Hook highlights why we need more geeks and how Neustar is helping.

How to Find Mentors for Women in Science, Technology, Engineering & Math [Under the Microscope] – This great resource highlights where women in the early phases of their STEM careers can look for mentors.

Smartphones Let Retailers Target Deals to Shoppers {CNN.com] – CNN looks at how mobile marketing is changing the shopping experience for shoppers and retailers.

Mistakes to Avoid on Your Business Blog [my.biz] – Don’t make these three common business blogging mistakes.

How Google’s, Localeze’s Vision on Social Changes Social Search [Mediapost] – Localeze’s Jeff Beard discusses local search, business listings and the challenges of reconciling information across platforms.

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Communication service providers (CSPs), consumer electronic vendors, and network suppliers continue to fuel the obsession with connectivity through new devices, mobile broadband, and innovative ways for us to stay in touch. For those that attended any of the behemoth trade events that happened in the first quarter, you saw firsthand how connected homes, cars, refrigerators, and personal devices dominated the landscape.

The most recent industry exhibition, Mobile World Congress (MWC), is the largest event in mobile, which drew a record 67,000 attendees. This exhibition highlights mobile developments from around the globe and truly does preview the future of the industry. Over the years, MWC has expanded to include nearly all the various elements of the mobile community. 2012 was no exception, as we saw the GSMA Connected Home demonstrate how connectivity is becoming integrated into all aspects of our lives.

Having attended MWC since its humble beginnings, this is the annual event I use as a benchmark on the industry’s change. The increase in attendees over the last few years isn’t all that surprising, given the rise of mobility to mainstream. In the States, users might not know what “4G” signifies, but they know they want it. The Director General for the GSMA told us during her keynote that, globally, there are more than 6.6 billion mobile phone connections, 3.6 billion mobile phone subscribers and 1.3 billion phones supporting mobile broadband. It is no wonder the conference has grown to such an enormous size.

A noteworthy change at this year’s MWC is the shift away from the telecom industry’s obsession with “speeds and feeds,” and instead toward the customer experience. In 2011, the show buzz was all about 4G and LTE as globally CSPs raced to increase their network’s capabilities. This year we saw a very different focus, not only from our customers, but also other vendors at the exhibition. It isn’t so much what the network can do, but the experience it can offer.

The evolution to all-IP mobile technologies is well underway. The question now is how can CSPs monetize those investments. Policy and billing take on increasing importance as content providers flood the network with applications that harness the increased network capabilities. Many exhibitors at MWC 2012 highlighted their growing portfolio of services for this initiative.

While cost savings initiatives are critical, and certainly deserve a seat at the all-IP table, the real emerging stars are those capabilities that promote new revenue growth. It’s no surprise that more than 12,500 attendees visited the App Planet or that the GSMA unveiled its mPowered Brands program. Our growing connected-life has not escaped the notice of content providers and mobile service providers.

Questions on how to address issues of industry fragmentation, privacy and contextual intelligence were some of the main topics we addressed, with not only CSPs, but also others in the mobile industry. As demonstrated by the attention on the App Planet and mPowered Brands, our mobile lives have expanded beyond simple voice and web connectivity. Around the world, consumers and business professionals are keen to access information that is contextually relevant and enriches their mobile experience.

The new buzz phrase from MWC 2012 may just be “customer experience”, but what that means will evolve over time. Neustar took the stage this year to show the art of what is possible with mobile experiences, ranging from mobile financial services to enhanced mobile location capabilities connected to social media. For us, harnessing technology to enrich our personal connections is our mission.

As we head into the second quarter of the year, it will be interesting to witness how
“customer experience” changes the focus of the mobile industry. For those of us helping to shape this new paradigm, it is arguably one the best times to be in mobile.

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Localeze is a trusted service offering business listings identity management, helping businesses update and verify their local listings, so customers can easily find them. Additionally, Localeze offers local search platforms – more than 150 authorized partners including social sites and mobile apps – accurate local data to provide the very best online local search experience. In addition to me, you can expect posts from Jeff Beard, president of Localeze, and Gib Olander, vice president of market development of Localeze.

From local search business listings to location-based apps to mobile search to local advertising successes and challenges, we will offer best practices, trends and more. So stay tuned! If you have a particular local search topic you would like to see covered, please leave us a note in the comments.

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We hope to see you there!

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