InvisibleHand Blog

A brand spanking new feature has just been added to InvisibleHand for all our US users on Chrome!

InvisibleHand now finds the latest hyper-relevant daily deals for users while they are searching online for a restaurant or service.

Try it out – go to Yelp in your Chrome browser and type in any category from “dentist” to “massage” in the area of your choice and your favourite InvisibleHand notification will discreetly appear when it has automatically found relevant deals to show you.

These deals come from well known sites such as Groupon and Living Social,  just like our well known retailers, so you can now also trust InvisibleHand to find you the best daily deal!

Just another genius idea from the InvisibleHand team ; -)

To see it work before your very eyes, simply uninstall the current InvisibleHand and download the newest version from our website (any issues with how to do this please let us know at info@getinvisiblehand.com).

In case it’s all too much to take in, we’ll clarify this for you: InvisibleHand can now automatically find US users the lowest priced products, flights, hotel bookings, car rentals and now Daily Deals (on Chrome in the US)!

What more could you ask for? (If you do have more to ask for – drop us an email!)

So the US anti pay-per-view phenomenon, Netflix, has finally crossed the pond to the UK this week – but what does this mean for the future of DVDs? Are they destined for the charity shops?

The introduction of the latest online multi-film channel with a monthly fee for unlimited content has got the InvisibleHand team’s brains ticking, we agree it is the future – for many a long awaited step forward – some are even happy to see the back of DVDs. Some say it’s much easier to store your film collection online, it’s portable, and does anyone watch a film more than twice? Is there a need to hold onto a DVD to watch it again when it can be conveniently found online at any time?

A big selling point for online film retailers is that the user can sign into their account on any device – your smart phones or your laptops – and watch the films anywhere they go. The ‘unlimited access to film and TV’ angle tips the scales in the favour of online film retailers too, the customer doesn’t have to travel anywhere to pick up or return a film, and they can get much more for their money – in these cash strapped times. Well known film rental chains are on the way out, with the US already seeing a major rental chain disappear from the high street, so surely online rental (by the month) is the next logical step? The rental now moves from one film to a catalogue of films, due to the increased appetite for online content consumers have now developed – and are used to, with the introduction of music software which offers unlimited access for a monthly fee.

It is now more common to buy DVDs online as they’re much cheaper, would it make a difference if the transaction was made shorter by the customer seeing the film as soon as it was found online? The television market is already ladened with “+1″ channels and TV on demand players for the major channels, this solution combines the already successful TV players with a match for films too. It’s a similar argument to the ongoing rivalry of mp3s vs CDs/vinyls – the physical disc over the mass storage of digital music.

Ultimately watching films over the Internet for such a low price, coupled with unlimited access, is a bargain that is hard to turn down. Most TVs being sold this year are smart TVs which will have the capacity for apps such as Lovefilm or Netflix to be downloaded, so by next year this could be a firm fixture in the majority of households.

Are you ready to move online? Or will you find it too hard to let go of your growing DVD collection?

Uh-oh. It’s only three more working days until Christmas, and you’ve still got some presents to get – but no time to get to the shops (or sensibly you just don’t fancy getting crushed in the panicked mob).

Don’t worry!

We’ve pulled together a few online retailers who are still delivering before Christmas, you’ll have to make your mind up quick though!

Delivery deadlines for the US:

Buy.com

21st December, ‘next day air’ delivery if ordered before 12pm PST

The Home Depot

21st December, for express delivery

Newegg.com

21st December, two day delivery if ordered by 3.30pm

22nd December, next day delivery if ordered by 3.30pm

Overstock

21st December, for 2nd day shipping order by 1.59am EST

22nd December, for next day shipping order by 12pm EST

23rd December, for Saturday delivery order by 11am EST

Walmart

21st December, ‘Rush shipping’ cut off date

23rd December, last day for ‘pick up today’ if picked up by 6pm

Bestbuy.com

24th December, order by 3pm local time for store pickup

ToysRUs

24th December, order by 4pm to pick up at store

Delivery deadlines for the UK:

Marks & Spencers

21st December, for clothing, home, beauty, wine, gifts & entertainment

HMV

21st December, order by 12pm for express delivery

The Hut.com

21st December, for express delivery

John Lewis

22nd December, click and collect until 7pm

ToysRUs

22nd December, order by 4pm

Argos

22nd December, order small items by 1pm for delivery

Amazon.co.uk

24th December, for evening delivery at £7.48 per unit, order by 8.30am GMT)

HAPPY SHOPPING!

Check out our fun infographic below to see what’s been happening in 2011 for InvisibleHand:

Research from one of our recent surveys found that surprisingly a quarter of Brits didn’t think much of UK hotels – so little in fact that they came top in a poll of worst hotels!

Perhaps the stereotypical rainy weather in the UK literally put a dampener on the hotel experience, whereas hotels in Italy and Portugal had the sun on their side? One annoyance that was clear was dirty rooms and noisy neighbours – 94% asked were frustrated with dirty rooms and 84% with noisy rooms.

Portugal came out top, with only 1% voting the popular holiday hot spot as a source of hotel misery – the USA came third with only 3% disliking the hotels across the pond.

We know how important hotels are to your holiday, 6 in 10 of you echoed this by stating hotels can make or break your holiday! That’s why we added a new feature to our superb price finding extension. As well as automatically finding the lowest price for products you search for, InvisibleHand now automatically finds the lowest price for hotel rooms you search for too – anywhere!

Not only can you book the lowest priced hotel room with our real time price comparison, but you can also see the highlights from reviews in an easy to view summary, to double check the hotel meets your expectations before you get there!

There is also a map showing the hotel you are viewing, plus alternative hotels and places of interest.

What else could you need to know? (There are pictures too of course, we all know that’s most important after price!)

Broad retailer coverage is crucial to making invisibleHand a useful tool. So we’ve been working hard to increase the number of retailers that are covered.

In fact, over the past 4 months, the number has doubled to 599, and more are joining every week. If you’re you an InvisibleHand user, you’ll see better-than-ever product coverage.

If you’re a retailer and would like to join InvisibleHand, just send an email to info@getinvisiblehand.com and we’ll get you integrated.

Yes, that’s right – we’ve undertaken research which shows that Ryanair is not manipulating prices by using cookies.

Rumours allege that Ryanair uses browser cookies to unfairly push prices up. Specifically, it has been suggested that travellers who search for a flight, don’t buy it, and then carry out the same search later are given a higher price. A few users have reported that clearing their browser cookies appears to bring the price back down again.

We put this to the test in a two-day experiment, searching 52 routes in two different browsers and found no discrepancies – regardless of whether cookies were cleared or not.

What we did…

On day 1, using Firefox we ran 52 Ryanair flight searches on randomly selected routes, including return & one-way trips, and logged the prices.

On day 2, using Firefox we ran the same 52 searches and noted down the prices. However, we also carried out identical searches using Google Chrome – simultaneously with the Firefox searches. All cookies were cleared from Chrome after every search. Cookies were not cleared from Firefox at any point during the experiment.

If the price manipulation allegations were true, we would have expected to see price discrepancies in the results between Firefox and Chrome on day 2. What we actually saw were exactly the same prices on both browsers.

Is this definitive proof that Ryanair isn’t using cookies to manipulate prices? No. We only searched 52 routes from thousands of potential flight combinations, and we don’t have inside knowledge on how Ryanair sets its fares. But what we do know is that Ryanair changes its fares constantly using a sophisticated pricing model. Any number of factors could cause price fluctuations, but manipulation via browser cookies doesn’t appear to be one of them.

Ryanair the cookie monster? It’s an urban myth.

Update: Original source data is available here