According to a recent survey relesed by Sterling Commerce, higher-income consumers, college graduates and younger consumers have made cross-channel shopping a standard, indicating to retailers that achieving cross-channel execution can increase consumer loyalty and share of wallet. Consumers are using the Web as a first touch-point and channel-hop to complete their purchases, making integration across channels essential to retail success.

The Direct Marketing Association's (DMA) "Direct Marketing Facts and Figures in the Automotive Industry," reveals that auto retailers who spent $7.3 billion on direct marketing campaigns in 2007 saw it drive $248.1 billion in sales, a return on investment of $33.81 on every dollar spent. At the same time, the auto manufacturers spent $8 billion on direct marketing advertising in 2007, realizing $77.8 billion in sales, or a $9.68 ROI per dollar spent.

According to the latest Nielsen Global Online Survey on internet shopping habits, more than 85% of the world's online population has used the internet to make a purchase, increasing the market for online shopping by 40% in the past two years.

New ABI Research sees the total number of mobile TV subscribers growing to 462 million by 2012, driven in large part by the expansion of 3G networks, and flat-rate plans for mobile video. The build-out of mobile video delivery networks and an increase in the amount of available content will also contribute to the market's growth.

According to the results of the comScore annual Super Bowl post-game survey the television broadcast averaged a record 97 million viewers throughout the game, making the event even more important than usual for this year's advertisers. The most popular advertiser during the Super Bowl was Anheuser-Busch, whose commercials for Bud and Bud Light (including comedian Will Ferrell's offbeat spot) scored well amongst viewers, with nearly half indicating they would most like to see the commercials again. Beverage spots were particularly popular this year, with a large percentage of respondents saying they would also like to see ads for Pepsi (28 …

A deeper look at career and educational sites including viewer demographics, advertisers, ad types and sizes.

According to the Newspaper Association of America (NAA), the average monthly unique audience figures for newspaper websites grew by more than 3.6 million in 2007, a record year for the industry and an increase of more than 6% over 2006 numbers.

comScore, in a recently released report, The 2007 U.S. Internet Year in Review highlighting the major trends in U.S. Internet activity, finds that that top gaining properties and site categories featured some of the top Internet brands, including Google, Facebook, Wikipedia and Craigslist.

Harris Interactive reports that, overall, one in five US adults (19%) describe themselves as either "very" or "extremely knowledgeable" about vehicles. These "Influentials" are much more likely than "Non-influential" ordinary consumers to say they are more likely to talk to other knowledgeable people about the vehicles they are considering.

A recent report from Forrester Research, summarized by Internet Retailer, shows that Online retail sales in 2007 reached $175 billion, a 21% increase over $144.6 billion in 2006, the first significant drop in growth after years of around 25% growth.