According to Best Buy chief marketing officer Barry Judge, the new applications, which also include several Facebook apps that will appear on the company's branded page, take advantage of the company's "Remix API," (application programming interface). This allows third-party developers to access Best Buy's inventory data, pricing, and product images for use in their web or mobile applications.

Next month, the first of several Google-created Best Buy applications will launch. The new app will allow consumers to do product searches and then will provide them with the location and directions to their nearest Best Buy store. It will even direct the user to the exact location of the product within the store itself. Phones sold in Best Buy will include the app pre-loaded onto the handsets prior to purchase. Also coming are applications designed specifically for Android, Google's mobile operating system, but there's no word yet as to what those apps will be. Best Buy currently carries two models of Android phones, the G1 and the myTouch 3G.

Other Plans: Websites, Gadget Deals, and Facebook Apps

In addition, the company is launching a dedicated website for Best Buy Mobile in October, is lining up exclusive deals to sell highly anticipated gadgets like Nokia's first netbook, the Booklet 3G, and is launching a series of Facebook applications.

The revamped Facebook page, which the company said will attract anywhere from 3 to 4 million fans, will offer several apps designed to help holiday shoppers find gifts. One, the "Hint Hacker," allows visitors to send gift hints to their family and friends about what products they're interested in. Another, called the "Holiday Morning Simulator," is a goofy Christmas card where Best Buy Blue Shirt employees sing holiday tunes, also addresses gift-purchasing questions. A third is a Facebook Secret Santa app. These, too, will be revealed in the coming weeks.

Email Marketing a Top Priority

Those companies that are seeing the current downturn as a chance to expand and that are planning to spend more on their online efforts this year, say that they will focus their investments on search (80%), email (65%), and social marketing (60%). According to this report, these businesses see email as one of the most important means to communicate with their customers and most plan to use it to inform customers of new product launches, promotions, and to get customer feedback. 90% of all respondents listed a focus on email marketing as a top priority.

Companies Won't Scale Back Social Media Campaigns

Interestingly, the study also found that those companies that are growing faster than expected during this downturn are also more likely to embrace social media. Even those companies that are planning to scale back their online operations this year still plan to experiment with social media campaigns.

Imaged used courtesy of Flickr user jakerome.

These problems were only compounded during the last year, as eBay also lost a lot of its casual sellers to Craigslist (which saw its traffic rise 40% over the past year).

As Compete's Matt Pace rightly points out, eBay's strategy of emphasizing fixed-price transactions only muddled the waters and blurred eBay's distinction from other online retailers, including eBay's own shopping.com. Also, users clearly prefer to buy from a trusted source like Amazon, and the average order value on eBay has remained stable at around $28 for the last year.

That doesn't mean that eBay's focus on "Buy-It-Now" transactions was a total failure, though. The number of these transactions grew steadily over the last year (up 20% from last year), but this was not enough to make up for the simultaneous decline in eBay's auction business. According to Compete, 1.5 million fewer users actually placed bids on eBay in February 2009 than a year ago.

How does it work? The first step for users is to enter your zip code (U.S. only) to view and select pre-screened providers in your area. You can then click on names to view profiles, insurance information and ratings. The next step is to describe your project (using photos if you like), set your schedule and name your price. You have to upload sufficient funds into your "ServiceLive Wallet", but the website assures us that "you maintain control of your funds until the project is completed to your satisfaction." The providers you select can then "compete for your business" - they may also respond with a counter offer for a different time or price.

The main site is focused on the same consumer market that largely drives Sears' offline retail business, but ServiceLive also features a special section for 'commercial' customers - such as companies and Property Owners/Managers.

For service providers, ServiceLive is free. The business model for Sears is that the customer pays 10 percent of every completed service order amount. There is a rating system for the service providers - and only customers who have hired providers through ServiceLive are allowed to post ratings and comments. In a way ServiceLive is similar to websites like Angie's List, which provides consumer reviews of tradespeople and other service providers. But ServiceLive takes it a step further, by allowing users to order services online using the auction system.

In our initial tests, we managed to find 6 local plumbers in the Portland zip code. All were unrated, but we assume that Sears will get more ratings into the system once they market the site to its huge retail customer base. As with all 'web 2.0' apps that rely on user-generated content (in this case ratings and comments), it requires a large user base to get decent ratings data. But Sears is in a much better position than startups to get that data, given that ServiceLive is very complementary to its core retail business. Imagine for example getting a flyer with each home improvement product purchase in Sears or KMart, promoting ServiceLive. This could very quickly ramp up.

ServiceLive began in 2007 and is a subsidiary of Sears Holdings, parent company of Kmart and Sears. Currently there are more than 20,000 "ServiceLive-Approved providers" available to hire through the online marketplace. The $10.00 posting fee for users to place an order on ServiceLive has been waived for the rest of February, as an initial promotion. But we obviously think that Sears can find other much more effective ways to promote the service in its Sears and KMart stores.

Sears says that it is the leading home appliance retailer, so ServiceLive.com is a natural online complement to its core offline retail business. This is definitely worth watching to see how quickly it grows, as it's potentially a very useful service for both homeowners and tradespeople.

Big in Japan called the Target store in question and spoke to the manager, who indicated that she was not aware of the policy. We also contacted Target's corporate headquarters to confirm Target's policy, or lack thereof, but we first had to explain the application to the company representative. They had never heard of such a thing before! (As it turns out, Target has no policy whatsoever on barcode scanning their merchandise.)

The same customer also noted they had visited Sam's Club, where they demonstrated the application to a store employee who seemed "confounded that such technology even existed," wrote the user.

Instant Price Match Is Retail's Future

Although this is just anecdotal evidence from one customer, it's entirely believable that without concrete store policies in place, you're going to encounter rogue employees here and there who have no idea what you're doing and will ask you to stop.

On the flip side, stores that do get hip to this trend may decide to implement store policies that ban scanning, once they realize that customers could discover their high prices. A post on AdLab for example, a blog about advertising and marketing, suggests retailers do just that. They also recommend retailers should consider investing in a a cell phone jammer. They even provide a "No iPhones on Premises" sign for printout.

That doesn't seem to be a very proactive way of dealing with the technology. In fact, it reminds us of how both the music and movie industry attempted to quash the pirating of songs and films: they just tried to make it stop. Instead of going a route destined for failure and trying to shut down barcode scanning altogether, retailers could choose to embrace the trend. They could offer easy-to-find barcodes on their promotional items with signage encouraging customers to compare the price instantly with other stores in the area. They could make barcode scanning the new advertising circular.

Hopefully, stories like those of the Shop Savvy customer will remain isolated incidents and no other store employees will bother customers looking to save money. If you've used barcode scanning applications and have experiences to share, please let us know in the comments.