Lucky Mag Wants to Help Women Shop--With Their Phones (Mashable)

"We have one mission only," says Brandon Holley, editor in chief of Lucky Magazine. "And that is to help women shop." These days, that means helping women compare prices and manage their shopping lists on their smartphones. The Lucky Shopper app for iPhone and Android devices purports to do just that.

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The app allows consumers to scan an extensive range of barcodes, including QR codes, UPC codes, Microsoft Tags and Digimarc watermarks. Once scanned, users are sent to a Google shopping page where they can then choose from a list of vendors to complete their purchase. If there's no barcode, users can snap a photo instead.

If a user isn't ready to make a purchase, he or she can attach a "sticker" and notes to save the product for later reference. Access to some of luckymag.com's content is also available through an in-app browser.

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Compared to other scan-and-shop apps on the market, Lucky Shopper falls short. Most apps -- including Google Shopper and eBay's RedLaser -- allow you to scan multiple kinds of barcodes and automatically save your scanning history. Google Shopper even lets users search by image recognition, text and voice, and pulls up relevant discounts from Google Offers. The shopping features on those apps are also better integrated, allowing users to complete purchases online or locate nearby stores in far fewer steps.

Still, Lucky's app has potential. Holley says she and her team want to create an all-in-one shopping cart that would reside on luckymag.com and sync across multiple devices. Users could use the app to tag items they're looking at in stores, or to, for instance, quickly purchase replacement eyeliner when they've suddenly discovered they've run out. A bookmarklet would allow users to save things they were looking at across the web. Users would also be eligible to get discounts on the items they'd scanned, and get email notifications when the items they'd saved went on sale, a la Have to Have, Svpply and Lyst. Holley also mentioned the possibility of interacting with Lucky editors through the app, perhaps for feedback or recommendations.

Lucky even plans to edge into SCVNGR's turf. Holley and her team demonstrated one possible promotion, in which Lucky readers would be invited to come into Ann Taylor stores to scan barcodes on various clothing items to win products or secure discounts.

Should Lucky build out the app further, it could have the potential to compete in the space, particularly given the brand and its readers' affinity with shopping. For now, we recommend you stick with Google Shopper, unless you're really keen on accessing Lucky content in app form on the go.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/applecomputer/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/mashable/20111110/tc_mashable/lucky_mag_wants_to_help_women_shopwith_their_phones

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