Andrew Mason Out as Groupon CEO

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Groupon CEO Andrew Mason was fired by the company’s board Thursday, less than 24 hours after dismal earnings sent the company’s stock price into a tailspin. The board is currently looking for a replacement, and board members Eric Lefkofsky and Ted Leonisis will serve as co-CEOs of the company until one is found…

With NJ News Co-op, Prof. Deb Galant Keeps to Her Hyperlocal Roots

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In July 2012, the Baristanet founder decamped for the nearby groves of academe – to the new Center for Cooperative Media at Montclair State University. Not surprisingly, Galant stayed true to her entrepreneurial spirit, launching the center’s NJ News Commons, which brings together news organizations from around the state to share stories and resources. Street Fight caught up with Galant recently to find out more about the news co-op, and why the project is important for hyperlocals…

Report: Blocking Access to Wi-Fi Could Hurt Retailers

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Wi-fi connectivity may be starting to affect where consumers decide to shop, according to a new report by JiWire. The study, which surveyed users across the company’s ad-supported wi-fi network, found that one out of two mobile consumers are influenced by the availability of in-store wi-fi when deciding where to shop…

Street Fight Daily: AOL COO May Exit, Airbnb Expands Hyperlocal Contnent

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.COO Artie Minson Could Exit Aol, Patch Issues To Blame? (TechCrunch)… Airbnb’s Neighborhoods Program Expands With the Addition 93 Local Guides in 4 New Cities worldwide (The Next Web)… Foursquare CEO Looks Beyond Mobile Handsets: Anywhere There’s A Screen, We Want To Be On It (TechCrunch)…

Groupon’s Stock Dives as Deal Margins Shrink

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Groupon lost more than a quarter of its market value in after hours trading on Wednesday after the company reported diminishing margins and continued international stagnancy in Q4. The once-resurgent daily deals company saw gross billings increase 24% year-over-year in the fourth quarter, but declining margins in both its local and ecommerce business forced its gross profit down 10% from a year earlier…

With Mobile Growing, WPP Sees Opportunity to Make DOOH Smarter

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The agency’s Spafax Networks has announced a new partnership that will bring PlaceIQ’s audience data to its DOOH buying process. Like PlaceIQ’s channel partners in the mobile space, Spafax can use the latitude-longitude data associated with its inventory to target media by audience segments like “middle aged moms” or “business travelers” in vendor and geography.

LocalVox Turns to SMB Seminars to Drive Leads in New Markets

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New York-based LocalVox is expanding from New York and Boston to Washington D.C. The move is a small-but-significant step in the company’s grand plan to replace legacy players like ReachLocal as the marketing platform of choice for local businesses. LocalVox’s product allows small business to publish content across their own email, social, and web properties, as well as to a host of listing sites and other media properties from a single touchpoint…

Street Fight Daily: Samsung’s ‘Passbook’ App, PayPal Co-Founder’s Payments Play

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Samsung Takes a Page from Apple’s Passbook With New Wallet App (Verge)… PayPal Co-Founder Levchin Launches New Payments Startup, Affirm (AllThingsD)… Apple Patents Situational Awareness And Location Information Sharing For Mobile Devices (TechCrunch)…

Just Another Chat With a Frustrated Patch Editor

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“We have had two conference calls in a row the last two weeks with the people at HQ excitedly talking about big ideas that are going to get us to profitability, but the ideas sound like bad ones, not to mention ones that they have already tried,” said this editor, a mix of frustration and exasperation in his voice. “They are getting farther away from the hyperlocal vision and really pushing generic SEO content to try and get unique visitors…”

How to Ensure That Your Geofence Is Sized Correctly

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Location-based push campaigns have a lot of upside, from satisfied customers to higher ROI. But it can be a thin line that separates a successful campaign from one that leaves mobile users extremely annoyed — so really homing in on how to deliver the right geofence to optimize your campaign is crucial…

Street Fight Daily: Foursquare Expands Deals, Visa Teams with Samsung

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Foursquare Opens Up Check-In Deals to More Kinds of Plastic (AllThingsD)… Visa Teams Up With Samsung on Mobile Payments (New York Times)… With ClubLocal and New SaaS Tools, ReachLocal Wants to be the Amazon of Local services (PandoDaily)…

Voice Media Group Relaunches City Apps — Can Mobile Really Be Alt-Weeklies’ Salvation?

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Voice Media Group, which acquired 11 alt-weeklies around the country back in October, is re-launching its various cities’ mobile apps, which it hopes will become go-to listings and reviews guides for their local markets. According to Tiffany Shackelford, the executive director at the Association of Alternative Newsmedia, many alt-weeklies, like VMG, are beginning to understand the importance of mobile…

5 Strategies for SMBs Using Social Gifting Apps

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Translating Facebook fans and Twitter followers into actual sales is a challenge that even the largest brands are still working to overcome. To break through the clutter and get noticed, small businesses are increasingly using social gifting platforms to send gift cards and physical items to online fans. Here are five tips from the experts on what small businesses can do to ensure a high ROI on any social gifting promotions…

Street Fight Daily: Airbnb Eyeing Former Square COO, Nokia Opens ‘Here’

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Airbnb May Hire Former Square Exec Rabois as COO (Wall Street Journal)… Nokia Opens Up Here platform With an Eye to the Future (GigaOm)… Why Big Brands Fell Out of Love with Check-Ins (Digiday)…

Case Study: Restaurant Chain Uses Mobile Program to Target Nearby Customers

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At 54th Street Grill & Bar, a regional chain with 19 locations in Missouri, Kansas, Illinois, and Texas, marketing director Kelly Reid used a mobile loyalty platform called Front Flip to send discounted offers to consumers who’d visited businesses within a five-mile-radius of any 54th Street locations without checking-in at one of her restaurants, and had managers ask those customers why they hadn’t come in before. Here’s more about what she learned….

5 Ways SMBs Can Find Success With Social Media Marketing

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A debate has been brewing on Street Fight over whether small business owners should be spending money on social media, and its general overall importance as a marketing strategy. We figured it might be worth it to check in with a few social media marketing companies to get their latest and best tips and insights for SMB success in social media…

PODCAST: This Week in Location-Based Marketing — Talkbits, Moves

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In this week’s episode, hosts Rob Woodbridge and Asif Khan look at Talkbits — this generation’s version of the CB radio. Meanwhile, Weve wastes no time and starts working with Virgin Records; big quick-serve restaurants Olive Garden and Applebee’s get into the location marketing game; Yahoo! destroys (er, acqui-hires) Alike; and a glimpse of the future of the insurance industry from Spain. Plus, Sampo Karjalainen, founder of Moves stops by, and our resource of the week shows the power of big data…

Street Fight Daily: Life After Patch, What Really Happened at LivingSocial?

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Life After Patch.com: A Newspaper Editor Returns To Newsprint (The Awl)… What Really Happened at LivingSocial? (Fortune)… The Newsonomics of The Boston Globe Sale (Nieman Journalism Lab)…

Euclid Raises $17 Million to Deepen Analytics for Brick-and-Mortars

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Netscape founder Marc Andreessen may think retail’s demise is inevitable, but Benchmark Capital has just made a big bet on its future. The venture firm has led a $17.3 million series B round in Euclid, a startup that uses wi-fi analytics to provide brick-and-mortar retailers with web-like reporting on in-store traffic…

In an Effort to Woo Brands, Verve Mobile Launches Audience Solution

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The targeting tool allows advertisers to use location data to reach specific audiences – say, middle-aged moms or travelers – with a higher-funnel branding message, rather than the lower funnel “call-to-location” messaging endemic of traditional geo-fencing campaigns.