home services

6 Lead-Generation Platforms for Local Businesses

Share this:

More than a quarter of consumers say they use the internet to find local businesses every day, and yet a whopping 29% of small businesses still don’t have websites. Here are six examples of lead-generation platforms that small businesses are using right now.

5 Local Marketplaces for Housecleaners

Share this:

Marketplaces aimed at providing consumers with easy ways to quickly find and book local housecleaners and home services providers are heating up, with frontrunners like Handy and Homejoy enjoying major investments from well-known venture firms like Revolution (led by AOL co-founder Steve Case and Groupon chairman Ted Leonisis), Google Ventures, and Redpoint Ventures. Here are […]

The Local Sharing Economy Is Here (But Scale Will Prove Difficult)

Share this:

Every iteration of things that can be shared, from baby clothes to power boats, has been picked through by college students who have been steeped in the gospel of Zuck and turned into a local service set to scale. The problem, however, is that almost every startup gets stuck at city one. The reason? If the sharing requires some sort of physical exchange of goods or services, then it requires the commitment of two people who live close to each other to complete transaction. And they need to find each other even though the just-launched app won’t reach critical mass for a long time…

Street Fight Daily: Google Upgrades Places, PlaceIQ Tracks In-Store Visits

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Google Upgrades Its Google Places Dashboard With Google+ Local Integration (Search Engine Land)… SMG to Track How Mobile Ads Lead to In-store Visits (AdAge)… Local.com Launches Premium National-Local Ad Network (Screenwerk)…

6 Marketplace Platforms for Local Buyers

Share this:

Limited-time promotions are an effective way to generate immediate customer demand, but what happens once the hype is over and the deal is complete? To counteract their one-and-done reputations and give merchants a way to extend their promotions, a number of hyperlocal companies are developing local marketplace platforms with more opportunities for long-tail marketing…

SXSW: With Pivot, Zaarly’s Focus Shifts to Merchants

Share this:

Zaarly rolled out its “storefronts” initiative last fall, and soon will completely drop the consumer-generated request model it was founded around to shift entirely to a storefront selling approach. From a hyperlocal marketing perspective, one of the most profound effects of this is the way Zaarly is now counting on sellers to bring in buyers…

Street Fight Daily: Zaarly Pivots, Can Hyperlocal Scale?

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Zaarly Shutters Its Reverse Craigslist Marketplace, Goes All In On Virtual Storefronts As Co-Founder Exits (TechCrunch)… Hyperlocal Cooties (Buzz Machine)… NY Daily News Releases City Guide App With MyCityWay (AdWeek)…

Zaarly Co-Founder on Pivot: ‘Toughest 4-Month Build of My Life’ (VIDEO)

Share this:

Street Fight was in attendance at the recent Fortify.vc Distilled Intelligence 2.0 confab where Zaarly co-founder and CMO Eric Koester talked about the pain that comes with making a pivot at a startup that has tremendous momentum, funding and the former head of eBay on board…

More Hyperlocal Investment Content Coming to Street Fight

Share this:

Over the last six months, our Hyperlocal Investment Report newsletter has aimed to guide investors through this new industry, to give context and insight into the market potential of pre-public companies, and to synthesize activity in the public markets as well as in private placement, venture capital, mergers and acquisitions, private equity and the like. With this issue, we’re moving it from a paid product to delivering this content on our public website for free, to engage in broader discussion around key issues in hyperlocal investing.

Zaarly Expands Local Marketplace With ‘Storefronts’

Share this:

A little less than year after raising $14 million in series A funding and adding HP CEO Meg Whitman to its board, Zaarly has pushed out the next iteration of its local marketplace this morning. Called Storefronts, the product provides verified sellers with curated brand pages, where buyers can browse services, engage with content about the provider, and begin to build relationships with the individuals behind the services…

Street Fight Daily: Yelp Bulls Get Bearish, Google Wants More Wallet

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Yelp Traders Brace for Lockup Expiration; ‘Better to Be Safe Than Sorry’ (Wall Street Journal)… Google Wallet Aspires To Hold All Your Cards and Tickets (GigaOm)… How The Web ‘Check In’ Is Growing Up (Forbes)…

Street Fight Daily: DMN Buys Pegasus News, Zaarly Launches ‘Anywhere’

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.The Dallas Morning News Buys Hyperlocal Online News Provider Pegasus News (Dallas News)… When DIY plans meet reality: Zaarly unveils “Anywhere” API (GigaOm)… LivingSocial CEO: Why We’re No Groupon (CNBC)…

Street Fight Daily: Journatic Gives a Preview, Chalkboard Shutters

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology...

The Burbs Get a First Look at Journatic (Chicago Reader)…

Singapore-based Location Ad Service Chalkboard Closes (The Next Web)…

Groupon Plans for World Domination Include More ‘Hyperlocal’ Offers (Wall Street Journal)…

6 Lead-Generation Tools for Small Businesses

Share this:

Hyperlocal platforms aimed at fulfilling consumer service requests are becoming increasingly attractive to these small business owners, since these platforms generally involve a minimal investment of time or money on the part of the local merchant. Rather than paying upfront for advertisements that may or may not generate actual leads, business owners can sit back and wait for leads to come to them…

Street Fight Daily: Highlight Updates, Groupon Crushing It, Tippr Layoffs

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...

Hot Location-based Networking App Highlight Gets Even More Useful (TNW)…

Chart: Groupon Is Crushing Its Closest Rival (Business Insider)…

Daily Deal Site Tippr Lays Off 25 staffers, Restructures Sales (GeekWire)…

Local Marketing Shifts From Ads to Interactions to Requests

Share this:

There’s a huge opportunity to aggregate potential leads across these siloed services in real time, and notify or proxy respond on behalf of local businesses so they can service leads immediately. In this online new paradigm, small business no longer needs to wait for their customers, they cherry-pick on demand…

Local Quotables: Mason, Sheetz, Evans and more

Share this:

The best words about and around the hyperlocal industry.

Andrew Mason realizes Groupon has fallen short with its social media presence; Ashley Sheetz from Gamestop explains why she backed out of Facebook’s failing virtual market; Perry Evans discusses the changing relationship between local businesses and consumers; and more.

Hyperlocal Media and Collaborative Consumption Services

Share this:

The “shared economy” being ushered in by startups like Airbnb, Getaround and Toolspinner is creating new marketplaces where locals can rent their homes, cars, and tools to neighbors. This new trend enables the efficient sharing of resources and goods that are used on occasion as an alternative to outright ownership…

PODCAST: This Week in Location-Based Marketing — Zaarly’s Eric Koester, Layar & BrightKite

Share this:

In this episode, hosts Rob Woodbridge and Asif Khan discuss BrightKite’s demise, Layar’s enhanced yellow sticky pad, Hallmark’s move to feature Billy Ray Cyrus via QR code. Plus a special interview with Zaarly’s Eric Koester…

Street Fight Daily: 12.02.11

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...

Zaarly App Aims to Deliver Customers to Small Businesses (Mashable)

Groupon’s Exaggerated Deals Will Be Probed By UK Government (PaidContent)
Mobile Commerce To Hit $6.7B In 2011 (MediaPost)