Street Fight Daily: Foursquare’s Plans Leaked, Google Now on iOS

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

FoursquareLeaked Doc Shows Foursquare’s Big Plans for Your Check-in Data (CNet)
In May, Foursquare will introduce the first of two new ad types for advertisers hungry to capitalize on data the company has collected from 30 million users who have checked in more than 3.5 billion times, according to a leaked pitch deck. Foursquare plans to offer a check-in retargeting tool to help advertisers improve the performance of their display, video, or Facebook Exchange ad buys with knowledge gleaned from member check-ins.

5 Tools For Improving Email Delivery Rates (Street Fight)
Marketers can spend hours crafting the perfect e-newsletters and researching the most opportune times to send their messages out, only to have their emails get bounced before they reach their subscribers’ inboxes. As inboxes get tougher to penetrate, marketers are looking for new ways to ensure their messages get through. Here are five tools that marketers can use to improve their email delivery rates.

Google Brings Virtual Assistant to iOS ‘Now’ (Internet2Go)
Greg Sterling: Whether we call Google Now “predictive search,” “anticipatory search” or a “virtual assistant,” the capability is is now available for the iPhone and iPad. Google Now is partly Google’s answer to Siri (and Passbook) and partly a wholly independent development that takes your search history, your Gmail entries, your calendar, your location and other “context” to deliver a range of personalized information without having to actively search for it.

Survey Shows Rise In Mobile Search as a Starting Point for Consumers (Street Fight)
A new survey, released by Telmetrics and xAd, indicates that there is increasing use of mobile devices by consumers as a part of their path-to-purchase, as well as increasing desire for local. The results found that 45% of consumers go to their mobile device first when starting a search. One-third said they used mobile throughout their purchasing process, two-thirds switched to another device or converted offline.

Jack Dorsey Talks Square and Wearable Devices (New York Times)
Mr. Dorsey said he fancied devices that wrap around the wrist, like smartwatches or exercise bands, because they felt more natural. The conversation might hint that Square is considering a payment app for a smartwatch, perhaps the watch from Apple that has long been rumored to be in the works.

As Tides Turn, Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley Responds to Critics (Street Fight)
The technology community seems to have turned on Foursquare in recent months, with some people publicly deriding the once-adored company. Dennis Crowley, the company’s founder, responded to criticism Monday morning, asserting that Foursquare is in the process of “basically reinventing local search.”

How Groupon Bought Its Way to Patent Prominence (Crain’s Chicago Business)
Before he was fired as CEO, Groupon co-founder Andrew Mason received two patents on the basic online group-buying idea. But the company also bought a bunch of e-commerce patents from Priceline founder Jay Walker, who runs Walker Digital Management, an intellectual-property firm in Stamford, Conn.

Small Businesses’ Investment in Digital Marketing Rises (eWeek)
The majority (66 percent) of small businesses plan to invest as much or more in digital marketing, such as Websites, social media and online advertisements, as they did last year, according to the 2013 AT&T Small Business Technology Poll, which surveyed 1,000 small businesses nationwide. To remain competitive, more small businesses are turning to LinkedIn as an easy and affordable way to create awareness.

Why Local Digital Advertising Agencies Have Upper Hand in China (AdAge)
International agencies dominate many aspects of China’s marketing industry, but when it comes to digital, local players have the upper hand — an edge that puts them squarely in the M&A crosshairs.One reason local players have thrived is the country’s unique internet ecosystem. Global platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are blocked by China’s “Great Firewall,” replaced by dozens of local players in a highly fragmented space, made more complicated by the language.

Koupah Does Tablet-Based Point-Of-Sale, But Also Zaps Credit Card Transaction Fees (TechCrunch)
Koupah is a fresh take on the tablet-based point-of-sale space, which is growing in popularity among SMBs that want a solution that’s flexible, extensible and less expensive than legacy POS-specific hardware systems. The company takes the model a step further by offsetting some or all credit card transaction fees with advertising.

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