Street Fight Daily: GoDaddy Moves Ahead With IPO, Mapquest Reboots

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology

GoDaddyGo Daddy Said to Pick Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan for I.P.O. (New York Times)
The Go Daddy Group, the Internet registrar best known for cheeky, controversial ads, is moving full speed ahead with plans for an initial public offering. The company has hired Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase to coordinate a stock sale that could take place later this year.

Mobile Ad Revenues Growing Faster Than Previously Expected (Street Fight)
In the U.S. Local Media Forecast, the research firm projects that mobile ad spending in the U.S. will rise from $7.22 billion in 2013 to $25.47 billion in 2017, a 20% increase from what the company projected last year. Meanwhile, the share of mobile ad spending spent on locally-targeted ads continues to grow as well — albeit at slightly slower rate than previously expected.

MapQuest Aims For Reboot With New Content, Partners, UI (SearchEngineLand)
A few years ago, while others were investing in their mapping platforms, AOL was coasting with MapQuest. AOL’s sustained neglect of the online mapping pioneer cost the site its leadership in digital maps. Now, the company hopes to claw its way back with new content and functionality in what was described to me as phase one of a new multiphase rollout.

Case Study: Texas Pharmacy Leverages Beacons for In-Store Offers (Street Fight)
Rather than going it alone and creating a targeted marketing platform from the ground up, Tarrytown Pharmacy owner Mark Newberry opted to work with a hyperlocal startup that was looking for businesses to test out its platform. The company, Shelfbucks, offers personalized deals to people shopping in store using iBeacons.

Yelp’s Deal With Yahoo Has Small Businesses Crying Foul (Wall Street Journal)
A recent deal by Yelp to provide business listings for Internet searches on Yahoo is getting bad reviews from some small-business owners, who say years of positive feedback from customers have vanished from Yahoo. Since mid-March, new reviews about a business posted on Yelp replace reviews that had been posted on Yahoo Local, the Web portal’s own consumer-review tool.

Airbnb Expands Its Cleaning Service To Los Angeles (TechCrunch)
Hospitality startup Airbnb has expanded its experimental cleaning service partnership into another market. The service in New York City and San Francisco was made available through partnership with home cleaning startups Homejoy and Handybook, and we’ve heard that the latter company is leading the L.A. expansion test.

‘Showrooming’ Hits Luxury Fashion (Wall Street Journal)
Showrooming”—when consumers browse items in a store and buy them online—has already rocked the books and consumer-electronics sectors, forcing some chains such as Borders and Circuit City into bankruptcy. But it is now rippling into the luxury world, where brands have long contended that selling online

iBeacons Have Exciting Possibilities Outside of Retail (Guardian)
There’s been a lot of noise about iBeacons since they launched with iOS7 last summer, and much of the discussion has focused on how they benefit retailers and add to the in-store shopping experience. However, the application of iBeacons shouldn’t be limited to retail – it also holds tremendous promise for changing the face of hospitality, banking, transportation, pharmaceuticals, healthcare, events.couldn’t replicate or replace the in-store experience.

Wi-Fi Teams up With NFC to Create Secure Connections With a Simple Tap (GigaOm)
The Wi-Fi Alliance is certifying a new technology that uses an NFC tap to grant devices access to Wi-Fi networks. The technology is targeted at the internet of things, but it would be very useful for smartphones too.

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