Street Fight Daily: Uber Looks to Driverless Cars, Datalogix Raises $45M

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

new_uber_logoUber CEO: Self-Driving Cars Are the Future, Drivers Are Not (Recode)
Self-driving cars are coming and, when they do, Uber drivers are simply out of luck, the company’s CEO Travis Kalanick said Wednesday at the inaugural Code Conference. He made clear that when that day comes, the upside of Uber using them will be greater than the downside of having to let drivers go.

Native Ad Revenue May Be One Click Away With ‘Selfies’ (Street Fight)
Broadstreet is offering a new ad unit called the “Selfie” — short, self-generated messages that businesses and anybody else can place in the middle of an article to catch the eye of searching users. The company’s co-founder says the Selfie aims to lure businesses that want to get their message out, but are resistant to buying more expensive display ads.

Datalogix Raises $45M to Help Advertisers Track Offline Purchases (Adage)
Datalogix, the analytics company best known for its ad partnerships with Facebook and Twitter, has just raised $45 million in equity financing from investors. The 12-year-old company takes sales data and makes it available for advertisers to anonymously target consumers online based on their offline purchase history.

6 Strategies for Onboarding Merchants to a New Marketplace (Street Fight)
Being unable to attract qualified sellers is one of the biggest obstacles a local marketplace will face. But vendors working in a number of hyperlocal verticals have found ways to overcome these challenges to create thriving local marketplaces. Here are their strategies for successfully onboarding new merchants to a hyperlocal marketplace.

Payments Firm Swipely Raises $20M More As Its Processing Tally Crosses The $2B Mark (TechCrunch)
Payments company Swipely has announced that it raised a Series C round totaling $20 million, bringing the company’s tally to more than $40 million. The company announced recently that its payment processing rate had doubled to $2 billion on an annual basis.

Facebook’s Plan to Go After 25 Million Small Businesses Could Backfire (AdAge)
Facebook is on a mission to get America’s 25 million small businesses to actively invest in Facebook ads, modeling its efforts on how it’s already courting big brands. However, this plan could backfire if Facebook doesn’t do one thing first: Teach small businesses how to define and develop their brand.

Walmart CEO Talks Amazon, 3-D Printing and the Future of Physical Retail (Recode)
In one of his first public appearances as Walmart’s new CEO, Doug McMillon talked respectfully about its giant competitor Amazon, but explained why physical retail is here to stay. He also talked about how digital platforms and sales channels will become increasingly important to the retailer’s business, including the need to improve its presence in digital media.

Verve Mobile Launches White-Label Mobile Offers (MediaPost)
Verve Mobile is introducing a new white-label service geared to small and medium-sized businesses for serving location-based mobile offers. By utilizing Verve’s programmatic API , marketing partners would be able to provide small businesses with a self-serve solution for location-targeted mobile ads, as well as ad creative and campaign management tools.

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