Street Fight Daily: LivingSocial Losses Grow, Yelp’s European Push

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

LivingSocialLogoLivingSocial Losses Grow To $32M In Third Quarter (Washington Business Journal)
LivingSocial posted a widening $32 million third quarter net loss on $64 million in revenue, marking a difficult quarter for the D.C.-based daily deal company. The numbers have been adjusted to account for businesses the company has sold off, including Korea-based Ticket Monster and LivingSocial’s Southeast Asia operations.

Mobile Payments Still Facing the Same Big Obstacles (Street Fight)
Nick Hughes: This year has been a turning point in mobile payments, as Square, Paypal, along with Apple have all made strides in their digital payment offerings. But three years after starting a now-defunct mobile payments company, I’ve identified three big reasons why we will not be paying with our phone in everyday retail stores for a long time to come.

Yelp’s European Push Continues As It Snaps Up French Review Site Cityvox (TechCrunch)
The company announced the acquisition of Cityvox, a reviews site in France that focuses on restaurants and nightlife. Now as a formal complainant in the EU antitrust-search investigations, some of the logic of why they are getting more vocal in Brussels is getting clearer.

In Frozen Yogurt Wars, A Battle for Digital Domination (Street Fight)
Sponsored Content: A deep-dive analysis of local presence by Where2GetIt finds that Yogurtland outperformed its smaller counterpart across Google, Facebook, Foursquare and a number of other local search sites. The study shows that Pinkberry has done slightly better on social media, but still struggles among some of the more fundamental elements of local search and discovery.

Apple Pay Registered One Million Credit Cards in First 72 Hours (Recode)
Apple users are flocking to Apple’s other new product from the past month: Apple Pay. Apple Pay users activated more than one million credit cards in the first 72 hours after the service was launched, according to CEO Tim Cook, marking a substantial first step for Apple’s foray into the payments business.

5 Geo-Location Tools for Social Media Posts (Street Fight)
When businesses listen primarily to the opinions of consumers in their direct marketing areas, they’re better able to streamline their listening strategies and optimize their social media marketing programs. Here are five tools that businesses can use to geo-target their social media strategies.

Should Local Publishers Follow Facebook’s ‘App Portfolio’ Strategy? (Local Search Insider)
Greg Sterling: One could argue that focusing on small business advertising and marketing solutions and “letting go” of the consumer side of the business is rational given the competitive nature of the market and resource constraints many publishers face. However I think “giving up” is a mistake for several reasons.

Is Uber Going to Crash Into Google? (Fortune)
Dan Primack: Are the two companies on an eventual collision course? Everyone seems to believe that Uber’s future is on-demand local delivery, with “rides” becoming a founding feature rather than a primary product. Google, of course, also appears to have interest in on-demand delivery, given its recent Express roll-out.

Making Apps as Easy to Search as the Web (Recode)
One of the main problems is that, while Web pages have a well-understood structure that search engines can crawl, apps are kind of the Wild West. Luckily, a bunch of companies are working on this issue, including Facebook and Google as well as startups such as Quixey and URX.

Using The Past To Predict The Future For Local Search (Search Engine Land)
Myles Anderson: It’s not guaranteed that the past predicts the future, but it certainly shines a light on the likely direction and outcomes we’re heading toward. And when we complement this analysis with a practical understanding of Google’s objectives, I believe these predictions hold water.

Startup Deliv Widens Same-Day Delivery, Following Google (Wall Street Journal)
Ahead of the crucial holiday shopping season, Silicon Valley startup Deliv, which offers same-day delivery from malls and stores like Macy’s, is set to announce an expansion on Monday to four new metropolitan areas and 18 shopping centers. (Subscription required)

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