Street Fight Daily: Uber Paves Way to IPO, GM Sells Ads In Cars

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

UBERUber Closes $1.6 Billion in Financing (New York Times)
With the new cash, Uber has more incentive to take on a new life as a publicly traded company. The securities sold to Goldman’s clients can be converted into shares in the start-up once it begins trading on a stock exchange, at a discount of 20 percent to 30 percent of the price set in an initial public offering.

YP Now Lets You Target Mobile Ads Based on Desktop Searches (Street Fight)
The company has announced a new partnership with Tapad that will allow marketers to use the company’s desktop search data to targets ads to the the same user on their mobile device. The move should help open the impressions in the firm’s mobile ad network to the billions of dollars spent on retargeting campaigns.

GM Is Beaming Advertisements Into Your Car (Fast Company)
A new program called AtYourService will integrate coupons into GM’s OnStar service, and big-name brands such as Dunkin’ Donuts and RetailMeNot are already on board. Automakers like GM want to make sure they’re at the forefront of putting advertisements in cars instead of companies like Google, Garmin, or Yelp.

Sponsored Content: Why Call Tracking Works Across a Variety of Local Marketing Contexts (Street Fight)
Call tracking and analytics can be implemented across any media channel — although online search, directories and context-based marketing are especially important avenues. The key is to include a tracking component to measure and capture post-call, offline information and behavior in order to identify real advertising value.

Sensory Marketing Is the Next Frontier in Mobile Advertising (AdAge)
Ari Brandt: As mobile usage accelerates, we’re seeing more marketers and more dollars flowing into this platform. But in order for mobile advertising to fulfill the promise to create immersive user experiences and thereby engage people on an emotional level, sensory marketing is the next frontier.

Dallas Morning News Bets Ranch on Its Local/Hyperlocal Strategy (Street Fight)
Tom Grubisich: For the Dallas Morning News, local and hyperlocal — increasingly digital but with a continuing and strong print presence — define the future of the 130-year-old A. H. Belo Corp. newspaper. To find out more about what the DMN is doing to plan for the local digital future, we talked recently with several executives.

Taco Bell’s Chris Brandt Makes Mobile A Priority & It Has Paid Off With Nearly 2M App Downloads (Marketing Land)
Chris Brandt: As mobile usage increases, our customers told us they wanted a mobile ordering and payment option at Taco Bell. We saw the opportunity to build an app unlike anything else in market: one that would deliver location-based orders and secure payment, while showcasing a personal experience.

Can Ratter Turn Local News Into National Headlines? (Nieman Lab)
Founder AJ Daulerio doesn’t see Ratter as a typical local news site. Ratter will not be the place for reports on local council proceedings, recipes of the week, or prep football highlights. The directive he gives his local editors is simple: “The specific goal I told them was to alienate the local readership as much as possible.”

Google Might Be Working On A Better Way To Compete With Apple Pay (Business Insider)
Google might soon implement some major changes to its mobile payments service in order to better compete with Apple Pay. Analysts from Piper Jaffray predict that Google will “meaningfully upgrade” Google Wallet at its annual I/O conference in June, which is where the company usually talks about new projects.

Instacart Now Delivers Kitty Litter With Petco Deal (Wall Street Journal)
Instacart, which recently landed a $2 billion valuation for its same-day delivery service, said Wednesday it would begin delivering goods from Petco, marking its first non-grocery partner. The deal with Petco means Instacart’s couriers will bring to customer doors kitty litter and birdhouses in as fast as one hour.

Don’t Overlook Legacy Sellers In Digital (NetNewsCheck)
Media organizations need both digital-only and multimedia salespeople, argues BIA/Kelsey’s Stacey Sedbrook. With the right product segmentation, digital and legacy sellers can compliment each other, leading to a better overall outcome than a digital-only sales structure.

Here’s Why Apple Pay Users Have Cut the Plastic (eMarketer)
Shopping is easier with Apple Pay, at least according to a November 2014 study. Among US iPhone 6 and 6 Plus users, nearly three-quarters said using Apple Pay was easier than checking out with a debit or credit card, compared with just 3.0% who said it was worse.

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