Street Fight Daily: Yahoo’s ReachLocal Partnership, Amazon Wants to Deliver From Farmers Markets
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology…
Yahoo Follows Google in Building Out Local Search Marketing Reseller Program (Search Engine Land)
Yahoo’s latest partner is small business marketing platform ReachLocal, which will represent Yahoo’s Gemini search marketing platform to thousands of small business customers. ReachLocal indicated that it isn’t yet selling native advertising on Yahoo, but that it will be adding PC and mobile traffic from Yahoo search to its existing advertising network.
Will Mobile Search Dethrone Google? (Street Fight)
David Card: Why would Google’s market leadership be vulnerable to mobile search incursion? Innovation in search can occur at the user experience level, the core indexing and ranking algorithms, and the business model and ecosystem that supports search. Each of these faces potential mobile disruption.
Amazon Is Testing Farmers Market Produce Delivery (Los Angeles Times)
Amazon’s Farmers Market Direct program is launching in Southern California, promising to bring customers high-quality, locally grown produce and serving as a trial for a new business model that could be expanded nationally in the near future.
Google Reportedly Kills Plan to Let Retailers Send Notifications in Maps (The Verge)
A feature designed to work within Google Maps would’ve been called Google Here and was slated to launch with big-name partners. Here would serve up a notification immediately after a user entered any partner location, many of them retail stores. Larry Page apparently made the call to shut down the project, backing his decision with concerns over invasiveness.
6 Ways Local Merchants Can Compete in Organic Search Results (Street Fight)
Type in a generic search term for nearly any local service and you’re likely to see listings for national brands and retail chains. Local businesses have largely been pushed out of the first page, so local merchants have to make a change in their SEO strategies.
Starbucks and Under Armour Are Winning Mobile (Forbes)
Michael Jones: Starbucks has set the bar for other marketers and been a prime example of the right way to approach mobile commerce. Under Armour wasn’t interested in following mobile retail trends — it wanted to create them, so it thought like a tech company and made digital acquisitions that extended the brand’s reach.
For Privacy-Wary Consumers, Anonymity and Beacons Power Northeast Loyalty Programs (GeoMarketing)
App-based loyalty programs face several challenges in getting consumers to adopt and use them, with privacy issues and convenience at the top of the list. Beacon marketing provider Estimote has been expanding its partnership with New England startup Adored to take the worry and friction out of targeted rewards programs on behalf of independent businesses.
Apple and Facebook Put Lesser-Known Factual on the Map (AdAge)
Apple has bolstered its map capabilities for iOS in part through acquisitions and in part via a partnership with Factual, a location-data firm Apple has worked with for three and a half years to provide local business data. Factual also recently signed Facebook as a client, using its regularly updated Places data for business information that will show up in Facebook’s Places Search, Business Pages, and Check-ins.
GrubHub’s Stock Has That Sinking Feeling (Crain’s Chicago Business)
GrubHub’s move from online food ordering into delivery, where it faces new competitors like Uber, DoorDash, Postmates, Groupon, and Amazon, has analysts worried that the company’s growth and profit margins are vulnerable to attack.
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