Street Fight Daily: Verizon Acquires Yahoo, Retailers Leverage Instagram for Loyalty
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology…
Yahoo Cuts $4.8 Billion Deal to Sell Core Business to Verizon (New York Times)
The board of the Silicon Valley company has agreed to sell Yahoo’s core internet operations and land holdings to Verizon for $4.8 billion, according to people briefed on the matter. After the sale, Yahoo shareholders will be left with about $41 billion in investments in the Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba, as well as Yahoo Japan and a small portfolio of patents.
How Retailers Are Turning Instagram Into a Customer-Loyalty Vehicle (Glossy)
Michael Kors is hacking its Instagram feed to turn its 8.2 million followers into not only customers, but returning customers. It’s no small task. Despite opening its API and introducing an algorithm-based feed, Instagram still doesn’t allow active links in captions. So retailers have been coming up with ways to make the products in its posts easy to find off the platform.
How Google’s Monetization Shift Will Impact Local Search (Street Fight)
In this new feature, local marketing gurus David Mihm and Mike Blumenthal kick around some of the biggest ideas affecting the local search ecosystem and the broader industry. This edition looks at the latest changes from Google and how local marketers should react.
Survey: Retail Emails Lead to Quick Sales (eMarketer)
For nearly a third of retailers, the average customer makes a purchase within the first 48 hours of signing up for marketing emails, June 2016 research found. And for approximately a quarter more merchants, customers first buy within a week of email signup.
Case Study: Sailing Company Leverages Online Reviews to Maximize Sales (Street Fight)
Online reviews can make or break a business in the tourism industry, which is one of the reasons why Kai Kanani Sailing Charters is pulling out all the stops to drive a higher volume of reviews on third-party websites like Yelp, Facebook, and TripAdvisor.
Pokémon Go, Augmented Reality, and the Future of Local Marketing (Search Engine Land)
Brian Smith: As the popularity of Pokémon Go and augmented reality continue to soar, marketers are dying to get their hands on the popular app for advertising purposes. So what’s a local marketer to do? We’re still in the early stages of augmented reality going mainstream, but here’s what you should be on the lookout for in the near future.
Why Car Tech Companies Should Look to Amazon for Inspiration (TechCrunch)
Darrell Etherington: The most advanced automotive tech available ahead of the arrival of fully self-driving vehicles should, ideally, be incredibly sophisticated, and completely invisible to users. So far, of all the major tech companies, Amazon is the closest to striking that balance.
How Chatbots and A.I. Will Change the Future of Everyday Commerce (VentureBeat)
Imagine if everything around you were connected and A.I.-enabled. Ordering at your favorite restaurants would be as simple as sending them a text. Your dry cleaner would know exactly when to pick up your laundry without you uttering a word. And when you run low on groceries, your refrigerator would order food for you.
Thumbtack Contractors Make an Average of $61k (Business Insider)
“We think that future of work is going to be in the skilled professional,” CEO Marco Zappacosta said. “It’s going to be about having a specific talent that the world wants and needs and monetizing that talent.”
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