Street Fight Daily: Google Begins Mobile-First Indexing, Apple News Drives Traffic for Pubs

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

Google Begins Mobile-First Indexing, Using Mobile Content For All Search Rankings (Search Engine Land)
While called an “experiment,” it’s actually the first move in Google’s planned shift to looking primarily at mobile content, rather than desktop, when deciding how to rank results.

Apple News Drives Significant Traffic for Some Publishers, But Measurement Remains Iffy (Nieman Lab)
The traffic picture is improving for publishers on Apple News, but news organizations still have some big hangups when it comes to measurement and monetization. CNN, for example, says its Apple News content got 36.5 million unique readers in September, a major increase from August’s 5 million.

Just How Big a Deal Are Voice Search and Chatbots for Local? (Street Fight)
David Card: At Street Fight Summit we raised a little controversy around the potential disruptiveness of voice search to the hyperlocal economy. Street Fight believes voice search is a critical emerging technology, a view that seemingly contrasts with that of many companies on the supply side of hyperlocal.

The Platform of the Future Will Own the Intersection of Advertising and Marketing (AdExchanger)
Matt Keiser: Reducing the differences between mar tech and ad tech to their billing models doesn’t capture the true distinctions between marketing and advertising. In the coming years, the marketing cloud or agency that can master and meld both worlds – marketing and advertising – will dominate an industry currently ruled by Facebook and, to a lesser degree, Google. Salesforce, Oracle, Adobe and the holding companies are all possible contenders.

Report: Airports Could Be the Next Big Beacon Hubs (Street Fight)
In U.S airports, we don’t see as much beacon activity as we might expect, but a new report by Unacast’s proximity marketing network service, Proxbook, indicates that by 2019, 84% of all global airports will be involved in a deployment or a trial project with beacons or other proximity sensors.

Ben & Jerry’s Sees Huge Success on Instagram — Snapchat Experience ‘Spotty’ (eMarketer)
Ben & Jerry’s was the second brand to advertise on Instagram, and it has seen the evolution of the paid side of the platform. Kate Paine, digital marketing manager at the ice cream–maker, spoke with eMarketer’s Maria Minsker about what makes Instagram effective and how it stacks up against Snapchat.

How Cities Like San Francisco Use Local Strategies to Keep Tourists Coming Back (Skift)
By segmenting the personalities of their individual neighborhoods, cities like San Francisco have more options to align their visitor experiences with different visitor profiles. That customization helps cities expand their destination image, build destination loyalty, and boost repeat visitation.

The Economist Turns to LinkedIn over Pinterest and Tumblr (Digiday)
In a platform world, publishers face tough decisions on where to place their resources. In August, the Economist faced this head on and axed its ailing Pinterest and Tumblr accounts while ramping up its commitment to LinkedIn.

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