Street Fight Daily: Lyft Eyes Opportunity in Uber Turmoil, Creativity on Social Can Backfire for Brands

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

As Uber Stumbles, Lyft Sees an Opening and Bits Its Tongue (NYT)
Lyft’s refusal to gloat publicly over the misfortunes of the Competitor-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is a savvy maneuver from a company that has spent years positioning itself as the friendly, laid-back alternative to Uber’s cutthroat corporate ethos.

How Brands Can Refine Their Local Marketing Mix to Maximize Results (Street Fight)
The right marketing mix can open up doors for an enterprise brand, as successful acquisition campaigns naturally funnel new customers into loyalty and retention strategies. We asked hyperlocal executives for their perspective on how brands can tweak the marketing mix to maximize high-yield results. 

Some Brands Get Clever on Social Media (and Some Consumers Aren’t Feeling the Vibe) (eMarketer)
Whether it’s using GIFs or the latest slang, brands do what they can to stay relevant on social media. But despite their best efforts, many people find these behaviors more annoying than cool.

An Unsexy Truth: Emerging Tech Hinges on Local Data (Street Fight)
Michael Boland: The visual search future in which “the camera is the new search box,” will have a massive reliance on local data. Therefore value and demand are boosted within that world for companies that have unique local data sets — everything from NAP to snaps.

Here’s How Brands Are Partnering with Waze to Reach Riders (AdWeek)
Waze, the driving navigation app acquired by Google in 2013, pitches its ad products as being ideal for brands that want to act as a utility for drivers. Since launching the platform in 2012, Waze has worked with brands across a variety of industries—from Dunkin’ Donuts and McDonald’s to Adidas and AT&T.

Apsalar and Singular Merge with an Eye on Busting Mobile Data Silos (AdExchanger)
On Tuesday, the duo announced that they will become one and marry their respective technologies – Singular’s mobile marketing analytics tech and Apsalar’s mobile attribution and DMP offering – to take on the likes of Adobe, Oracle and Salesforce on the mobile front.

Instagram Video is Soaring for Publishers (Digiday)
Publishers are piling into Instagram video. Fifteen months after the Facebook-owned platform raised the maximum length on a video from 15 seconds to one minute, video has become a central area of focus for publishers there, according to NewsWhip data.

Foursquare Strengthens in Asia (Medium)
Steven Rosenblatt: As Asia-Pacific technology companies are increasingly looking at international expansion, Foursquare is on a roll, broadening our reach thanks to new and expanded partnerships with industry-leading customers in Asia — and a growing team of experts based out of a new office in Singapore.

Meet the New Google News: Less Clutter, More Fact-Checking, and More Local Stories (Poynter)
Remember using Google News to cut through the clutter, find fact-checked articles and learn about what’s going on in your area? Probably not, because before this week, that was nearly impossible.

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