Street Fight Daily: Instagram Video Engagement on Steep Rise, Smartphones Drive Web Traffic

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

Engagement with Instagram Videos Is Surging (eMarketer)
Savvy publishers are finding success on Instagram with video, a format the social media platform added to its app back in 2013 in a move that seemed revolutionary at the time—and still may prove to be.

The New ‘Location, Location, Location’ in Retail (Street Fight)
“The new consumer (and search) paradigm favors small-scale, hyper-focused boutiques close to population centers as opposed to horizontal big box retailers on suburban commercial strips,” David Mihm says to Mike Blumenthal in their bi-weekly conversation.

Advertisers, Take Note: Smartphones Are Driving All Web Traffic Growth (Recode)
Since January 2015, there has been a 68 percent increase in smartphone web traffic in the U.S., while desktop and tablet both saw declines.

How Cinnabon Uses Digital Tools to Thrive Despite Declining Foot Traffic (Street Fight)
“Everyone’s going to use the buzzwords like omnichannel, but the bottom line is you have to figure out how your brand is going to play in the new world and be accessible to people in the way they want it,” says Joe Guith, president of Cinnabon.

Google Changes AdWords Guidelines in Response to Apple’s Intelligent Tracking (MediaPost)
Apple will change its tracking procedures with iOS 11, scheduled for release this month. In response, Google has created a new Analytics cookie that will capture campaign conversion data from Safari to conform to Apple’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention.

Taste of Home Turns Raw Social Engagement into Fully Cooked Audience Strategy (AdExchanger)
Taste of Home amassed almost 6 million followers on its Facebook pages, where readers actively commented and shared posts – without ever hiring anyone to run audience development.

Inside the Rise of Dmexco, Ad Tech’s Biggest Global Event (Digiday)
With just 14,200 attendees in its first year in 2009, the Cologne, Germany, event now draws more than 50,000 people from around the world and takes a sizable bite of ad tech’s marketing budget.

Facebook Wants to Know If You Want to Meet Up With Friends (AdWeek)
The social network is testing a feature that aims to spur friends to make plans, confirming to Jacob Dubé of Motherboard that the test group for a new feature is comprised of “a small number of users” in Toronto and New Zealand.

Mobile Ad Tech Firm Glispa Acquires JustAd (VentureBeat)
Mobile ad tech firm Glispa has acquired JustAd, a maker of playable ads, for an undisclosed price. Glispa also revealed that it has a new CEO, Itamar Benedy, who replaced founding CEO Gary Lin.

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