News and Analysis

BUST: A Hard Landing as Soft Surroundings Files for Bankruptcy

BUST: A Hard Landing as Soft Surroundings Files for Bankruptcy

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Here we go again…another beloved retailer shutters its brick-and-mortar operations. Soft Surroundings filed for bankruptcy this week. This MULO (multi-location) women’s clothing brand once had 80 locations physical locations (reduced to 44) and is now shuttering all of them. The company, which released its first catalog in 1999, also sold home goods and accessories. However, […]

Captify, Adform Partnership Creates First End-to-End Contextual Activation

Captify, Adform Partnership Creates First End-to-End Contextual Activation

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A new partnership between the search intelligence firm Captify and Adform, a programmatic platform, is creating an industry-first end-to-end contextual activation that bypasses the need for cookie identifiers.  The collaboration between the Captify and Adform enables privacy-first, audience-based programmatic buying for marketers, opening the door to greater scale across inventory pathways, which are often deprioritized […]

5 Consumer-Permissioned Data Platforms to Watch

5 Consumer-Permissioned Data Platforms to Watch

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The concept of data privacy has taken center stage in 2023. As consumers grow more aware of the value of their personal information — and the potential risks associated with its misuse — a new paradigm that places power back into the hands of individuals is beginning to emerge. Consumer-permissioned data platforms are at the […]

Commentary

Ad Tech and Privacy

Expert Roundup: The New Data Arms Race

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A new privacy era is changing the rules of data-driven business. Below, leaders in digital marketing expound on those changes and on what the future of business, especially in digital advertising, will look like.

LBMA: Disney Launches Genie Service

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In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers Disney launching their Genie service, GroundTruth partnering with No Kid Hungry, Barilla helping the blind make pasta, and United Airlines teaming up with Walmart and Albertsons on Covid testing.

Google Local Search Trends I: Personalization

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Though it’s not always easy to find the common threads in Google’s complex evolution of the local search consumer experience, some themes do stand out, such as the drive toward increasingly personalized search results, which I’ll be covering in this initial entry in the series. Fortunately for marketers, personalization, along with the other themes I’ll cover, offers numerous opportunities to outpace the competition and convert more searchers into buyers. A better understanding of these emerging trends will help marketers prioritize their efforts.

Latest Posts

The Undeniable Drive of Diana Lee and Constellation Agency

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Constellation Agency CEO and co-founder Diana Lee immigrated to the US at five and endured a rough-and-tumble childhood, watching her parents get robbed repeatedly. But to the extent that anyone can, Lee has beaten insecurity, economic and affective. She is at the helm of an advertising technology company that, while remaining self-funded, has outgrown its offices numerous times, catapulted to more than 100 employees, and is on track to report $45 million in revenue this year.

The Next Era of Data Intelligence: Privacy by Design

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While people seem to be increasingly aware of the problem posed by surveillance-based advertising, the demand for customized experiences has not decreased. But how are brands supposed to get to know their consumers and create customized experiences without access to data?

Expert Roundup: Data-Driven Advertising’s New Playbook

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Experts from StitcherAds, AdColony, VRTCAL, ENGINE, and Placements.io weigh in on the future of data-driven advertising as privacy changes accrue. In particular, the crew discusses the resurgence of contextual ads and the intersection between privacy and antitrust issues.

SOCi Acquires Brandify, Melding Location Marketing Strengths

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Brandify has been acquired by SOCi, a fast-growing market leader in location and social media management for enterprise brands. Brandify and SOCi will combine their technologies and expertise under the SOCi name to serve more than 700 major national and international brands, accounting for over 3 million total store and office locations worldwide. The acquisition includes Street Fight, which will continue to operate as an editorially independent media outlet.

LBMA: Sam’s Club Tests Scan and Ship Feature in Stores

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In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers Brookfield Properties partnering with ARIA Network for AR air rights activations, Adtech Realworld lauching QDOOH to make buying billboards easy for local brands, Sams’s Club testing a “scan & ship” feature for in-store shopping, and Coty getting Covid-friendly with perfume sampling.

Autonomous Retail

Beyond the Checkout: Using Data to Create Autonomous Retail Experiences

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The autonomous retail sector is booming, and brick-and-mortars are getting curious about how to free up their employees’ time and foster new experiences to lure customers in store.

online privacy

Media Measurement in the Data Privacy Era

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Marketers need to understand how to gather and leverage consumer data on the fly and according to protocol. Gartner forecasts increasing regulations will lead to more than one million organizations appointing a privacy officer by the end of 2022, a signal that now is the time to get serious about media measurement in the privacy era. Let’s explore some strategies that will define the next generation of media measurement.

Survey: Retail Loyalty Strengthened Among Millennials Post-Pandemic

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Brand loyalty is changing, and it might not necessarily be for the worst. Despite dire predictions earlier in the pandemic that consumers would be more likely to opt for alternative brands, a new survey by the location intelligence firm Ubimo paints a very different picture.

The Grand Reopening: DOOH Strategies to Capitalize on Lifted Restrictions

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DOOH screens can be found in most of the locations that consumers were restricted from over the past year — such as bars, restaurants, malls and movie theaters — as well as essential places that consumers continued to visit, including convenience stores, gas stations, subways, grocery stores, and more. Now that people are returning in droves to these environments, marketers are using a variety of DOOH strategies to reach consumers. Let’s review those tactics.

Field Day Leverages an Uber-Style, Human-to-Human Marketplace for Local Marketing

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An Uber for local marketing, Field Day connects brands, including current clients Panera Bread, Blaze Pizza, Equinox, and about 50 others, with “brand ambassadors”: locals who speak to the brands’ targets in their home neighborhoods in order to increase awareness and drive adoption.