News and Analysis
New DoubleVerify Report Should Alarm Advertisers
Online advertising now represents nearly $800 billion in spending in 2025, up from a $374 billion market size in 2020. What else is up this year? A new report from DoubleVerify confirms the increases in fraud, AI bots, and ad blocking. Among the highlights for the North America market, based on a survey of 400 advertising […]
5 MULO (Multi-Location) Trends We Can’t Ignore
We’re more than halfway through the year, and the consumer (and its artificial intelligence equivalents) have spoken! The MULO (multi-location) ecosystem is poised for a significant transformation. MULO comprises restaurants, retail, home and personal services businesses, hospitality, convenience stores, groceries, branded housing complexes, and other companies that have multiple brick-and-mortar locations. Here are some of […]
Are Discount Stores and Outlet Malls Still Relevant?
Long before Amazon, consumers would make excursions to factory outlet malls and wander the aisles of stores like Loehmann’s, seeking the ultimate bargain. Bargain shopping remains a great American pastime, and thrifting and upscale second-hand stores have joined the mix, alongside big-box, high-volume membership stores like Costco. Among the MULO (multi-location) discount store brands today […]
Commentary
Streets Ahead: Optimizing for Instagram, Local Level Marketing
In this week’s Streets Ahead update, SOCi discusses the Instagram 4:5 layout and algorithm secrets and Bright Local’s views on the future of local marketing. Instagram – Optimizing Your Strategy and Feed The News Instagram recently announced several updates aimed at enhancing user experience and content visibility. a) Profile Grid Enhancements: Adam Mosseri, the head […]
Data Drama: Why Your Insights Are All Talk and No Action
Data has become the backbone of modern marketing, promising brands the ability to predict trends, personalize experiences, and drive customer loyalty like never before. For multi-location businesses, the stakes are especially high. With endless streams of customer data pouring in from numerous locations, the expectation to turn this information into actionable insights seems like the […]
Will the Privacy Push Kill the Addressability of Streaming TV Advertising?
As ad-supported streaming platforms gain momentum, they promise to revolutionize advertising by offering unprecedented addressability—tailoring ads to individual viewers based on their interests. However, this promise is at risk of being derailed by privacy regulations and the limitations of contextual targeting, which may force the industry to revert to strategies reminiscent of traditional TV. For […]
Latest Posts
Report: Consumers Have Mixed Feelings on Spending
When it comes to spring spending in 2025, consumers plan to keep the home fires burning, as the British sang during World War I. In 21st century America, however, nothing spells patriotism like consumerism. Although consumer confidence has been taking a dive this year, falling to a 12-year low in March. With inflation persistent and […]
Skai Says “Yes!” Celeste Has the Answers for Commerce Media
U.S. ad spending on commerce media will surpass $100B by 2028. What is commerce media? Marketers use data from consumer purchases and browsing habits to improve targeting, personalization, and overall campaign effectiveness. After all, if someone is looking for baby clothes, they may also shop for diapers, cribs, and bottles. Leveraging behaviors to boost same-category […]
Setting the Record Straight on Curation
Curation is dominating conversations in the advertising world right now, and while it is not an entirely new concept, it still comes with misperceptions and confusion. Our industry’s desire to succinctly define curation, assign responsibility for it, and spell out guidelines and best practices is understandable—yet also challenging. But curation is more than a buzzword […]
This Brand Won’t Get Stale!
What brand? Cracker Barrel, of course! Any MULO (multi-location) brand can all get a bit soggy or rancid with time. However, savvy brands must get ahead of the aging process and bring in fresh talent to keep their traffic and revenue appealing. Cracker Barrel, which was founded in 1969, is leaning into that trend and […]
Streets Ahead: Google Business Profile Reverifications and Meta Chatbots
In this week’s Streets Ahead update, SOCi discuss the issues regarding Google reverifications and explores Meta’s roll out of AI Chatbot features. Google Business Profile Reverifications The News In early March, the SEO community noticed a significant increase in locations requiring reverification on Google Business Profile, prompting many to temporarily halt updates. Last week, Google […]
IHOP & Applebee’s Serve Up Huge News
From hot cakes to happy hour, a new co-branded restaurant in Texas now gives diners a wide range of food options. Applebee’s and IHOP (owned by the same operator) announced this new concept last month. Those who love breakfast for dinner and power-eaters who want to start the day with a Bloody Mary and a […]
8 MULO Ad Trends 2025
The 2025 advertising season kicks off annually with the Super Bowl. Brands spend millions and attempt to out-do each other with cinematic artistry and celebrity appearances. Savvy brands take those trends and enhance them throughout their digital footprints, ensuring that visitors to TikTok, Instagram, and brick-and-mortar stores will notice and, ultimately, pull out their wallets (physical or […]
The Rise of AI Ad Buying Agents: A Marketer’s Perspective
AI-driven ad buying is not new. From Google Ads’ “set-it-and-forget-it” approach to Meta’s dynamic audience targeting, the goal has always been to automate away the tedium of bidding and targeting. But with the more recent advancements in generative AI and deep learning, the promise is morphing into something more expansive: real-time, hyper-personalized ads that match […]
Seedtag’s Contextual AI Seeks to Understand Multi-screen Content
Is multi-screen contextual targeting at a granular level even possible? With Contextual AI, Seedtag aims to make it a reality sooner rather than later. The global contextual advertising company specializes in serving ads across the open web and CTV, which is rapidly expanding its reach but struggles with precision audience targeting. Targeting to broad genre […]
Vistar Media and Western Union Partner Up for DOOH Ecosystem
Vistar Media, the leading global provider of technology solutions for out-of-home (OOH) media, just announced an agreement with Western Union to manage and monetize its growing network of more than 2,200 digital out-of-home (DOOH) screens across the United States, Canada, and Brazil. The global out-of-home (OOH) advertising market is projected to reach $42B billion in […]
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