News and Analysis

On GDPR’s 5th Anniversary, Fragmentation Remains Biggest Privacy Challenge

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The more things change, the more they stay the same.  Although the privacy landscape is quite different in 2023 than it was five years ago, when the European Union’s GDPR went into effect in May of 2018, the adtech industry in the U.S. remains in a state of flux, struggling to deal with fragmentation caused […]

5 Franchise Tips to Ease Friction

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Franchise businesses account for a whopping 10.5% of all companies with paid employees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, they account for $1.3 trillion in sales across various industries. Franchising enables brands to grow and quickly open multiple locations. People who buy into franchises have the ability to fulfill their entrepreneurial dreams without shouldering the […]

Acoustic Gets to the ‘Why’ of the Customer Journey

Acoustic Gets to the ‘Why’ of the Customer Journey

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Acoustic is a global SaaS subscription company that provides customer-engagement tools for B2C brands. It has worked with brands including Pura, PayPal, Scientific American, and Ticketmaster. In 2022, Acoustic helped clients manage over 120 billion personalized interactions by focusing on the customer journey. John Riewerts, SVP of Engineering at Acoustic, explains the company’s newest offering […]

Commentary

Reveal Mobile Logs a Patent on “Custom Tagging”

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In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers Safegraph raising $45M, the bLinkup app providing Covid safety ratings on bars and restaurants, Reveal Mobile receiving a patent on “custom tagging,” and Apple dropping a hint at wearable tech with a new patent of its own.

Google’s Ad Changes: The King Just Built a Moat Around His Castle

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The initial frenzy over Google’s news regarding its latest privacy updates has abated, and now it’s time to really think about what it means – for Google, for brands, and for the industry as a whole.

As governments have lit a fire under brands and consumers have become more data-conscious, the future of marketing and advertising is unfolding before us. Let’s take a dive into what it all really signifies.

Brand Marketing 2.0: Brand is Back, But Expectations Have Changed

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The allure of immediately seeing metrics like clicks, downloads, or form completions outweighed instincts to make investments that pay dividends over the longer term. No longer.

Latest Posts

How Brands Can Rise, Retain, and Return Stronger Than Ever this Holiday Season

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Prior to Covid-19, traditional demographics still directed many brands’ targeting strategies. However, the pandemic has laid bare just how flawed this method can be. We believe that the best measure of what someone will purchase in the future is looking at what they’ve purchased in the past. This holds true even in an uncertain market and is invaluable for retailers as the holidays approach. 

Crucial Attribution and Targeting Tools

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The lines in the traditional funnel have blurred. Consumers may enter and pursue a non-linear route before making a purchase or moving on. The path from awareness to decision is no longer predictable in an omni-channel environment. A progression that works for one type of consumer may have no relevance for another. These changes necessite another look at attribution models.

Identifying Content Opportunities from SEO Keyword Trends During Covid-19

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Keywords that were optimized to improve inbound sales aren’t doing their job because people are no longer inputting those search terms. Does that mean that your product or service isn’t needed? No, absolutely not. Your brand’s content is needed. But the keyword trends that you had been relying on have changed.

To be able to once again reach your audience, you need to study search trends as they stand now and determine how you can create content around those terms.

7 Shoppable Video Platforms

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How do you engage customers when in-store shopping is in many places all but obsolete? One solution that brand retailers around the country have been digging into this year is shoppable video. Using recorded and live video streams, brands have been able to capitalize on the shift toward mobile video and give customers direct links to buy their products online.

Here are seven examples of shoppable video platforms brands are using right now.

Location Weekly: Party City and Nextdoor Launch Halloween Campaign

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In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers Ferrara’s Trolli brand creating an AR game for Halloween, Party City and NextDoor launching a Halloween campaign, Burberry teaming with IBM for product traceability, and Walmart redesigning its stores with a touch of airport way-finding tech.

Why Creative is Paramount for This Year’s Holiday Ads

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When marketers are all using the same platforms and automation tools to bid and compete against each other this holiday season (like with Facebook Automated App Ads and Google App Campaigns), the key differentiator will be ad creative. Preparing an arsenal of high-performing creative will be critical to advertisers in order to keep costs down and be effective this year.

What Happens to Drive-to-Store Campaigns After Apple’s IDFA Update?

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Given that Apple’s Limit Ad Tracking feature already renders roughly one-third of iOS users totally anonymous, drive-to-store conversion measurement has been limited at the device-level for some time. The iOS 14 update from Apple simply adds another challenge on top of what was already a difficult endeavor. For marketers who haven’t done so yet, they should take this opportunity to pivot to measurement strategies that are less reliant on the ever-shifting policies of tech giants like Apple.

Location Data Says Krispy Kreme’s Times Square Plan May Be Half-Baked

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As someone who studies human mobility in New York routinely, I am compelled to question the pandemic-era business logic behind this aggressive expansion. The world will go back to normal or something like it one day, but, by using our human mobility data sets and assuming a continuation of current trends, we can see there is little evidence that these new Krispy Kreme locations will draw enough foot traffic in the coming months and quarters to survive, let alone thrive. 

Heard on the Street, Episode 57: Streamlining the Digital Ad Stack

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What can one learn through a combination of the Peace Corps, CPA training, and the ad tech world? On Street Fight’s Heard on the Street Podcast, we often talk about the virtues of “cross-training” in a given career path. Perhaps no one embodies that principle more than VRTCAL founder Todd Wooten.

Covid-19 is Boosting Mobile Use, and These Apps Are Taking the Lion’s Share

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With many social options put on hold, people find solace in retail therapy. Between April 2019 to 2020, the cost to acquire a user who completes a first purchase in a shopping app has decreased by more than half (50.6%), compared to the same period in 2018. Similarly, the cost to acquire a registration ($8.76) has dropped nearly 40%.

Plus, with a 40% increase in purchase engagement year-on-year — and 110% increase over two years — it’s clear conditions are positive for marketers to reach and engage a highly motivated, high-value audience.