News and Analysis

BOOM: “Bruschetta and Bocce Near Me?” Eatertainment is Surging

Can you possibly eat cornbread without a rousing game of cornhole? Or what’s a game of mini-golf without a Moscow Mule?  Combine a dining experience with one or many games — physical or digital — and that defines “eatertainment,” a category that’s been growing steadily over the past decade (but paused during the pandemic).  But […]

Flashtalking Social Ads Manager Includes Social Media Activation

Flashtalking Social Ads Manager Includes Social Media Activation

Omnichannel advertising platform Mediaocean has deepened its relationship with Google, striking a unique deal as it relates to the former’s Flashtalking Social Ads Manager (in the past known as Scope by 4C). For the first time, brand marketers who access the Flashtalking Social Ads Manager, an independent tech platform, will be able to activate against […]

BOOM: Multi-Location (MULO) “Needles” Businesses: Part 2

BOOM: Multi-Location (MULO) “Needles” Businesses: Part 2

We’ve already established that people will overcome a childhood fear of needles (or at least cope with it) if they see an upside benefit — like vitamin therapy. The other reason people will allow themselves to be poked with a sharp metal object (in addition to vaccinations and blood tests) is beautification. Multi-location (MULO) aesthetics businesses […]

Commentary

Growing Your Local Business While Keeping Consumer Privacy Top of Mind

Feeling overwhelmed by the apparent complexity of data privacy laws is understandable. But these issues are experienced by marketers throughout the country, and there are many resources available to help your business become compliant.

How Retailers Can Prepare Omnichannel Operations for Looming E-commerce Fatigue

The aim of clienteling is to increase customer loyalty and drive sales, while also increasing associate motivation by rewarding staffers for the resulting revenue uplifts.

The Pandemic Prompted a Programmatic DOOH Revolution. Here’s What Comes Next

Rather than stunting DOOH’s long-term growth, the pandemic instead led to DOOH becoming a more nimble and integrated part of advertisers’ overall media mixes.

Latest Posts

Meliá Hotels Uses Local Influencers to Drive Covid-19 Awareness

Brochures and signage are easy to overlook, but social media influencers are harder to miss. As they work to bring back guests during the Covid-19 pandemic, a number of hotel chains are relying on partnerships with social media influencers to educate guests on the new safety protocols they’ve put in place.

Street Fight’s September Theme: Mapping the Future

What does “Mapping the Future” entail? As a primary tool for consumer local search and discovery, mapping continues to undergo UX innovations and structural changes. We’ll examine these areas as well as mapping’s interplay with local search and SEO strategies.

Though mapping is more of a Street Fight staple than a trending topic, market signals indicate that the timing is right. In fact, we already got started last month with a look at Snapchat’s moves into local mapping — not just UX upgrades to Snap Map but also self-serve advertising for local businesses.

Blocking Third-Party Cookies Will Not Mean the End of Marketing Attribution

The demise of third-party cookies will not mean the end of digital advertising and the ability to assign proper attribution to individuals engaging in various touchpoints along the buyer journey. Several entities are currently hashing out other methodologies brands can leverage to retrieve audience analytics.

Marketing attribution providers will continue to provide reliable data to enterprise marketers on consumers and their customer journeys through the sales funnel. Attribution providers worth their salt will not only make sure they are compliant with the tightened rules around cookies but also ensure their clients are following the letter of the law.

Ditch the Department Store: How DTC Brands Take Back Control

We are anticipating monumental online sales volume for brands with the approaching holiday season. To capitalize on this transition to online shopping, DTC (direct-to-consumer) brands must take back control of their sales channels. DTC brands can’t control whether big-box retailers open their storefronts or the number of consumers they allow inside. They also can’t manage the customer experience with the brand, especially given the many variables Covid-19 has thrown at brick-and-mortar retail.

The one thing brands can control is their online sales channel.

Ad Tech and Privacy

California Attorney General Targets “Low-Hanging Fruit” for CCPA Non-Compliance

The California Consumer Privacy Act enforcement period began July 1, and two months later, numerous firms have received letters from the attorney general’s office about noncompliance. Multiple major companies, including Walmart, Sephora, and Ring, have been hit with class-action lawsuits.

But there’s no great mystery or nefarious agenda tied to the companies that have been targeted as this point, says Dan Clarke, president at IntraEdge. To avoid meeting the same fate, companies need to adhere to the fundamentals of the nation’s first major statewide privacy law. Clarke spoke with Street Fight to explain.

More Brands Are Scaling Digital Channels for Customer Engagement — Here’s Why

Communicating with brands on social media has become the norm for consumers. Surveys show that roughly half of all consumers who engage with brands on social media are reaching out about customer care concerns, and more than 65% of social media users across all platforms expect brands to respond, regardless of whether the initial outreach was via private messages or public posts.

Those expectations have only heightened over the past six months, and many brands have had to pivot their customer support and engagement priorities on the fly.

Location Weekly: Burger King and Wawa Innovate for Covid Era

In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers Wawa launching drive-through-only convenience stores, Waze launching contactless gas payments at Shell and Exxon Mobil, Burger King printing customer orders on face masks, and Heineken launching its “Star of the Summer” campaign at Tesco UK.

Who’s Afraid of CCPA? Steps Toward Ethical Data Collection

The marketing and advertising communities are inherently about data collection. They survey and track people’s online behaviors to uncover a deeper understanding of trending sentiments. Through this, the ultimate goal is to help marketers better target the right audiences with messaging that will resonate with them on the platforms they typically frequent. 

While data privacy should be a given considering how central it is to the industries at hand, it’s often still seen as a challenge to overcome. So, where is the problem?

How Covid-19 Is Speeding Up OOH Advertising’s Digital Transformation

Some OOH media providers have already moved beyond the traditional real estate-based approach in which advertisers focus on a specific region or even choose specific billboard locations. Instead, they are using data and technology to target specific audiences and measure the impact of their campaigns. For the laggards, the pandemic is proving a catalyst for overdue change. Let’s consider why OOH’s audience-based future is closer than ever as well as what is next for the industry’s evolution. 

Earnings Season Teases Retail’s Next Normal

Earnings results that rolled out from retail giants over the past week further demonstrate what our next normal will look like. Specifically, Walmart and Target both hit record numbers. This is partly a function of Covid-era circumstances, but it is also due to each retailer’s active e-commerce momentum.

The earnings validate consumer acclimation to digitally infused local shopping. What’s more, other retailers and down-market businesses will look to replicate this success. This can all therefore be viewed as a leading indicator for retail’s next normal.