News and Analysis

Smaller Brands Are Struggling with Social Commerce. Here’s Why

Share this:

Social commerce is expected to grow 3x as fast as traditional e-commerce, according to a report by Accenture, to reach $1.2 trillion by 2025, but that doesn’t mean savvy marketers from smaller brands can’t find their own points of entry. By thinking outside the box and looking beyond Instagram and TikTok for attention, some midsize brands are finding opportunities to shine.

Retailers Scramble to Implement AI-Based Pricing Strategies

Share this:

Supply shortages are easing, but inflation is showing no sign of slowing down. Retailers are using AI to refine their pricing strategies.

In Crowded Space, Brands Rethink Approach to CTV

Share this:

Research from eMarketer shows that advertisers spent $10.3 billion on connected TV programmatic display ads in 2021, an 82% increase from the year prior. But what they got in return is anyone’s guess. For all the advancements in digital marketing, CTV advertising still remains an opaque space where advertisers know little about the shows or other ads their spots are running against. This can lead to wasted budgets, ad frequency issues, and even fraud.

Commentary

3 Ways DTC Brands Impact Legacy CPG Playbooks

Share this:

Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands have forced legacy CPG brands into a major strategy shift. The rumblings of the digital transformation signaled change was coming, and the rise of DTC brands has led CPGs to rethink consumer engagement and the marketing tactics necessary to achieve that goal. And, in today’s digital-first marketplace, CPG margins are tightening because of the competition from DTCs as well as Amazon’s white-label product lines.

The result of these challenges sees the CPG playbook evolving to meet the digital-first ecosystem through tactics including investing in acquisitions, moving advertising budgets into digital, and including emerging marketing channels such as experiential marketing to create brand awareness and make direct consumer connections.

Physical Stores May Resemble Our Newsfeeds in the Near Future

Share this:

We’re currently living in a time of unprecedented change in the marketing and advertising industries. One of the most interesting emerging trends is the incorporation of new advertising opportunities within physical stores, in ways that will remind you of your social media newsfeeds.

If you’re a member of Generation X, or even an older Millennial, you probably remember walking through the aisles in grocery stores and grabbing coupons out of plastic dispensers. What we will see occurring in the future is the 21st Century’s version of the coupon machine — the personalized newsfeed-ification of physical stores.

Employees Are Connecting On Facebook: Here’s Why They Shouldn’t

Share this:

When they aren’t connecting in the office, 87% of employees are connecting on Facebook. With more than 1.5 billion daily active users, it’s no surprise that employees flock to the platform to connect with colleagues. Facebook is easy and familiar, and many employees have used it for years. When employees want to connect personally with someone they know professionally, Facebook is the natural first step. 

But Facebook isn’t the best place for making personal connections with coworkers, mainly because of the amount of personal content employees post. They express their political opinions and might post jokes and language that could easily offend in a professional setting. When you introduce professional contacts to a personal platform, the lines of what’s appropriate are blurred. People might begin to censor themselves, which isn’t always healthy. Or employees might feel uncomfortable with a coworker based on something they’ve seen online.

Latest Posts

Street Fight Daily: Mary Meeker’s Trends for 2018, The State of MarTech Acquisitions

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Mary Meeker’s 2018 Deck: Highlights and Analysis… What’s Next in Marketing Tech Investing?… Ad Tech Vendors Wrestle with IAB Europe’s Transparency and Consent Framework…

Customer Feedback: Authenticity as the Final Frontier

Share this:

Coherent feedback cuts the distance between a company and its audience. But all that is compromised when paid reviews and rigged ratings enter the scene. Authenticity therefore remains the final frontier for marketing and client-oriented strategies.

Mobile App Header Bidding Expands Monetization Opportunities for Publishers

Share this:

Increases in impression volume and ad spending on mobile devices are changing the monetization opportunities available to mobile app developers, according to a new report released by the publisher-focused sell-side platform PubMatic.

Street Fight Daily: Programmatic Comes to Audio, Publishers See Increase in Direct Traffic

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… DoubleClick Bid Manager Opens Up Digital Audio Ad Buying Globally… In the Post-Facebook Era, Publishers See Rise in Direct Traffic… Mobile App Header Bidding Expands Monetization Opportunities for Publishers…

SMB OS Operators, Part IV: Peter Krasilovsky

Share this:

“We like to cite $500 billion as the broad SMB OS opportunity—roughly 3.5 times the size of local advertising,” veteran industry commentator Peter Krasilovsky says. “But I think the end number has got to be many times larger.”

Research Highlights Shifting Social Media Dynamics for Brands

Share this:

Rachael Samuels, social media manager at Sprout Social, hopes that brand marketers who look at the research come away with a greater understanding that social cannot be approached with a one-size-fits-all mentality, and what works for one industry, or even one brand, may not work for another.

Street Fight Daily: Programmatic Plummets in Europe, The SMB OS Opportunity

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… GDPR Mayhem: Programmatic Ad Buying Plummets in Europe… How Do Consumers Choose in a World of Automated Ordering?… Google Bests Amazon in Smart Speaker Shipments…

How Not to Respond to Reviews: 10 Common Pitfalls

Share this:

Contrary to the popular saying, all publicity isn’t good publicity. It’s quite possible to go about review response in a way that does more harm than good. Listed below are 10 common practices that won’t do your business any favors and are arguably worse than no response at all.

Street Culture: Techstars Co-CEO on Coaching Startups to Define Culture

Share this:

“I think that culture is one of the few problems that you have to address before they’re problems,” says TechStars co-founder and co-CEO David Brown. “If you’re struggling to figure out how to grow sales, you can wait until sales are in trouble and still turn it around. But if you wait until you’re in trouble with culture, it’s really hard to turn that boat.”

LBMA Podcast: Gimbal & Drawbridge, Brightcodes, Wirecard & Garmin

Share this:

On this week’s Location-Based Marketing association podcast: Phunware + Kontakt.io, Dstillery teams up with Captivate, Gimbal buys Drawbridge, Brightcodes, Wirecard + Garmin, Ericsson Emodo, Sao Paulo’s Yellow Line, Circle K goes Coke, Locomizer patent.