News and Analysis

Innovation Brief: Microsoft, Twitch, and Autonomous Pizza

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M7 Innovations’ Matt Maher discusses Microsoft’s Nuance acquisition, virtual influencers reinventing the livestream, and autonomous pizza delivery.

Verizon and Catalina Partner to Power Online-to-offline Attribution

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Seeing a void in the marketplace, ad tech vendors are stepping in with tech solutions designed to help brands link in-store and online transactions to digital ads in real-time. Just this month, Verizon Media partnered with Catalina, a provider of consumer-driven marketing solutions, to help CPG brands more effectively connect digital campaigns with sales. The partnership matches Catalina’s sales data to Verizon Media’s identity graph, which means Verizon Media is now the first DSP to be integrated with a top CPG sales data provider.

Social Media Isn’t Just an Ad Channel

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With third-party data sources such as the cookie under threat, Apple downgrading the mobile identifier for advertisers, and data collection in general growing tougher, businesses increasingly need to find reliable, consensual data wherever they can get it. Social media is one of the solutions to that problem.

Commentary

AR in Local Commerce: Google Shows the Way

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Mike Boland: A recent and relatively understated development from Google could portend the future of augmented reality. Its previously teased “VPS” was released into the wild for a small set of users. For those unfamiliar, VPS (visual positioning service) guides users with 3D overlays on upheld smartphone screens. Sort of a cousin of AR, this type of experience could represent the sector’s eventual killer apps. Though we’ve seen the most AR success so far in gaming (Pokemon Go) and social (Snapchat AR lenses), it could be more mundane utilities like navigation that engender high-frequency use cases.

The Future of AI Is Here: Reflections on IBM Think

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Damian Rollison: Among hundreds of sessions, exhibits, and demos, one theme came through clearly at IBM Think this month in San Francisco: for large enterprises especially, the AI-driven future for which we’ve been told to prepare is already here. In fact, enterprise companies are using IBM’s Watson technologies today to address a myriad of challenges inherent in the scale of those businesses.

Identity Crisis: Optimizing a Brand While Pursuing Omnichannel

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Andrew Witkin: When viewed as a way to raise brand awareness and impressions, a clicks-to-bricks move can still net an overall gain—if the traffic from the retail space driven to the website costs less than what it would to purchase those impressions through online advertising. The end goal of an omnichannel strategy is not only to engage customers with an experience that isn’t available online but also to use this unique experience and brand awareness to boost online sales.

Latest Posts

Street Fight Daily: Pinterest Empowers Brands, Uber Sues an Agency

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Brands Can Now Tap Pinterest’s Pin Collective Via a Self-Serve Customer Platform (AdWeek) Pinterest formed Pin Collective last October as a way to give brands access to the social network’s best content creators—publishers, production shops and individuals—to work directly with them on their campaigns. How […]

‘Mobile Marketplace’ from Button and Ibotta Adds 30 New Brands

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Ibotta and Button today launched a performance-based marketing platform that improves customer acquisition and mobile traffic. The new marketing platform extends the benefits that come with Ibotta rewards to fast-track the mobile commerce efforts of traditional retailers.

How AI Bots, Voice Assistants Are Changing Shopper Behaviors

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Rapid changes in the way people communicate aren’t just impacting personal relationships, they’re also hitting the retail market as consumer preferences evolve. In a new report released just this morning, the post-purchase solutions provider Narvar uncovers generational differences in how consumers prefer interacting with retailers.

Street Fight Daily: Google Appeases Antitrust Regulators on Shopping, Brands Turn to Influencers

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Offers to Treat Shopping Rivals Equally Via Auction… Why More Brands Are Adding Young Influencers to Their Creative and Marketing Teams… The Luxe Lab at Neiman Marcus Signals a Shift in Focus for Department Stores…

iPhoneX, AR & Local: How Do All the Pieces Fit?

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There are lots of ways that augmented reality (AR) is a natural fit for local commerce. But questions remain: How will AR will materialize in local? How long it will take? And how do these factors signal local startups and media companies where to place their chips?

How Social Media Disasters Can Tarnish Brands

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Gaffes by businesses, celebrities, and politicians on Twitter and Facebook have been with us since the advent of social media, but recent events have highlighted two very serious consequences for brands that may not have been clear previously.

Street Fight Daily: Inside Uber/Lyft Funding War, Small Brands Hit Roadblock on Instagram

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Funding Talks at Uber and Lyft Complicate Ride-Hailing Allegiance… Small Brands Are Finding It Harder to Get Verified on Instagram… Never Mind GDPR, Here Comes Apple’s Intelligent Tracking…

Street Culture: Blind References Help Weed Out Drama at Zaius

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“In the hiring process, we often use the terms ‘smart, hungry, and humble,’” says Zaius CEO Mark Gally. “This notion of being humble is really a critical component of culture. We don’t take ourselves seriously, but we take our work extremely seriously.”

Local Marketing Tricks and Treats for Halloween 2017

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Last year some 171 million Americans spent an astounding $8.3 billion for Halloween, shattering past records. And it’s entirely likely that spending will smash last year’s total. If you’re a CPG marketer, you’ll want to get in on the action.

LBMA Podcast: Facebook, KFC China, Verizon

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This Week in Location Based Marketing is a weekly video podcast from the Location Based Marketing Association with Asif Khan and Aubriana Lopez. On the show: Wasteless, Hong Kong tourism, Nestle Purina PetCare, Gravy Analytics + V12. Special Guest: Casey Binkley from Hauler Ads.