News and Analysis

Google’s Latest Privacy Play Has Big Implications for the Open Web

Google’s Latest Privacy Play Has Big Implications for the Open Web

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Google’s recent announcement that it would stop selling ads based on users’ specific web browsing histories was met with enthusiasm among consumer privacy experts. Within the local marketing and advertising community, the reaction was different.

Brand Identity, Privacy, and First-Party Data

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Lucid is a research technology, or ResTech, firm that hooks up companies with millions of customers to gauge customer sentiment at scale. I connected with Pauline Wen, chief privacy officer at Lucid, to understand the challenges brands are facing and how they can navigate a rising bar for privacy.

What Emerging Tech is Driving Localized Brand Marketing?

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Running an emerging tech-driven digital agency, Maher is on the front lines of marketing innovation for brand clients like Panera and Bolle. For both of those campaigns, there was a local component, including Panera’s in-store AR integrations and Bolle’s local activations at Dick’s Sporting Goods.

To anticipate the upcoming Street Fight Summit and Maher’s speaking role, we sat down with him for his view on the drivers and dynamics of digital marketing. Here’s our dialogue with Maher on the biggest brand marketing trends and value drivers he’s tracking.

Commentary

Inform Your Multichannel Customer Experience Strategy

Will 2019 Be Remembered as the Year of GMB Messaging?

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Mihm to Blumenthal: Absent a messaging competitor, even a handful of conversations with real customers make businesses *think* Facebook is where the party is. In reality, as you and plenty of others have found, 90% of actual leads are coming from Google. And a serious chunk of that 90% comes directly from Google My Business. Per my prediction, Google is *just* starting to push the “Message” CTA to consumers. And I think the floodgates are about to open.

LBMA Podcast: Alexa’s Location Alerts, Starbucks and Uber

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On this week’s edition of the Location-Based Marketing Association podcast: CS Hudson, Baidu Maps, XYO Protocol’s blockchain lab, Ariana Grande + YouTube, Alexa’s location alerts, Starbucks + Uber.

Will Audio AR Drive Local Commerce?

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Mike Boland: AR may not play out in the way you think, at least in the near term. Though it’s generally thought of as graphical overlays on your field of view, another “overlay” could be more viable in the near term: sound. This “audio AR” modality could come sooner than—and eventually coexist with—its graphical cousin.  

Latest Posts

Why Location Measurement and Attribution Are Key to Brand Visibility

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Attribution “is the metric that all brands and media verticals are moving to as it solves a number of gaps in the market.” says Freckle IoT’s Neil Sweeney. He believes measuring how branding strategy is working is becoming just as important as brand visibility.

Street Fight Daily: Facebook and Amazon Fuel Local Food Transactions, Netsertive Buys Mixpo

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Americans Love Ordering Pizza on Facebook and Amazon… Netsertive Acquires Seattle Ad Tech Firm Mixpo… Hard Look at Online Pays Off in Higher Quarterly Profits for Kohl’s…

Enterprise Local Marketers Treat AI Hype as Means to an End

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Our research suggests that big brands and retailers don’t have AI high on their list of local marketing priorities. But it appears that if brands are very email- and direct mail-focused, and that’s where they’re thinking of applying AI.

How 5 Brands Use Geo-Targeting to Fuel In-Store Sales

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By serving mobile ads based on users’ geographic locations, brands can avoid these types of blunders and hone in on the type of hyper-specific messaging that boosts engagement and click-through rates.

Street Fight Daily: Target Acquires Grand Junction, Lyft Has Capitalized On Uber’s Woes

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Target Acquires Transportation Company Grand Junction to Expand Same-Day Delivery… Lyft Focuses on Self-Driving Cars But Confirms It’s Gotten a Boost from Uber’s Troubles… Ad Institute Challenges Google and Facebook to Improve Measurement Standards…

Can Yelp Extend Its Moment in the Sun?

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“[Yelp has] not been very innovative in approaching the many needs of the SMB markets,” Mike Blumenthal writes to David Mihm. “It would seem that there could be (or should have been?) a raft of functionality that they could provide from appointments to customer follow-up that would be a natural fit.”

LinkedIn Focuses on Revving Up Its SMB Efforts

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“There is a huge market of smaller companies, and it is a fast-growing segment. There is definitely momentum,” says LinkedIn’s independent agency head Ryan Wilson. “But they are often made to feel like second-class citizens. Enterprise companies have been getting all the love.”

Street Fight Daily: Facebook Explores Offline-to-Online, Foursquare Partners with InfoScout

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Can Brands Create Facebook Custom Audiences Based On Brick-and-Mortar Visits?… Foursquare Partners with InfoScout to Offer Fuller Picture of Customer Journey… Postmates Relies on Streaming Data to Deliver Positive Experiences on Demand…

Openings and New Hires at Signpost, Vendasta, Spirited Media

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Every two weeks, Geoff Michener covers some of the latest openings and new hires in this dynamic industry. This week’s edition includes moves and new openings at Rio SEO, CBS and RingPartner.

Raise Report: New Funding for Pro.com, Amplitude, CommonSense Robotics

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Every two weeks, we round up some of the biggest fundraises taking place in hyperlocal marketing, commerce, and tech. This week’s edition includes funding for Jebbit, Parse.ly, CarDash, and Booster.