News and Analysis

Digital Marketers Deploy AI to Break through the Noise

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Chief among the newest strategies brands are adopting is the use of artificial intelligence in digital marketing. Brands are increasingly willing to try AI to gain a better understanding of customer behavior, so they can spend more time on creativity and delivering more relevant content, says Mary Schneeberger, director of the integrated marketing practice at Avionos.

What Gannett’s Partnership with Snap Means for Local Marketers

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Despite its obvious benefits from a marketing perspective — with the ability to connect to more Gen Z consumers than Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger combined — Snapchat’s youth-focused advertising tools haven’t always been easy for small and mid-size businesses to take advantage of. A new deal with Gannett could change that.

Not Every Agency and Ad Tech Firm is Decrying Google’s Privacy Moves

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The big question is what Google’s shift portends for users and advertisers. Is it actually a boon to user privacy? Will it undermine digital advertising? Or will models like Google’s Federated Learning of Cohorts, which will allow targeting of groups of users with similar interests instead of targeting of individuals per se, fill the gaps?

Commentary

Cybersecurity Firm DEVCON Says It Can Knock Out ‘Bad Ads’ Costing Publishers Billions

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In this Q&A, cyber-security company DEVCON co-founder and CEO Maggie Louie details how she says her company halts “bad ads” before they victimize publishers and their readers.

Retail as a Service: Amazon will Create (and Destroy) with Cashierless Checkout Solution

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Mike Boland: The innovation including and surrounding cashierless checkout goes beyond payments to affect a broader set of functions like supply chain, inventory management, and store layouts. It’s like a retail toolkit in a box, with cash-flow friendly pricing, à la SaaS. You may have heard of it: It’s called retail as a service (RaaS), and it could transform the next decade of retail. Amazon will lead the way.

Beyond Proximity Offers: The Second Act of Beacons is Underway

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Beacons have grown into a nuanced component of successful mobile marketing. We’ve learned what they do best—strengthen advertiser approaches to metrics and measurement as well as the relevance and contextual richness of on-the-ground, in- or near-store experiences—and we’ve figured out that while push notifications can be a part of the story, they aren’t the main narrative.

Latest Posts

SMB Index: July Was a Banner Month for Local Stocks

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July 2017 was a strong month for the SCP SMB Index which gained 4.6% versus the other benchmark indices we track. The SCP SMB Index also outperformed all other indices on a total returns basis, now up 33.2% since Jan 4, 2016.

How Red Wing Shoes Finds Its Stride in Brand Marketing

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Even with a history that spans more than 110 years, the company cannot take for granted that its product will remain front and center with buyers. Dave Schneider, Red Wing’s CMO, spoke with Street Fight recently about keeping the brand connected to its audience and the Wall of Honor, which lets customers share stories about their trusty, well-worn boots.

Using Social Media for Enterprise Local Marketing: Comparing Twitter and Facebook Marketers

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Surveys suggest social media is pretty influential for shoppers, particularly young ones, although they gravitate to Instagram and Snapchat. Big brands are taking heed. Although packaged goods giant P&G said it was paring back its most highly-targeted Facebook ads, it recently confirmed that it was maintaining its overall Facebook spending.

Street Fight Daily: Businesses and Users Love Instagram Stories, Snap Rolls Out Measurement Program

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Half of Businesses on Instagram Use Stories As It Turns 1… Snap Rolls Out New Measurement Program… 10 Ways Brands Could Use Apple’s Augmented-Reality Platform…

After Some Challenging Pivots, Moz Digs Deeper for Growth

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After several years of fast growth pushing into a variety of different marketing products , the firm announced last August that it was laying off 28 percent of its workforce in order to refocus on its core competencies. We caught up with CEO Sarah Bird recently to talk about the changes and where she sees the digital marketing industry headed.

inMarket Expands Audiences Segmenting Product in Bid to Fix Programmatic Location Accuracy

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In-store advertising vendor inMarket is expanding its offerings to agency trading desks this morning, with the announcement that it’s opening up its Audiences segmenting product as a self-service solution. Beginning today, agency bid desks will be able to use inMarket’s reservoir of first-party location data to enable hyperlocal targeting.

Street Fight Daily: Amazon Creeps Up on Ad Duopoly, Facebook Invests in Conversational AI

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Advertisers Warm to Amazon’s Increasing Ad Pitch… Facebook Buys an AI Startup to Turn Its Middling Assistant into a Siri Killer… Autonomous Vehicles Projected to Drive In-Car Advertising…

Local SEO Guide Launches Tool for Tracking Google My Business Updates

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The company is releasing a tool to minimize unapproved changes to Google My Business pages. Although Local SEO Guide’s Locadium tool was originally developed for the company’s own clients, CEO Andrew Shotland says the decision was made to open Locadium up to the general public after a number of SEO firms expressed interest.

Brand Battle: Weight Watchers vs. Jenny Craig

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To gauge how each company approaches local marketing, Brandify’s proprietary technology analyzed Weight Watchers’ and Jenny Craig’s store locations with focus on areas of local presence management. 492 Jenny Craig locations and 663 Weight Watchers locations were included in the data sample.

The Place of Newspapers in the Local Marketing Ecosystem

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“Digitally speaking, NextDoor is encroaching on a space that local papers really should own.” David Mihm tells Mike Blumenthal. “It’s basically a glorified forum that in my view would be every bit as successful, if not more so, if hosted by a truly local entity.”