News and Analysis
Why Disney Gets Phygital Right
First, you’ll hear a lot of the term “phygital” (the convergence of physical and digital) throughout 2025. It’s the theme of our Street Fight LIVE Summit on September 18th. Although the term itself has been around for years, technology and devices have finally caught up to the word. Consumers expect brands to know them as […]
Snack Brand LesserEvil Discusses OOH
You’ve got to love OOH if you’re a brand marketer. It’s location-based, has real-time and locational relevance, and there are no pesky brand-safety issues to worry about. The Out of Home Advertising Association of America (OAAA) is gearing up for the 2025 OOH Media Conference May 5-7, and some esteemed brands will be represented not […]
Does DEIB Make a Difference for MULO Brands?
The issue of DEIB (diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging) has become hot in the U.S. these days. Programs are being slashed at a government level and some of the private sector is following suit. MULO (multi-location) brands now need to think even harder about their hiring policies and public images. Consumers have taken to social […]
Commentary
In the Age of AI, 3 Must-Have Skills for Digital Marketers
Everything changed in November 2022. That’s when OpenAI’s ChatGPT launched to the public, and having a clear understanding of how to harness generative AI instantly became a requirement for digital marketers around the globe. In the eight months since generative AI went mainstream, the field of digital marketing has undergone a metamorphosis. Marketers today find […]
From Google to Social to Generative AI: The Evolution of Search Journeys
Remember when search ads were just a bunch of blue links? Believe it or not, that wasn’t that long ago – when a mention of search conjured a near-identical image in everyone’s minds. If you asked 100 people to describe their search journeys today, you might get 100 different answers. Those answers would almost certainly […]
Impossible? How to Actually Get a Return on Your Technology Investments
Technology investments have been a priority for most companies since before the pandemic, which brought new urgency to the implementation of new solutions. However, fully implementing a digital transformation is surprisingly uncommon – a new study found that only 15% of businesses with digital transformation programs have completed them. That low success rate is concerning because […]
Latest Posts
Starbucks Stirs Up Leadership Model
Starbucks, a company known for transformation the coffee shop model and introducing a wide range of seasonal beverages and products is now transforming the MULO (multi-location) leadership model. The company announced this week that it is creating a new leadership model. As innovative and unique as its current lavender beverages, the structure is designed to […]
3 Ways to Battle Efficiency Headwinds in 2024
You don’t have to look too deep for significance there: measurement is tough right now (even for measurement companies), and fraud is rampant and stands to get worse as AI governance lags behind AI adoption. No matter how big your brand or what industry you’re in, efficiency is going to be a challenge in 2024. […]
Stepping Up Brand Protection with AI-Powered Risk Monitoring
Maintaining a positive online reputation is extremely important for businesses in our digital world, especially for multi-location brands. With the rise of social media and online review platforms, negative commentary and potential crises can spread rapidly, posing significant threats to a company’s reputation and profitability. In an attempt to help MULO marketers address this challenge, […]
A Marketer’s Guide to Transitioning from Third-Party Cookies
Third-party cookies are going away. Not tomorrow, maybe not next week, but in the months to come, marketers will come face-to-face with the reality of a new world of marketing measurement. Google appears to be committed to their complete blocking of third-party cookies in Chrome by the end of 2024, so marketers need to prepare […]
Why Some MULO Brands are Going Online-Only
This week, Outdoor Voices announced that the company is closing stores and migrating its business to online only. Will they re-brand “Indoor Voices?” Joking aside, the move appears essential for the popular athleisure brand to remain alive. They are hardly the first brand to go from MULO (multi-location) outposts to just the screen. Athleisure is […]
BUST: Jo-Ann Fabric and Crafts Needs to be Re-Stitched
We recently covered the challenges of the MULO (multi-location) crafts industry and speculated on whether the giant stores that sell sewing, knitting, scrapbooking, and other creative supplies and classes would survive. The question is still unanswered, despite the fact that 81-year-old Ohio-based Jo-Ann Fabric and Crafts (JOANN) just filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. All of […]
OOH Will See Record Political Ad Spending in 2024
Alright, we survived Super Tuesday and its political ads, but the OOH ad-media beatings won’t stop until the election is finally over. And even then, we can’t be sure. From now until November, U.S. voters must endure messages around choosing a president, 33 senate races, representatives for all 435 seats of the House, and 14 gubernatorial […]
Embracing AI in Media and Advertising
History changes slowly and then overnight. A mere two years ago, the early publicly-available generative AI models from OpenAI, Microsoft, Google looked like curiosities–intriguing but plagued by obvious limitations. Today these models have advanced so far and so fast that they are already well on their way to changing media and advertising forever. AI is […]
Voices Amplified: How Consumers Are Rewriting the Rules for Brand Accountability
Today, consumer voices can be magnified across channels with the click of a button. The power of the consumer is undergoing a seismic shift, providing both opportunities and challenges to businesses around the world as they rewrite the “rules” of brand accountability. Traditional online review sites are no longer the only medium to share opinions. […]
How NXTDRIVE’s Data Can Target without Cookies
When American Furniture Warehouse (AFW) wanted to expand its customer base in Texas and Arizona it turned to Vericast, a marketing technology and data company, whose NXTDRIVE™ customer data marketing platform (CDMP) was made available to retail marketers nationwide earlier this year. Using NXTDRIVE, AFW and Vericast were able to supplement and enrich the retailer’s […]
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Beyond Search: AI Visibility the New Growth Lever for MULO Brands