News and Analysis
Local Search Association Crowns the Best Solutions in Local
At its annual conference in Dana Point, CA, this week, the Local Search Association recognized the best solutions in location-based search and advertising with its annual Ad-to-Action awards. Award winners, who competed in a field of over 80 entries and were selected by judges representing companies such as Google, Amazon, and Walmart, included Brandify, PlaceIQ, and Vendasta.
7 Delivery Trends You Should Know in 2019
Greater customer expectations and technological advancements are driving big changes in delivery. What’s more, the delivery experience has emerged as a differentiating factor for customers when choosing one retailer over another. eCommerce retailers that operate solely online and omnichannel retailers that offer a physical and digital presence are both beginning to expand their delivery options to meet customer demand. Here are seven trends that will define retail delivery during 2019.
In Age of Social Media, Brands Must Stay On Top of Reputations Capable of Changing on a Dime
A single video posted to YouTube was all it took for Chuck E. Cheese’s online reputation to go up in flames this month, at least temporarily, when an internet celebrity posted his theory about the pizza chain’s misshapen pies. As viral conspiracy theories on social media become increasingly common, brands are finding that their initial response can set the tone and create a carry-on effect that impacts customer sentiment across dozens of multimedia channels.
Commentary
Why Data Attributes Power the Long Tail of Local Search
The mandate for brands is simple: manage data attributes as a crucial element of your location marketing strategy. But it’s not enough to create attributes. You need to constantly monitor the ever-changing nature of your business and your customers and be ready to act on your attributes as needed.
Latest Posts
Street Fight Daily: Yelp and OpenTable End Partnership, Google’s Plans For Accelerated Mobile Pages
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Yelp, OpenTable Part Ways amid Heightened Competition (Reuters)… Inside Google’s Plan to Speed Up the Mobile Web (Poynter)… DoorDash Partners with b8ta for On-Demand Tech Gadget Delivery (TechCrunch)…
Is the Humble Phone Call Actually the Killer App for Local Businesses?
It turns out reports of voice calling’s death are greatly exaggerated. Despite an explosion in data usage and mobile messaging, voice calling — facilitated by search and virtual assistants — remains a popular activity among mobile users. A lot of those calls are going to local businesses, where they are more likely to convert to revenue than web forms or emails.
6 Reasons Why Hyperlocal Tech Initiatives Continue to Elude Consumers
Hyperlocal is a totally logical concept in the minds of technologists, analysts, and investors, but many hyperlocal tech initiatives have yet to catch fire with consumers. Part of the challenge is people are creatures of habit. Here are six reasons why hyperlocal tech will continue to elude consumers’ grasp in 2016.
Street Fight Daily: Facebook Partners with Uber, Will Google’s Driverless Cars Be the Next Uber/Lyft?
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Facebook Messenger Now Lets You Hail Uber Rides (The Next Web)… Google’s Plan for Self-Driving Cars Means It Will Have to Compete with Uber (Recode)… Brand Relevance and Revenue in the Age of Snapchat (Nieman Lab)…
7 Ways Predictive Intelligence Can Be Applied to Small Business Marketing
Small business owners have the tendency to shy away from advanced technologies like predictive intelligence, however experts in the field say that’s a mistake, and many of today’s platforms can be implemented by merchants on Main Street. Here are seven ways that small businesses can get in on the action and start using predictive intelligence tools today.
5 Reasons Why Local Marketing Will Mature in 2016
The past few years have seen the introduction of a whole universe of new tools designed to address individual aspects of digital marketing. In 2016, we will see a shift away from many of these discreet, single-purpose tools toward more comprehensive marketing solutions, DataSphere’s Gary Cowan predicts. Here’s a look at five ways SMB local marketing will mature in the coming year.
Street Fight Daily: New Google Research on ‘Micro-Moments,’ What Won’t Happen in 2016
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Says Search Intent Matters More for Marketers Than User Identity (Adweek)… Trends for 2016: What Won’t Happen (eMarketer)… What You Need to Know About Facebook’s New Local Search ‘Test’ (Marketing Land)…
Storefront Fills a Growing Market for Short-Term Retail Spaces
Pop-up shops are becoming of a fixture of the omnichannel retail landscape — and not just during the holiday season. Storefront is a three-year-old startup that connects anyone who wants to sell and promote their wares with landlords who have retail spaces they want to rent — a “marketplace for renting short-term retail space,” as co-founder and CEO Erik Eliason described it. The model is proving successful in syncing both large retailers and local artisan/makers with physical spaces that would otherwise lie dormant.
Missing from ‘Spotlight’ Movie: How News Sites Pay for Top-Quality Investigative Journalism
The Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative team uncovered the pedophile priest scandal in the Catholic Church, but for all the acclaim the reporting won, it didn’t save the paper from a catastrophic financial decline that nearly put the Globe out of business. To understand how such journalistic success could be followed by such financial failure, Street Fight spoke with Dan Kennedy, associate professor in the School of Journalism at Northeastern University, who has written extensively about the subject.
Street Fight Daily: Pinterest Prioritizes Search Advertising, Facebook’s Quiet New Yelp Competitor
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Pinterest Narrows Ad Focus to Match Users’ Interest (Wall Street Journal)… Is ‘Facebook Professional Services’ Facebook’s Stealth Project to Beat Yelp? (Search Engine Land)… Storefront Fills a Growing Market for Short-Term Retail Spaces (Street Fight)…
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Why TV Remains the Heartbeat of Local Connection