News and Analysis
Alexa Has the Confidence of SMB Marketers. Should It?
Forty-eight percent of marketers surveyed by Uberall said they trust the e-commerce giant over its competition when it comes to marketing applications of voice technology in these early days of the medium. Google Assistant had the vote of 29% of the market, with Apple’s Siri scoring a surprisingly high 17% given the widespread consensus that voice is really a two-way race at the moment.
Adjust Leverages AI to Neutralize Ad Fraud
Advertisers and brands are expected to lose an estimated $50 billion as a result of ad fraud by 2025, with one of the most problematic types of ad fraud involving bots designed to mimic human behaviors. Using bots, fraudsters can imitate clicks and engagement KPIs on ad campaigns, wreaking havoc for mobile ad vendors and the advertisers that work with them. So what’s the solution? Firms like Unbotify are pioneering a new approach to bot detection and digital fraud prevention using artificial intelligence and machine learning. Unbotify’s solution analyzes human behavior patterns within websites’ and mobile apps’ user flows in order to differentiate between bots and humans.
Data Science as a Solution: conDati Opens Doors for Digital Retailers
The pitch is that today’s marketers with omnichannel inspirations need a machine learning-driven platform that will not only assess the success of campaigns across several media but also point them toward paths for future success. That’s an expensive technical infrastructure to create in-house, and conDati’s betting its solution is worth the spend.
Latest Posts
LBMA Podcast: Lowe’s Is Opening a Hardware Store in Space, eeGeo Launches Global 3D Mapping Platform
On the show: Lowe’s is opening a hardware store in space; eeGeo launches global 3D mapping platform; MLB used Snapchat Geofilters for World Series; Taggalo blends beacons with facial recognition; Sochat, which allows you to text anyone nearby, just raised $2 million. Plus, news from Sears; IBM + Weather Channel; Thinknear; and Facebook.
Street Fight Daily: Postmates Acquires Local Discovery Startup Sosh, Facebook’s New SMB Ad Products
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Postmates Is Buying Sosh, a Service for Discovering Local Activities (Fortune)… Facebook’s New Tools Let Merchants Tailor Ads for Nearby Consumers (Adweek)… How Handy’s Founder Oisin Hanrahan Is Scaling His Startup into an On-Demand Powerhouse (The Next Web)…
The Path to Purchase Is More Mobile than Ever: xAd Study
xAd’s fourth annual Mobile Path to Purchase study indicates the customer journey is more smartphone-dependent than ever, even for big-ticket, high-consideration purchases like cars. “Location is much more than a targeting tactic; it’s a powerful indicator of consumers’ intent and immediacy of needs,” said xAd senior director of global research Sarah Ohle.
5 Tools Local Merchants Can Use to Segment In-Store Visitors
Loyal customers are incredibly valuable to local merchants. A new class of hyperlocal platforms is helping small business owners pinpoint and engage with repeat visitors using a combination of in-store beacons, geo-location tools, and customer segmentation technology. Here are five platforms that enable merchants to track visit frequency and send highly targeted promotions to maximize sales among their most valuable customers.
Street Fight Daily: Facebook’s Q3 Success Fueled by Mobile, Jet.com’s Emergency Fundraising
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Facebook’s Transformation into a Mobile Company Is Complete (Gigaom)… Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round (Wall Street Journal)… Hiku’s New Connected Grocery Scanner Lets You Order Groceries from Walmart and Peapod (TechCrunch)…
Q3 Earnings Roundup: Shift to Mobile Presents Commerce Challenge for Yelp, Angie’s List, Groupon
Consumers are spending more time on their mobile devices than ever, a shift that is affecting both traditional and digital businesses. Recent earnings reports from Yelp, Angie’s List, and Groupon indicate that some of these publicly traded local mainstays are handling the transition better than others, particularly the rising challenge to effectively combine content, commerce, and services.
Zenchef CEO: The Restaurant Tech Sector Is Booming
French company Zenchef, which offers an all-in-one marketing solution for restaurants, has taken on the challenge of uniting thousands of European eateries on one platform. With 2,500 customers in France, Spain, and the UK, and plans to expand to Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Turkey in 2016, co-founder and CEO Xavier Zeitoun said “the key in this market is distribution.”
Case Study: Restaurant Group Takes a Data-Driven Approach to Email Marketing
Data is changing the way large restaurant groups cater to their highest-value customers. Richard Sandoval Restaurants, the upmarket restaurant group with more than 35 locations worldwide, is looking for more strategic ways to use data for customer retention and acquisition. It has started harnessing its email database to make more data-driven decisions using tools like customer analytics and marketing platform Venga.
Constant Contact CEO Touts ‘Distribution Benefits’ After $1.1 Billion Acquisition by Endurance
Endurance International Group, which operates a stable of small business-oriented services, has acquired email marketing giant Constant Contact, in a transaction valued at $1.1. billion. Constant Contact will become the largest brand under the Endurance umbrella. “It’s taking our mission further by getting broader distribution. That’s the number-one rationale for the acquisition,” said Constant Contact CEO Gail Goodman.
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