News and Analysis

Factual Partners with Airship and Braze to Power Location-Based Mobile Marketing

The partnership will enhance Airship and Braze’s efforts to furnish clients with precise mobile messaging based on the location of the customers they want to reach. Airship and Braze help brands engage their customers, retaining their business and ideally driving them back in-store. Airship rebranded, dropping the Urban from its name, last month.

Foursquare’s Location-Based Loyalty Metrics Point to Best Practices for Casual Restaurants

Brushing aside customer surveys and other imprecise measures of customer loyalty, location intelligence firm Foursquare released a location-based report this morning that evaluates best practices and practitioners in loyalty among casual restaurant chains. 

Most importantly for future considerations, the report suggests that brands can improve loyalty in all four of the areas that contributed to its index.

Report: Consumer Expectations for Brands Higher than Ever in Age of Convenience

With the omnichannel age upon us, the impact of bad customer experiences is unprecedented. The main fear for businesses should no longer be a standoff between the worker behind the customer service desk and the angry customer who failed to get his discount; it should be the rant that hits social and is shared or liked a slew of times, dragging digital reputations through the mud.

Commentary

xAd Foot Traffic Data Reveals QSR Trends, Maps Audience Segmentation Opportunities

At a high level, the report, based on 37 million visits xAd observed on its platform from April 1 to June 30, gives us the inside track on which brands have been the most successful in driving foot traffic to their premises — and which brands have a way to go.

Maps.me Offers Open Source Alternative to Google and Apple Maps

I’m impressed by the level of detail and by some key differentiators that make Maps.me seem like a fresh approach to mobile navigation. Indeed, I can see the app eventually finding favor in the U.S. marketplace. Even before that happens, local marketers should take note.

Bringing Brands Into the Fold, inMarket Touts Its ‘Three-Sided’ Beacon Network

inMarket’s strategic product is not the app, the value is created by their network. Their network links dozens of publishers’ apps to retailers that host inMarket beacons and, the third stakeholder in the network, the brands, whose products are being promoted. In this video, CEO Todd DiPaola talks about the importance of this network.

Latest Posts

Street Fight Daily: Yahoo’s Search App Gets a Big Update, Postmates Moves Further into Commerce

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Yahoo Search App for iPhone Gets a Bit More ‘Now’ with Personalized Content (Search Engine Land)… Postmates Digs into Commerce with Curated ’12 Days of Postmates’ Campaign (TechCrunch)… Procter & Gamble’s New Strategy Shows Agencies Still Needed for Programmatic (Digiday)…

LBMA Podcast: UberMedia Introduces LROI Concept, Soundpays Launches Mobile Wallet in Canada

On the show: UberMedia introduces LROI concept; Soundpays launches mobile wallet in Canada; Mobify Buys Dónde; bfonics launches Wi-Fi beacon; racist tweets on billboards in Brazil; Tyrers Department Store tests “Digital Clothing Rail.” Plus, news from Aruba Networks; Domino’s; Placemeter; Krispy Kreme and NCR; and Blue Bite and Rouge Media.

Raise Report: Netsertive, EatStreet, Factual Secure New Funding

Every two weeks we round up some of the biggest fundraises taking place in hyperlocal marketing, commerce, and tech. In this edition, new investments include rounds for Netsertive, EatStreet, and Factual.

The Power of Pairing: 4 Reasons Matching Is Gaining Traction in Local Home Services

When variables such as trust, uncertainty, availability, and geography are at the core of decision-making — as they so often are when it comes to hiring professionals to perform home services — matching, especially when coupled with ratings and reviews, offers consumers peace of mind. It also provides an immediate connection in an often urgent and sometimes complicated time of need.

Street Fight Daily: Twitter Will Show Ads to ‘Casual Viewers,’ Location Startup Factual Raises $35M

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Twitter Aims to Show Advertising to Much Wider Audience (New York Times)… Startup Factual Knows Your Commute, and Much More (Wall Street Journal)… Billy Penn and Knight Foundation Want to Build ‘Yelp for Mobile News’ (Poynter)…

6 Ways Local Merchants Can Use Rewards to Bring in Holiday Shoppers

Consumers are expected to spend $630.5 billion this holiday shopping season. Local merchants are fighting tooth and nail to take back a larger share of that revenue from their ecommerce competitors. Here’s what industry leaders said about the types of incentives that work best for encouraging shoppers to make holiday purchases at local retail businesses instead of big-box stores or ecommerce sites.

Why Location Management Matters in the Age of Mobile and Social

If SEO is about websites and marketing is about brand awareness, location management is about brick-and-mortar businesses and removing friction along the customer journey from online search to offline purchase. Ignore it at your peril.

Street Fight Daily: Uber Launches Food Delivery App, Walmart Develops Own Mobile Payments Service

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Uber Tests Standalone Food Delivery App (TechCrunch)… Walmart to Offer Smartphone Payments in Stores (Wall Street Journal)… Facebook Is Updating Instant Articles to Help Publishers Make More Money (Adweek)…

Street Fight Daily: Yahoo Will Spin Off Core Businesses, Pinterest Buys Two Search-Centric Startups

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Yahoo Is Said to End Plan to Spin Off Alibaba Stake (New York Times)… Pinterest Buys Two Startups to Bolster Image Search (Wall Street Journal)… Uber Is Testing a New Service That Sounds Exactly Like a Bus (Business Insider)…

PlaceIQ Teams Up with IRI to Tackle Online-to-Offline Attribution

Marketers face a number of big challenges today. One is pinpointing their audiences as they move from device to device — and then from platform to platform on those different devices. Another is making sense all of the data consumers generate in the scores of micro-interactions they have every day across the devices and platforms they use. A third is online-to-offline attribution. The partnership with IRI that PlaceIQ announced today is a step toward tackling these hurdles.