News and Analysis
Forget the Alexa-Powered Toilet. The Big Local News at CES is the Amazon Echo Auto
While it may be the Alexa-powered toilet dominating water-cooler conversation this week, the real device to look out for is Amazon’s Echo Auto, an Alexa-powered, voice-activated product that will provide all the utility of Alexa, and connections to other voice-activated devices, from the dashboard of buyers’ cars. The device, which can be requested for just $25 and is available to a limited number of consumers now, has already been requested a whopping one million times—and counting.
Big Data Helps Predict Which Brick-and-Mortar Locations Will Thrive and Fail
While the Gap says its decisions are being made based on traffic trends and profits—the brand saw a 7% decline in quarterly comparable sales—data scientists from top technology firms are working feverishly behind the scenes to use big data to predict which store closures could come next. Having a heads up on which retail locations have a high likelihood of closing could benefit those in the commercial real estate sector, as well as retail brands looking to decide on future store locations.
After Amazon-Whole Foods, Microsoft-Kroger: The Grocery Revolution Is Happening
Microsoft and Kroger are teaming up, challenging Amazon’s dominance in grocery innovation and pushing back against its takeover of an increasing number of corporate verticals, including cloud infrastructure in the form of Amazon Web Services. (Street Fight’s Mike Boland has predicted that Amazon will sell its grocery tech just as it’s done with AWS, taking an in-house innovation and transforming it into a cash cow.)
Commentary
Brands, Meet the Data Amplifiers
Data amplifiers distribute and publish your data to a broader audience than you could ever do on your own — what I call the “network effect.” Your brand becomes more visible because your business data becomes more open and accessible to the influencers who are in a position to help customers find your business.
Retailers Shift Focus to Offline Affiliate Marketing
Location analytics represent the new battleground in retail, but imagine if you could apply the same analytics for online attribution to offline purchases. Offline affiliate marketing does just that, giving retailers the tools to analyze data from in-store purchases similar to what they can do for online purchases.
Yodle Weighs in on How Google’s SERP Change Has Affected Online Ads for SMBs
With a few weeks of empirical data, we now have a much clearer sense of how or if this change has affected local AdWords campaigns. At Yodle, we have seen a negligible effect on the performance metrics of the search engine marketing (SEM) campaigns we run on behalf of our local small business clients.
Latest Posts
Street Fight Daily: How Surge Pricing Could Affect Retail, Walgreens’ Mobile Approach
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Uber-Style Surge Pricing May Catch on with Retailers (Forbes)… Why Walgreens Is Partnering with Postmates and Betting Big on Mobile (LinkedIn Pulse)… Kroger Tests ‘Smart Shelf’ Technology (Indianapolis Star)…
NinthDecimal’s Staas: Programmatic Will Become a Strong Opportunity for Small Business Owners
“One of the challenges is a lot of the tools around the ecosystem have not really been built to scale for the small business owner, and they still require a lot of sophistication in understanding how to buy and sell media. The opportunity is in looking at how some of these platforms are evolving. I think programmatic will become a very strong opportunity for the small business owner,” said NinthDecimal president David Staas about shifting trends in location-based marketing and audience targeting.
LBMA Podcast: Eatsa Removes Waiters from the Restaurant, Coke-moji Happiness Experiment, Oscar Mayer…Matchmaker?
On the show: Eatsa removes waiters from the restaurant; Coke-moji Happiness Experiment; Oscar Mayer is your new…matchmaker?; Fujitsu partners with iProximity; Panama does location-based video sharing; Goodwill’s goBIN. Plus, news from Thinknear, Starbucks, Canadian Tire, and Mobiquity and Mobeam, and Rob’s new gig as VP of marketing at Foko.
Street Fight Daily: The Future of Search, Button’s Big Mobile Commerce Partnerships
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Looking Ahead: The New Search Landscape (Search Engine Land)… Mobile Startup Button Inks Airbnb, Ticketmaster Deals to Link Bookings to Other Apps (Recode)… Microsoft’s New Windows Phone App Lets You Recommend Home Maintenance Services to Friends (The Next Web)…
Four Local Marketing Strategies to Boost Same-Store Sales
Company success often rises and falls on the ability to deliver same-store sales increases, so multi-unit brands spend a lot of energy managing around this core metric. But it’s difficult to drive local success at scale with a one-size-fits-all approach. Here’s a list of four creative strategies (and associated tactics) that local stores can implement to boost their overall performance.
6 Tools for Tracking Business Competitors
Every business owner wants to know the competition’s secret sauce. Now, merchants who are interested in tracking their competitors can let technology do some of the work. Competitive analysis tools allow local business owners to understand what neighboring merchants are doing right through their digital marketing and on social media to get people through the door. Here are six examples of platforms that businesses can use.
Street Fight Daily: Twitter Launches ‘Buy’ Button, AOL’s Armstrong Ready to Fight Ad Blocking
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Twitter Makes ‘Buy’ Button Widely Available (New York Times)… Tim Armstrong Says AOL Is in the ‘Best Position’ to Fight Ad Blocking (Adweek)… Sources: Jack Dorsey Expected to Be Named Permanent Twitter CEO (Recode)…
Yext Gets in the Customer Engagement Xone
Fast-growing Yext is broadening its suite of location-based targeting products with the launch this week of Xone, a beacon-based program for businesses to engage in-store consumers with relevant content. Xone’s central feature is Tips, which enables businesses to customize and deliver messages to smartphone users who pass within range of an in-store Xone Beacon.
Whither the Search Engine in the Age of Mobile?
The path to purchase ceased being linear some time ago, probably as soon as online-to-offline became a standard part of the marketing lexicon. But as mobile has begun to wield increasing influence over the shopping process — at home, on the go, and in-store — the path has grown even more convoluted. The latest evidence comes from a new study conducted by International Data Corporation (IDC) on behalf of YP.
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