News and Analysis

Anne Marie Stephen Joins Street Fight as President

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Anne Marie Stephen, a veteran of tech and retail, is taking the helm at Street Fight, the premier media, research, and events company covering local marketing and technology. As president, Stephen will oversee Street Fight’s overall strategy, events, and budget as it pursues aggressive growth in 2019.

The Future of Advertising in an Autonomous Vehicle Landscape

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When autonomous vehicles begin to replace traditional cars, the local business advertising market will shift alongside. But SMB advertising might not actually look dramatically different than it does today; instead, today’s location-based, personalized marketing will reach new customizable extremes.

As Boomers Warm to Mobile, Brands Look to Capitalize

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Millennials have been shopping on their smartphones for years, but a shift toward mobile-direct shopping among consumers in the boomer generation is creating excitement for retailers and brand marketers this holiday season.

Commentary

INFOGRAPHIC: The Complex SMB Marketing Ecosystem 2.0

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As the head of digital strategy for a broadcaster operating local TV stations, Lorren Elkins has been challenged to clearly understand the digital marketing space from an SMB perspective. In response, he developed an interactive chart, now in its second iteration, to both enhance his own understanding and assist SMBs in identifying potential suppliers.

Online Reviews Providing Insights That Help Brands Compete

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The evidence is in. Reviews on social media have a material impact on the capital investments made by nationwide brands. The key is strength in numbers: A national brand will be more likely to have the critical mass of reviews required in order to move beyond anecdotal evidence and glean statistically significant results.

Editor’s Take: The Perils of Uberization for the Local Economy

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On-demand is a convenient rubric for speaking about a certain type of currently faddish platform, but not every underlying service or product is the same. Transportation is not the same as home services or restaurants. By extension, not everything Uber does will work equally well outside of its particular niche. Demand-based pricing is a prime example.

Latest Posts

Local Tech Businesses Diversify to Serve a Wider Range of SMB Needs — But Do They Really Know Their Customers?

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In the rush to diversify their offerings, single-product local tech companies either move horizontally (reaching out to all the markets that could remotely utilize their product) or, more often, vertically (seeking to cater to all the nuanced needs of a niche market).

Street Fight Daily: Facebook and Google Embrace ‘Buy’ Buttons

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Facebook Will Soon Add a ‘Buy’ Button So You Can Shop From Facebook (Business Insider)… Google Starts Testing Buy Button (Mashable)… 20 Years of Amazon: 20 Years of Major Disruptions (USA Today)…

Small Businesses Aren’t Afraid of Amazon — And You Shouldn’t Be Either

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Yes, Amazon is a giant. But as long as you continue to innovate and keep your hand on the pulse of independent business needs, it’s not going to kill your business. Here’s why.

10 Local Digital Agencies You Should Know About

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Although nearly half (49%) of franchise SMBs have been partnered with a digital agency for two or more years, independent merchants are just getting in on the action. Here are 10 digital agencies that businesses are using right now.

Street Fight Daily: Google’s iBeacon Competitor, Wi-Fi Proximity Program Launches

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Launches Eddystone, Its Platform-Agnostic iBeacon Competitor (The Next Web)… This New Wi-Fi Tech Uses Proximity To End Waiting In Long Lines (ReadWrite)… Like Google, Yahoo Wants to Reinvent Search Without the Search Bar (Ad Age)…

Courting SMBs, Facebook Integrates Its Ad Platform With Wix Email Marketing

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Facebook and Wix announced a new integration this morning that will allow businesses using Wix’s email marketing app to creating a Facebook ad within the platform, automatically taking the email’s content and images and translating them into Facebook’s format.

6 Strategies for Increasing Conversions in Mobile Food Searches

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Sixty-three percent of consumers use smartphones and tablets to find local businesses, and 23% of those local business searches involve restaurants. Here are six strategies that restaurants can use to help convert mobile search traffic.

Panel: Different Kinds of SMBs Require Different Kinds of Marketing

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At a panel discussion hosted by CoInvent last week in New York, SMB experts talked about a range of topics, including social media marketing, SEO strategy, and the importance of paying attention to online reviews.

Street Fight Daily: Google Tests Direct Hotel Booking, Yelp Sued By Delivery Drivers

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Tests Direct Hotel Booking (Search Engine Land)… Drivers Sue Yelp Over Unpaid Tips for Food Delivery Service Eat24 (Fortune)… Deep-Fried Crystal Ball: Seamless’s Recent Missteps Pave the Way for Competitors (Digiday)…

Why All SMBs Need an Ecommerce Strategy

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While online research to offline purchase is the more common path-to-purchase, future-looking SMB retailers will holistically consider an ecommerce strategy as more and more consumers embrace online shopping.