News and Analysis

Inform Your Multichannel Customer Experience Strategy

Facebook to Integrate Technical Infrastructure of WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger

While the move indeed indicates that Facebook’s chief executives are looking to centralize acquired properties that once operated with relative autonomy, the integration also marks a response to growing concerns over user privacy. Under this new technical configuration, all the messaging platforms will be endowed with end-to-end encryption, warding off the possibility that people other than those taking part in conversations will ever read messages sent on the platforms.

How 6 Brands Are Using AR to Drive Experience Marketing

Worldwide spending on AR is expected to reach $215 billion by 2021, as new hardware ships and AR moves further into the mainstream. Acceleration in the AR market is also being boosted by brands’ growing frustration over the limitations in display advertising. With AR, brands can bypass ad blockers and unleash their creativity in a bid to capture the attention of consumers. Let’s take a look at how six top brands are using AR for experience marketing right now.

Google Is Increasingly Taking the Reins in Managing Campaigns for Advertisers

Boosting its appeal beyond the reams of consumer data and stranglehold on search that make its digital advertising business the most expansive in the world, Google is increasingly executing campaigns for advertisers, deploying both automation and its own ad experts to get the job done.

Commentary

Facebook Continues to Experiment in Local — But Its Focus Is Long-Term

The company isn’t trying to build a unified local search portal at all. Instead, they’re launching trial balloons, turning developers loose to experiment with the company’s local data in order to surface features and nuances that might eventually be useful as subtle additions to the Newsfeed…

How the Rise of ‘Mobility as a Service’ Will Impact Local Marketing

Autonomous vehicles will put pressure on all kinds of players. The pressure will be felt not only by car manufacturers but all kinds of other industries including auto dealers, insurance companies and transit systems…

How Top Marketers Are Curating the In-Store Mobile Experience

With consumer behavior in place, and solutions making technology like beacons as simple as a media buy, mobile proximity is poised to become the fasting growing piece of mobile advertising in 2016. The brands that have tested and learned early on are in great position to scale up and reach their audiences this year.

Latest Posts

What Local Marketers Can Learn From the Trials of Google Plus

With Google’s recent announcement that Google Plus will be decoupled from YouTube and other services, industry watchers are predicting that this may be the beginning of the end for the social network. Here are a few lessons a local marketer might learn from the social network’s challenges.

Case Study: Restaurant Group Integrates Data for Targeted Customer Marketing

Fig & Olive’s guest management system has been set up to match reservations to POS data, which allows marketer Matthew Joseph to track the dining habits and visit frequency of guests. This information is then used to run automated marketing campaigns.

Street Fight Daily: An Inside Look at Amazon, Can Facebook Finally Conquer E-Commerce?

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace (New York Times)… Facebook’s Last Push Into E-Commerce was a Disaster, but It’s Gearing Up to Try Again (Business Insider)… Location Inaccuracy is a Bigger Problem Than Fraud (AdExchanger)…

Openings and New Hires at 4Info, Matchcraft, Foursquare and Yieldbot

Every two weeks, Geoff Michener covers some of the latest job changes taking place in this dynamic industry. In this week’s column, Triangle Business Journal gets a new president, Verve Mobile staffs up, and the Daily Voice hires a new publisher.

LBMA Podcast: Forbes Partners With Tinder, Proxbook’s Thomas Walle Jensen

On the show: Peaceful walking by Walkonomics; Blind French hikers trek 80km without a guide; AwareCar helps you avoid parking tickets; Embarcadero Technologies launches BeaconFence.

Street Fight Daily: Uber Will Return Your Online Purchases, Samsung Preps for Mobile Payment Launch

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… How Uber Is Fixing Online Shopping’s Most Annoying Problem (Refinery29)… Samsung Pay to Launch September 28 in U.S. But Will Businesses Accept It? (Recode)… Stores Suffer From a Shift of Behavior in Buyers (New York Times)…

Study: Local Advertisers Are Leaving Behind $14 Billion in Co-op Marketing Every Year

According to the report from Netsertive and Borrell Associates, 38 percent of local businesses cited “too much paperwork” as the greatest barrier to co-op marketing, and another 38 percent cited “too many rules.”

Why Local News Sponsorships Are More Relevant than Ever

How the Local Media Consortium Is Leveraging Its Relationship With Google for Higher CPMs

The Local Media Consortium is working to turn “digital dimes” back into the dollars. To see how the group is progressing, we recently spoke with Tobias Bennett, LMC’s “programmatic advertising champion.”

Street Fight Daily: Macy’s and Alibaba Join Forces, Amazon Changes Retail Ad Terms

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Alibaba Lands Macy’s as the First U.S. Department Store For Its Online Portal (Fortune)… Amazon Changes Terms for Retailers Advertising on Its Site (AdAge)… Layoffs Hit Groupon’s Restaurant Software Unit as Breadcrumb Founder Leaves (Recode)…