News and Analysis
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.)
How 5 Brands Leverage Voice Search Technology
Twenty percent of mobile searches now are voice-initiated, with voice technology users most likely to ask about business addresses, directions, and hours, followed by whether stores carry specific items. Let’s look at how five of these brands are taking advantage of voice search, and what other industry players could be learning from their approaches.
Los Angeles Sues Over Weather Channel App’s Data-Collection Practices
The move is representative of changing winds on attitudes toward privacy in the location data ecosystem. Following a series of New York Times Facebook and location data exposés and explainers, and with America’s own GDPR, the California Consumer Privacy Act, slated to go into effect on January 1, 2019, companies are waking up to a new reality in which selling and sharing user data to the tune of billions of dollars in revenue with little oversight is over.
Commentary
Report: Executive Survey on Hyperlocal Tech and Tactics
What’s on the mind of technology and marketing suppliers targeting the connected local economy? They’re keen on mobile — perhaps too keen — but struggling with their own companies’ brand awareness. The dichotomy between small businesses and national chains that sell locally is profound, and presents difficult challenges in scaling to support either, let alone both, according to Street Fight Insights analysis.
The Price of Free Listings Revisited: A Hyperlocal Business Perspective
The proliferation of online directories and directory services has made the local business owner’s life harder. It means more places to manage vital information and more third-party providers that control access to directories. Between the time and effort required to manage aggregators and the volume of citations, few small business owners do it themselves. As a result, the only stakeholders that truly know what information is authentic often are left out of the conversation.
In Local Marketing, ‘Obsolete’ Is All Relative
The pace of innovation is such that many new technologies are deemed “obsolete” before small business owners get the chance to fully understand them, let alone implement them in their business. Many feel left behind the curve as a result. But obsolete is not an absolute condition when it comes to marketing techniques. Where marketing tactics and technologies are underutilized, potential for competitive gains still exists.
Latest Posts
8 Things SMBs Should Consider Before Adopting Mobile Payments
With 22.6 million people in the U.S. expected to make at least one mobile payment in 2015, merchants of all sizes are feeling the push to start accepting mobile payments. But whether every local business should jump on board is still a matter of debate within the hyperlocal community.
Charlotte Agenda Carves Out Role as Brand Builder, Market Developer
In April, online city guide Charlotte Agenda arrived onto a shifting Charlotte, N.C. digital scene. The site’s eclectic mix of five-to-ten quick-read, mobile-friendly stories and a distinctive conversational style of commentary is standing out among local media players eager to reach a young audience, but will it prove sustainable?
Street Fight Daily: Yahoo Files for Alibaba Spinoff, Google Scoops Up Homejoy Staff
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Yahoo Files for Alibaba Spinoff, Though Tax Issues Linger (New York Times)… Google Is Getting Into the Home Services Market With Hire of Homejoy Staff (The Next Web)… TripAdvisor Taking on Airbnb? (Travel Trends)…
Openings and New Hires at Drawbridge, Yieldmo, Acxiom and Microsoft
In this week’s column, Steve Huffman is in as new Reddit CEO, two shifts at Microsoft, a new president of marketing services at Acxiom, and a new VP of Sales at Moasis.
Will Newspaper Companies Find Revival in Local Video?
Ten years from now newspapers will be delivering more local video programming than TV stations. Inconceivable? Sub out the word newspapers for “a local media company formerly known as a newspaper,” and consider the assets, cash-flow and aggressiveness of these big print companies, and you might warm up to my theory.
LBMA Podcast: Gimbal’s New Beacon, Tinder for Apple Watch
On the show: AOL/Verizon may be Millenial Media; Shape-changing interfaces; Big Gay Ice Cream uses beacons; Rubicon Global’s quest to be UBER for your trash; Waze’s RideWith ride sharing.
Street Fight Daily: Groupon Buys OrderUp, Advertisers Struggle With Google’s Mobile Update
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Groupon Acquires OrderUp Food Delivery Service (TechCrunch)… Google And Its Advertisers That Didn’t Prepare For Mobile Face Uphill Struggle (Marketing Land)… How Eddystone Will Take Beacons Further Than Ever Before (ReadWrite)…
2015 ‘Michele’s List’ Shows Strengths — And Weaknesses — of ‘Indie’ News Sites
There are encouraging and even bullish numbers in the performance of independent community news sites as reported in the 2015 “Michele’s List” survey. But other numbers indicate that “indies” are having a difficult time generating enough revenue to ensure stability.
Local Tech Businesses Diversify to Serve a Wider Range of SMB Needs — But Do They Really Know Their Customers?
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
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)…
Street Fight’s Big 3
Street Fight Columns
Street Fight Categories
Why AI Describes Locations Differently