News and Analysis
Efficacy of Google Posts Drops Following Relegation to Bottom of Knowledge Panel
Following a seemingly arbitrary choice on Google’s part to move Posts to the bottom of the Knowledge Panel, their efficacy in boosting businesses’ local search presence seems to be dropping.
Retail as a Service: Amazon will Create (and Destroy) with Cashierless Checkout Solution
Mike Boland: The innovation including and surrounding cashierless checkout goes beyond payments to affect a broader set of functions like supply chain, inventory management, and store layouts. It’s like a retail toolkit in a box, with cash-flow friendly pricing, à la SaaS. You may have heard of it: It’s called retail as a service (RaaS), and it could transform the next decade of retail. Amazon will lead the way.
Digital Ad Trends to Watch in 2019, Mobile to Account for 71% of Digital Ad Spend
Programmatic SSP Pubmatic released on Tuesday morning an elaborate report detailing digital ad trends to watch in 2019. The highlights include a look into how mobile, video, and of course programmatic itself will continue to evolve in the coming year, reshaping the way brands reach customers.
Commentary
Editor’s Take: The Perils of Uberization for the Local Economy
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.
Connecting the Local-Mobile Economy, One Step at a Time
Hyperlocal, mobile, on-demand contextual commerce enabled by buy buttons within mobile apps — that’s the new string of buzzwords making the rounds at industry conferences. The market reality: It’s going to take a while for this string to play out in the connected local economy. A key reason is that even as mobile disrupts search, most marketers and merchants can’t expect to get their own app on a majority of users’ home screens.
Editor’s Take: The Apps vs. Browser Debate Is a Distraction
The venerable apps vs. mobile web debate continues to rage on but it is largely a distraction for local merchants. Business owners do need to understand the changing media landscape to make the most effective possible use of their limited marketing budgets, but their time and their dollars are better spent on marketing fundamentals rather than investing in the increasingly difficult and crowded race to acquire, retain, and monetize app users.
Latest Posts
Street Fight’s 10 Most Popular Stories From the First Half of 2015
In the local space, the first six months of 2015 brought a deeper emphasis on local commerce and the connected local economy, new partnerships, and consolidation and restructuring at legacy players. Here’s a look back at the top Street Fight stories (at least in terms of traffic) so far this year.
Street Fight Daily: Pinterest Launches Buyable Pins, Bing Now ‘Self-Sustaining’
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Airbnb Is Helping Make Android Apps More Like The Web (ReadWrite)… Pinterest Takes E-Commerce To Next Level With Launch Of Buyable Pins On iPads & iPhones (Marketing Land)… Microsoft’s Bing Isn’t Such a Failure After All (Mashable)…
6 Tools for Linking Digital Marketing Efforts to Offline Sales
Only 18% of marketers currently say they feel “very confident” in their ability to measure mobile ad ROI. In order for that number to increase, marketers will need to partner with hyperlocal vendors that provide online-to-offline ad attribution. Here are six examples of vendors that they could work with…
Report: Marketplace for On-Demand Apps Set to Grow
A new report from industry organization The On-Demand Economy finds that there is a “massive” market opportunity for on-demand mobile apps, and that even as consolidation occurs they will likely continue to transform the local economy…
INFOGRAPHIC: How Digital Coupons Are Driving In-Store Conversions
Digital coupons have existed in one form or another for the last couple of decades, but according to a new infographic from SIM Partners, the category has really begun to take off — and are driving more and more in-store conversions.
Street Fight Daily: AOL Takes Over Microsoft Display Ads, Uber Acquires Bing Mapping Assets
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… AOL in Deal With Microsoft to Take Over Display Ad Business (New York Times)… Uber Acquires Part Of Bing’s Mapping Assets, Will Absorb Around 100 Microsoft Employees (TechCrunch)… Toyota Gets Local, Uses Geo-Targeted Snapchat Ads (Ad Age)…
Report: What Local Merchants Are Missing With Social Media
Two-thirds of small local businesses are using social media for marketing. Yet despite this broad adoption, and an overall good perception of digital marketing effectiveness, results with social have been disappointing.
Is the On-Demand Economy a Local Media Growth Engine — Or Its Death Knell?
Local on-demand services continue to dominate press and investor attention. But the elephant in the room is the degree to which on-demand could displace local marketing as we know it.
6 Strategies for Forging Strategic Partnerships
We asked a few industry veterans to tell us everything they know about forming successful partnerships — from locating and reaching out to potential partners, to evaluating the benefits and ensuring that partnerships align for everyone involved.
Street Fight Daily: Report Slams Google Search, Airbnb Raises $1.5 Billion
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Study Suggests Google Harms Consumers by Skewing Search Results (Wall Street Journal)… Airbnb Worth $25.5 Billion After Raising a Massive $1.5 Billion Round (Business Insider)… Lyft Acqui-Hires The Team From Messaging App Leo To Improve Location And Other Features (TechCrunch)
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Meta Is Automating Ads, But Brands Still Face a Bigger Problem