Commentary
What Local Media Can Learn From the Royal Birth
Who is “royalty” in your community? It’s something news organizations big and small should know, because these are the people who make things happen — or not happen — in and around you. They are of the 1% that we speak of in the widening “us versus them” debate in our culture today. Their comings and goings can be real news, but their social activities and personal lives can also be news…
With Digital Video, Newspaper Companies Could Disrupt Local TV
Here’s what I think will happen. The local newspapers that are smart are already getting serious about creating video content. Some of them are beginning to figure out how to get that content to consumers via set-top boxes, and they will be the first to experiment with partnering with companies like Aereo instead of fighting them in court…
How Local Search Looks to the Rest of Us
It seems like many recent conversations, webinars, articles, and studies have pointed to the same conclusion: local search as an industry is insufficiently aware of how its products are actually used by consumers and small businesses. Many of the solutions put forward by consumer-facing local publishers and by business-facing services overestimate our appetite for new products and the amount of time and energy we want to spend using online tools…
Latest Posts
First Data, a Payment Processing Giant, Looks Beyond the Swipe
The largest payment processing company in the U.S. is officially in the marketing business. Last week, First Data Ventures, the payment processing giant’s venture wing, announced a partnership and strategic investment with social marketing platform LocalVox — the latest in a string of investments meant to help the payment processing giant enter new markets…
Street Fight Daily: Uber’s Delivery Service, Square Expands Cash Advances
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… With New Delivery Service, Uber Declares War on Google and Amazon (Wired)… Square Expands Its Cash Advance Service (New York Times)… Google Tests A New Local Knowledge Graph Interface (SearchEngineLand)…
6 Demand-Based Pricing Platforms for Restaurants
With the goal of maximizing revenue and keeping their tables filled throughout the day, restaurants are using hyperlocal marketing platforms to incentivize guest reservations during off-peak times. Here are six hyperlocal platforms that restaurants can use to implement demand-based pricing…
Street Fight Daily: Google Tracks Calls Online, Yahoo Partners With Media Consortium
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Lets Advertisers Track Phone Calls Generated From Websites (MarketingLand)… Local Media Consortium Partners With Yahoo (NetNewsCheck)… As Google Builds Out Own Content, Some Advertisers Feel Pushed Aside
(Wall Street Journal)…
Dstillery CEO: ‘Dirty Data’ in Mobile Ads as Serious as Click Fraud
Reports suggest that more than half of the the available mobile inventory that includes location data is incorrect. Tom Phillips, chief executive at Dstillery and an early whistleblower of online advertising fraud, says false location data in the mobile advertising industry poses as great of a threat to marketers as fraudulent traffic on the web…
Productivity Solution: Free Wireless Internet On-the-Go
FreedomPop, the nation’s first 100% free internet service provider, offers a nationwide hotspots that provides free wireless internet wherever you are. Simply turn on a FreedomPop hotspot and instantly connect to the internet. There are no contracts or cancellations fees. Get a special offer now…
Street Fight Daily: Lay’s Uber Picnic, Google Buys Jetpac
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Lay’s Is Launching an Urban Picnic, Brought to You by Uber (AdAge)… Google Buys Jetpac To Give Context To Visual Searches (TechCrunch)… Amazon’s Square-Like Payment System Could Be Data Goldmine (AdAge)…
As Franchises Bounce Back, A Golden Market for Local Tech Surfaces
A booming franchise sector presents a unique opportunity for hyperlocal firms to blend the scale and reach implicit in the digital marketplace with the granularity and flexibility afforded by mobile, social and other locally-driven platforms. What’s more, the franchise industry — with its unique combination of scale and fragmentation — could help provide a critical stepping stone for vendors to reach the small business market…
Streets Ahead: Google AI Mode , OpenAI & Commerce, TikTok