News and Analysis
TVadSync and Unacast Partner for Cross-Platform TV/Digital Attribution
Unacast’s location data will allow TVadSync to prove with unprecedented accuracy that the campaigns it manages across TV and digital platforms are indeed driving exposed audiences to make purchases at brick-and-mortar stores.
Street Fight Daily: Groupon Puts Itself on the Market, Google Demoting All Slow Sites
The latest in local and hot takes on tech & marketing… Groupon Reportedly Puts Itself on the Market… Google Speed Update Is Now Being Released to All Users… Some of London’s Top Retailers Call for a Sales Tax on ‘Largely Online’ Rivals…
SMB Index Declines Slightly Over the Course of a Volatile June
June was a volatile month in the public markets, which saw the SurePath SMB Index give back 1.1%, after climbing 7.9% in May. Web.com led last month’s winners, leading the index with 31.5% growth in market cap following news of an acquisition offer.
Commentary
Local Media Companies Need to Evolve — And Do It Fast
Local media’s traditional big-man-on-campus chest-thumping doesn’t mean the same thing in digital that it does in the analog world. In fact, it’s downright laughable. So what do we do when we hit the wall, when we regularly miss revenue targets, when long term projections keep slipping more and more? So what do we do when we keep hiring more ad reps, only to discover that our revenue-per-rep begins to fall, when the evidence is undeniable that we’ve hit that wall? Here are five recommendations.
Why SMB Marketing Services Won’t Save Newspapers’ Bottom Line
Most newspapers aren’t building new and innovative tools to provide SMB services. Instead they are white labeling offerings from other providers or are connecting their audiences to an existing service. Over time, SMB tools are going to become a commodity. When someone who is still in high school can offer exactly what you are offering, you’re in trouble. With the high cost structures and overhead that newspapers have, being in a commodity business (where margins get pushed lower and lower) won’t prove lucrative in the end…
Why Hyperlocal Is Naturally Suited for Investigative Reporting
A new study by local media research/consulting firm AR&D and Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) reveals that investigative reporting is a big draw for consumers when it comes to media choice. Sixty-two precent said it was reason enough to follow a particular news organization, and it ranked only behind weather (54% preference) in terms of interest — and that interest is growing. Investigative reporting is plain old reporting. Period. And it begins with getting off the lazy and easy commodity news bandwagon and growing a reportorial spine…
Latest Posts
Daily Voice Expands Into Roger Ailes’ Territory
The Daily Voice has expanded to Putnam County in the Lower Hudson Valley, creating the regional corporate network’s 42nd site in the affluent suburban New York-Connecticut market. Tucker said Putnam Daily Voice’ was launched “with zero expansion” of staff, which includes eight reporters covering a number of communities in the New York-Connecticut suburbs…
Street Fight Daily: Andrew Mason’s Next Big Thing, Square Bets on Chips
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Groupon Founder’s Next Big Plan: Audio Walking Tours (Businessweek)…Square Bets Big on Next-Gen Credit Card Tech (Wired)… Payments Giant First Data Acquires Gyft in an Effort to Bring Digital Gift Cards to the Masses (Pando)…
10 Years in, Yelp Turns a Profit
Yelp is now in the black. The company beat analysts’ expectations, reporting better-than-expected revenues Wednesday with strong top-line growth and a million dollars in profit for the first time in its history…
The Impact of Google’s Local Update Is Still a Developing Story
Google seems to be experimenting with driving more traffic to its local competition, meaning that it’s more important than ever for a business to secure its presence across a broad base of directories. The value proposition of local SEO does not change in a fundamental way, given that Google has long used citation consistency as a prominent local ranking signal…
Study: Consumers Increasingly Receptive to Mobile Ads
A new study released by xAd and Telmetrics finds that consumer engagement with mobile ads has increased dramatically over the past few years. Nearly 50% of mobile shoppers said that they found mobile ads informative/helpful — up from 22% in 2013. In addition, nearly half of respondents who clicked on mobile ads said they went on to take secondary actions (like viewing a website or searching for additional information)…
The Data, Apps, and Science of Successful Marketing
VentureBeat’s inaugural event on the future of marketing tech — is gathering the industry’s biggest names at the Hotel Nikko in San Francisco on Aug. 5-6 to uncover new case studies, insights, and strategies designed to help companies more effectively acquire and retain customers and grow revenue. Click for more info and a discount code…
Apple Will Beef Up Privacy in iOS 8 — Here’s What It Means for Local
When Apple unveiled iOS 8 last month, only brief mentions were made of iBeacon, the company’s much-hyped proximity messaging protocol. But early versions of the software released to developers in July suggest that the forthcoming operating system could include changes with implications for stakeholders across the commerce, advertising, and retail technology industries…
5 Tools for Cross-Device Ad Targeting
Ad targeting was relatively straightforward back when consumers relied exclusively on their desktops to consume online content. But as the number of gadgets owned by consumers has increased over time, ad targeting has become considerably more complicated. Here are five companies that offer cross-device tracking for advertisers…
Street Fight Daily: Zillow Buys Trulia for $3.5B, Yelp Adds Videos to Reviews
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Zillow to Buy Trulia for $3.5 Billion in All-Stock Deal (New York Times)… Yelp’s Newest Feature Adds Videos To Your Restaurant Reviews (BusinessInsdier)… Startups Uber and Airbnb Court Business Travelers (Wall Street Journal)…
Street Fight’s Big 3
Street Fight Columns
Street Fight Categories
Why MULOs Need a Localized Unstructured Citation Strategy