News and Analysis

Toys ‘R’ Us Foot Traffic Analysis Reveals Challenges in Smaller Markets

Share this:

The results of a new foot traffic analysis conducted by the location data firm Factual reveal that Toys “R” Us’ demise, while partly attributable to Amazon’s strength, could just as easily be blamed on stiff competition from within the brick-and-mortar retail market.

Street Fight Daily: Mobile Payments on the Rise, Facebook Use Unaffected By Scandal

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Use of Mobile Payments Up 30%… Facebook Hasn’t Felt ‘Any Meaningful Impact’ As Result of Scandal… How NBC Is Giving Partners the Most Comprehensive Understanding of Their Ad Exposures…

How Krave Jerky Used First-Party Location Data to Boost Brand Awareness

Share this:

Krave’s success at leveraging InMarket’s location-based marketing solutions offers “proof that high tech strategies aren’t just for high tech brands — all CPGs can take advantage of big data in 2018 in turnkey fashion,” says Dave Heinzinger, inMarket’s vice president of communications.

Commentary

True Innovation in Local News Organizations Still Lacking

Share this:

News sites need to innovate around their core competencies by spending time understanding their customers (advertisers and consumers) and what problems they can solve for them. The solutions should be a good fit for the organization and should be something that they are uniquely positioned in the marketplace to provide…

How Siri Works and Why It Matters for Local

Share this:

It’s pretty clear that Siri’s interpreter can examine a spoken query for syntax and keywords in order to trigger what it thinks is the most relevant web service. Often when Siri gets it wrong, this is because it has made a mistake about which service to call. In my experience, Siri is somewhat over-eager to assume you want local businesses when you say a word that sounds like a product or service category…

Waze Highlights Inconsistencies in Local Data

Share this:

There are too many different ways to categorize businesses, and none of them represents a unified standard for online search. Such a standard if widely implemented would make all businesses categorized as grocery stores line up neatly with each other and would provide a significant boost in overall relevancy…

Latest Posts

Control Group, a Dev Shop for the Real World, Rethinks Subway Navigation

Share this:

The agency is one of a handful of development and marketing companies to carve out a niche in bringing the web to the physical world. These companies are helping retailers, restaurants and a range of other organizations with a stake in a physical place to use connectivity to rethink the way we engage with the world around us…

LBMA Podcast: Square, LevelUp, and Thinknear’s Eli Portnoy

Share this:

Top stories of the week include Square and Bookfresh, CommuteStream, LevelUp and Foodler, Muber, SounderPoster 3.0, Amtrak, Caribou Coffee, IMGuest.com, Mastercard and Syniverse and Stylinity…

Street Fight Daily: Staples Ditches Bricks, Flickr Founder Goes Hyperlocal

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technologyStaples to Close 225 Stores as Sales Move Online (New York TimesS)… Flickr Co-Founder Seeks Another Hit With New Findery App (Reuters)… Yahoo Rolling Out Indoor Maps (SearchEngineLand)…

New Patch Owner Hale Running Company in ‘Lean, Entrepreneurial Mode’

Share this:

“There are lots of potential models, and there’s no reason to be ideological about finding the right match between models and communities,” says Hale. “The best thing for hyperlocal journalism is a sustainable business model.”

In the Age of Big Data, Sometimes a Phone Call Still Works Best

Share this:

More and more, marketers are turning to deep data analytics to measure the impact relative to a local marketing campaign. But call measurement provider Telmetrics says that value can still be delivered by paying attention to a more basic form of interaction: phone calls…

Street Fight Daily: Google Kills Offers, Foursquare Reveals Revenues

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technologyGoogle Shuts Down Self Serve Offers Product (Blumenthals)… Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley, Rebuffing Sale Offers, Says Revenues Grew 500% in Q1 2014, 600% In 2013 (TechCrunch)… Short-term Profit Taking vs. Long-term Value Creation: The Future of PayPal (LinkedIn)…

New Location-Based Services Are Poised to Enter the Mainstream

Share this:

To a surprising degree, the panels and presenters at Street Fight’s Local Data Summit last week in Denver emphasized a similar theme: we’re about to see a plethora of new technology-enhanced real-life experiences centering on ingenious uses of data. The signal feature this time around is an orientation toward experiences situated in a physical context. The question the new technologies will answer is this: “What do I need my technology to do for me now, in this place, at this time, under these circumstances?”

Can Renewed Coordination Prevent a Rollup in Local Media?

Share this:

Last week Google made news when the search giant struck a deal with the Local Media Consortium to power a private advertising exchange . Yesterday, Christian Hendricks, the Consortium’s chairman and a McClatchy executive, pitched the plan to a room of media executives, and made the case why the new consortium could succeed where it failed nearly a decade ago…

Street Fight Daily: RadioShack Shutters Stores, A Rollup in Food Delivery

Share this:

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technologyRadioShack Plans to Close Up to 1,100 Stores (Wall Street Journal)… With Eye On Growth, Just Eat Buys Meal2Go To Offer EPOS Tech To Its Takeaway Partners (TechCrunch)… NCR Updates Its iPad Cash Register With Loyalty Features (GigaOm)…

6 Call Monetization Platforms for SMBs

Share this:

Phone leads may not be glamorous or trendy, but they’re the backbone of local marketing strategy for millions of small businesses in the professional services, travel, auto, and insurance industries. $68 billion is spent annually on localized ads to generate these calls. Here are six call monetization vendors that businesses can work with…