Commentary
What Motivates Yelp’s Power Users?
In an effort to dig a little deeper into what motivates Elite Squad-ers and other active Yelp users — beyond the free beer and crudités — Street Fight spoke with three power users who approach the service with differing goals in mind, but all of whom view Yelp as an integral part of their decision-making process.
Why Facebook Killed ‘Deals’
Mark Zuckerberg has said that Facebook operates on the premise that “everything is more fun when it’s social.” In his mind, things like music, photos, events and even simple thoughts, were inherently more enjoyable when shared with others. It’s precisely for this reason that I believe the company killed its Deals service…
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Street Fight Daily: OpenTable Bets On Mobile, ReachLocal President Resigns
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology… OpenTable Bets On Mobile App To Drive Revenue (Reuters)… More Exec Changes at ReachLocal (LocalOnliner)… Will ZIP-Level Targeting Help Twitter Gain New SMB Advertisers (Screenwerk)…
Winding Down Investment In Patch, AOL Writes Off Millions
AOL revenues fell sharply in the third quarter due to large writeoffs related to the continued challenges at the company’s hyperlocal news network Patch. During an earnings call Tuesday, the company said it took a $19 million charge due to recent restructuring costs at the hyperlocal media division as well as a $25 million charge related to non-cash asset impairment, or decrease in the valuation, of the project…
Groupon Defends Branded Keyword Practice
A spokesperson for Groupon yesterday defended the company’s practice of buying branded keywords to promote discounts run for clients, telling Street Fight that most clients wants as much reach as possible. Some in the local marketing industry have criticized the practice lately, arguing that the deals company may be cannibalizing merchants’ potential sales by promoting discounts to users who were already looking for the business while diverting customers away from the merchant’s existing site…
Constant Contact Rolls Out Digital Coupons for SMBs
Email marketing giant Constant Contact has rolled out a new coupon feature as part of its growing online marketing tools platform. The new service makes it possible for small businesses to offer discounts based on a given set of criteria such as increasing revenue and attracting long-term customers, within a single integrated resource…
How Online Review Sites Can Regain Consumers’ Trust
As long as there are economic incentives to create bogus reviews, unscrupulous people and businesses will continue to exploit the platforms that make it easy to deceive. For the local players seeking to help users in selecting a great business, use the offline world as a guide. Require an identity, build communities of real people sharing advice, and give legitimate customers a megaphone to honestly rate the service received…
Street Fight Daily: Square’s Ecommerce Push, Waze Data In Google Maps
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology… Square’s Quiet E-Commerce Threat (BusinessWeek)… Waze Data Is Starting To Show Up In Google Maps (BuzzFeed)… Selling By Groupon Insiders, Like Big News, Is On Way (USAToday)…
Is Groupon’s Deal Marketplace Undermining Merchants?
It has been my understanding that the purpose of daily deals is purely customer acquisition — to bring in new customers, not to target your existing ones. With the new marketplace focus, however, it seems as though this is no longer the case. I recently did a search for some of Groupon’s top NYC marketplace offers and I found that the company seems to be cannibalizing the local businesses’ existing customers by using Google AdWords to bid on nearly every Marketplace deal’s local business name…
Why Fixing Local Marketing Means Making Tech Disappear
Today, the local web — the network of technologies that help business and consumer interact locally — is far too opaque. Amid the rush to innovate and revolutionize the way we buy or sell goods locally, the industry has amassed a muddled soup of software that’s marked more by it’s complexity than its capability. If the last decade was about building the technologies that bring our local experiences online, the next ten years will focus on making those technologies go away…
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