News and Analysis

Follow-Up Thoughts on the SMB Marketing/Operations Universe

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“Regardless of the right package, the key for both agencies and small businesses is to choose best-of-breed components in each galaxy that integrate with each other so that you can add relevant and profitable services over time,” David Mihm says to Mike Blumenthal in their bi-weekly column.

Dr. Soon-Shiong and His New ‘Patient,’ the L.A. Times: Will His Rx Be ‘Local’?

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My hunch is that Patrick Soon-Shiong will find that applying advanced technology to local news is not as challenging as conquering cancer, especially if he listens to what Angelinos say is their biggest concern by a wide margin – getting from their home to work or other day-to-day destinations.

Street Fight Daily: Facebook Sheds Young Users, Brands Move Marketing In-House

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Facebook Is Shedding Those Coveted Gen-Z Users… 56% of Brands Plan to Move More Marketing In-House… What It Would Take for Amazon to Become FedEx or UPS…

Commentary

Delivering Local Deals: It’s All About the Data

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It’s become clear that the two hottest areas of digital media — deals and mobile — are colliding. Mobile payments (i.e. Google Wallet) are meanwhile closing the loop on decades-old deal redemption and tracking challenges. This has led to another important variable: Data. More specifically, mobile payment technologies open the door for more comprehensive consumer purchase data, which can fold back into the equation for more targeted deal delivery…

How to Use Flipboard to Create a Killer DIY Hyperlocal Publication in 5 Minutes

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For anyone who owns an iPad, it’s no surprise that Flipboard is a breakthrough. The one-year-old application allows you to instantly turn any news site, social feed, or photo stream into a slick, tablet-optimized, ad-free magazine — a pretty neat parlor trick. Apple selected it as their app of the year and Time listed it as one of their top 50 innovations of 2010…

The Hyperlocal Journalist and the Salesperson

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“I worry about the future of my profession when I see large segments of the online news industry failing to rigorously test the kinds of revenue models journalism needs to survive,” writes CJR’s Michael Meyer, who runs the News Frontier Database. “Taking our content seriously is a basic requirement, but are we taking ourselves (or even readers) seriously if we’re not wholly committed to monetizing it?”

Latest Posts

Mobile Payments Startup Flint Raises $6 Million in Series B Round

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Flint wants to tap into local commerce by bringing payment processing, and basic marketing capabilities, to mobile — without a dongle. The Redwood-based company announced a $6 million series B round of funding at Street Fight Summit this morning to expand its solution, led by Digicel Group with additional funding from SVG Venture…

Openings and New Hires at Tribune, Trulia, Moasis, Twitter

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Every two weeks, Search Influence’s Kelly Benish — who knows practically everyone in hyperlocal — covers some of the latest job changes taking place in this dynamic industry. In this week’s edition, new hires and jobs at Groupon, VendAsta, MOGL, Leaf, and more…

LBMA Podcast: Zumigo, Mobiquity, and the Explosion of Wearables

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On the show: Zumigo uses location to combat payment fraud from the phone; Mobiquity Networks brings proximity marketing to broadway; Shazam breaks into bricks and mortar; Trafi helps map the unmapped; Google gets deeper into NSA territory; and Asda brings 3D printing to the grocery store…

LivingSocial CEO: Our Business Isn’t ‘Daily Deals,’ It’s Ad Dollars

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“We realized with the asset base that we had that we should be able to do other things and leverage it into new areas,” said Tim O’Shaughnessy at Street Fight Summit on Thursday in New York. “How do we take the hundreds of thousands of merchants that we work with, the tens of millions of customers that we have, this big salesforce, and a technology team and figure out new ways to get customers through the doors of merchants.”

Street Fight Daily: Uber’s Regulator Fight Continues, Google’s New Take On Self-Service

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technologyWhy Is Uber Fighting a Regulatory Battle That It Already Won? (AllThingsD)… Google Updates Its Self-Service Offers Tool (TheNextWeb)… Square’s Credit Card Payments Are Great, But Here’s What The Company Actually Does Best (Business Insider)…

For Groupon, Resurgence Is In The Numbers

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Even as investors interest in daily deals company has waned, the game is not over for Groupon, and others in the deals space. After a calamitous 2012 , the company has bounced backed in 2013 thanks, in part, to a rise in the number of merchants offering longer-running, recurring campaigns instead of one-off deals, according to Jim Moran, co-founder at Yipit, who gave the afternoon keynote at Street Fight Summit in New York on Thursday…

In Race to Go Local, Brands Push Ahead Cautiously

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There’s been a quiet emigration in the local technology world away from the mom-and-pop market, with startups and existing players alike moving upstream to bigger brands with more. During a panel at Street Fight Summit in New York Thursday, executives from Groupon, YP, and the well-funded upstart Brand Networks sat down with AdAge’s Michael Learmonth to talk about the growing interest in local among brands, and the limitations that are holding them back…

Who’s The Future Of Local Search? The Consumer.

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As more and more consumers look to buy, as well as find and discover local businesses, online, the industry has evolved. During a panel at Street Fight Summit in New York Thursday, panelists from Yelp, Bing, and Yext gathered to discuss the evolving role of commerce in the local search industries, and strategies for the industry to adapt…

What Brands Are Doing Wrong On Mobile

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As consumers spend more time using mobile devices than browsing the web and even watching television, a mobile strategy isn’t an opportunity; it’s a matter of survival, says Urban Airship chief marketing officer Brent Hieggelke. During a keynote at Street Fight Summit in New York Thursday, Hieggelke argued that brands need to change the way they approach mobile, shifting from looking at the platform as yet another marketing channel to treating it as a central tool in creating a better consumer experience…

Riverhead Local Revenues Show Hyperlocal Display Ads Still Have Life

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Some local media observers say display ads don’t work anymore. But don’t tell that to Riverhead Local’s Denise Civiletti. In this wide-ranging Q&A she talks about why display continues to be the major revenue source for her site, and why she still believes “local doesn’t scale.”