News and Analysis

Local Marketing on Alexa? The Real Estate Industry Gives It a Shot

There are almost 40 real estate “skills” currently listed in Alexa’s directory. This is greater than those related to lawyers/attorneys, doctors/dentists, and a host of other SMB categories, and overall there doesn’t yet appear to be much adoption of voice technology at the local business level.

JCPenney’s Outgoing Mobile Chief: Digital Integration Vital for Retail Brands

“The most exhilarating thing about being in mobile is that it’s ever-changing. The traditional way of doing retail is dying; you have to reinvent yourself to stay relevant,” James Meeks, former head of mobile at JCPenney, told Street Fight.

Street Fight Daily: Yelp Fights Companies Soliciting Reviews, Snap Reckons with Post-IPO Disaster

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Yelp Increasingly Cracking Down on ‘Review Solicitation’… Snapchat Is Having a Crisis of Confidence. So Are Investors… Postmates Launches Grocery Service, Scheduled Deliveries, and Revamped App…

Latest Posts

Edo Bucks Trend, Expands Into Local

As firms like Group Commerce pull out of the local market, others like Edo are moving in the opposite direction.The company, which syndicates card-linked offers to financial institutions like Ally Bank and Fifth Third, has hooked up with local reseller 2Go Media to open its network to local merchants through a simplified version of its enterprise platform…

The Local Conundrum: Rich Content or Accurate Information?

Google may have thought that situating local within Google+ would somehow obviate the need to fix it, but the presence of engaging content does nothing to modify the basic requirement that information services provide useful information. Perversely, information services spend too much time pretending they are content services but offer none of the openness of those services where it’s really needed…

With Abraham Out, What’s Next for eBay Local?

Earlier this week eBay announced that it had parted ways with Jack Abraham, the founder of Milo (which eBay acquired two years ago) and a centerpiece of the web giant’s blistering push into the local space. Abraham’s departure leaves a vacancy at one of the more important positions in the hyperlocal ecosystem and presents questions about the evolving structure of eBay’s off-line commerce efforts….

Why OpenTable’s Foodspotting Buy Is Good for Restaurants

Foodspotting, a provider of a food-sharing and recommendations app, announced yesterday that it would be acquired by reservations company OpenTable for $10 million. While the two services seem quite different (one is for reservations and the other is a social network organized around food) the acquisition could mean good things for both companies as well as local restaurants….

Street Fight Daily: Intuit’s New Direction, Fousquare’s New Business App

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Intuit’s New Payments Directions In NFC, Passbook And Facebook Revealed In 20+ New Products (TechCrunch)… Foursquare’s New App Is Open for Business (AllThingsD)… Belly Bites is Free Sampling for Local Merchants Done Right (PandoDaily)…

#SFSNYC VIDEOS: Panels and Presentations From Our Recent NYC Summit

It’s been a couple of weeks since we gathered hundreds of hyperlocal industry execs in New York at the Street Fight Summit, but we’re still sifting through a lot of the ideas and inspiration that emerged from those few days. We’ve uploaded video clips of nearly all the onstage presentations and panels and are happy to share them with you…

6 Indoor Navigation Platforms for Retailers

Nearly three-quarters of consumers with smartphones say they would rather use their mobile devices inside a store than ask an associate for help. Here are six platforms that merchants of all sizes can use to help customers find products on store shelves and perhaps complete more transactions…

Street Fight Daily: Abraham Leaves eBay, Opentable Acquires Foodspotting

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.eBay Loses Head of Local Jack Abraham (Fortune)… OpenTable to Acquire Foodspotting for $10 Million (The New York Times)… Why the Future of Local-Mobile Advertising Is Not What You May Think (Screenwerk)…

What Multilocation Brands Need to Do to Prepare for Facebook’s Graph Search

National brands have invested nearly all their Facebook resources in building and supporting brand pages for the purpose of publishing content and managing customer relationships at the corporate level. But these brands don’t do business at the corporate level.They do business at the local level through large, brick-and-mortar networks. When it comes to Graph Search, these physical locations and their corresponding local Facebook pages are what really matter…

Bringing SMB Point-of-Sale Systems to the Cloud

The introduction of SaaS POS has broad implications, not only for payment firms like Square, but also a host of other loyalty and lead generation start-ups that have worked to tie into the point of sale over the past 18 months. It brings scalable access to real-time data on nearly every inch of local retailers’ operations, not only accelerating existing sectors like loyalty and rewards but opening new opportunities for key services like live inventory search…