News and Analysis

Street Fight Daily: Inside Uber/Lyft Funding War, Small Brands Hit Roadblock on Instagram

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Funding Talks at Uber and Lyft Complicate Ride-Hailing Allegiance… Small Brands Are Finding It Harder to Get Verified on Instagram… Never Mind GDPR, Here Comes Apple’s Intelligent Tracking…

Street Culture: Blind References Help Weed Out Drama at Zaius

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“In the hiring process, we often use the terms ‘smart, hungry, and humble,’” says Zaius CEO Mark Gally. “This notion of being humble is really a critical component of culture. We don’t take ourselves seriously, but we take our work extremely seriously.”

LBMA Podcast: Facebook, KFC China, Verizon

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This Week in Location Based Marketing is a weekly video podcast from the Location Based Marketing Association with Asif Khan and Aubriana Lopez. On the show: Wasteless, Hong Kong tourism, Nestle Purina PetCare, Gravy Analytics + V12. Special Guest: Casey Binkley from Hauler Ads.

Latest Posts

DataSphere Adds Belo to Its Community News Clients

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Hyperlocal middleman DataSphere has added Belo Corp. and 14 of its TV stations in top markets to its client list of broadcast chains who have gone digital at the community level. The Belo markets that DataSphere will serve with tech and sales services include Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, Seattle/Tacoma and Phoenix…

Street Fight Daily: Waze Helps FEMA, Springer Continues Classifieds Push

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.How Waze’s Crowd-Sourced Data Helped FEMA Deliver the Gas After Sandy (GigaOm)… Buying Another Classified Site, Springer Sees Digital Filling Print Gap (Paid Content)… Tree Maps and Dwindling Cigarettes: One Hyperlocal Site’s Approach to Sandy (The New York Observer)…

AOL: Patch Remains on Path to Profitability, Expenses Cut 30%

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During its Q3 earnings call Tuesday, the company reassured investors that the hyperlocal network remained on track to achieve run-rate profitability by Q4 2013, driven by, what AOL COO Artie Minson called, continued revenue growth and “an expense base that was 30% lower than last year.”

How One Hyperlocal Editor and His Site Chased, and Were Chased by, Sandy

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When a gigantic “frankenstorm” knocks out the power for your reporters and many other contributors, how can a hyperlocal site keep its coverage online and help its community? Here’s how The Alternative Press, the 19-site, 34-community network in suburban New Jersey, did it last week under the direction of founding editor and publisher Mike Shapiro.

Memo to Google: Solve the Local Data Problem With Local Data

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I think we can now state definitively that the big upsurge in claimed listings that might have occurred as a result of Google’s choice to embed local listings within its social network, a little over five months ago, will not happen on its own. Rather than achieving Facebook levels of adoption, Google+ Local is still an arena where participation depends heavily on early adopters as well as the assistance of local SEO consultants and companies like mine…

Street Fight Daily: Local Mobile Spend Jumps, Foursquare Rethinks Ratings

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology.Mobile Local Ad Spend to Hit $5.8B in 2016 (NetNewsCheck)… Beyond 5 Stars: Foursquare Looks For A Smarter Way To Rate Businesses(Fast Company)… Groupon’s One-Year Anniversary Feels More Like a Funeral. So What’s Next for Daily Deals? (Venture Beat)…

Local Corp. Survey: SMBs ‘Cautiously Optimistic’

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A new survey released by Local Corporation has found that 92% of small business owners are influenced by the national economy. In recent months, 46% have considered raising prices, while 40% have considered cutting back on marketing. Local Corporation CEO Heath Clarke says the uncertain economic climate has focused SMBs on getting the most ROI for their marketing dollars.

Managing Through Crisis: Yext, Patch & GramercyOne in Superstorm Sandy

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We asked three hyperlocal companies based in New York City, Patch, GramercyOne and Yext, to share the details on how they dealt with Superstorm Sandy. Their experiences shared the same urgency around helping their employees find shelter and safety. But they way they kept the day-to-day work going differed, largely reflecting the differences in their businesses: while Yext set up temporary headquarters in Times Square; Patch told everyone to stay home and kept operations humming with a remote workforce; meanwhile, GramercyOne leaned on tools that didn’t require location or physical presence.

Inside Patch During Superstorm Sandy

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In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, a big news event for hyperlocal publishers, we asked Patch’s chief content officer Rachel Feddersen to give us the scoop on how the AOL unit managed its own business during the storm: “When my colleagues and I weren’t able to commute to the city during the storm and in the days following, we just joined our field work force.”

From (Temporary) Yext HQ During Superstorm Sandy

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When the power went out on Yext’s offices in Chelsea Market in New York City, the team scrambled to find new work space and take care of its employees. Event halls where conferences had been canceled delivered even more space than the company had in its permanent offices, and employees were put up in hotels so that they were free to focus on work instead of water and power. “People were happy to get back together, and the atmosphere is very focused.”