News and Analysis
Street Fight Daily: Postmates Sheds Employees, What Oath CEO Learned from Leading Patch
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Postmates Laid Off All Its Cities Managers This Week… What Oath CEO Tim Armstrong Learned from Patch’s Struggles… Amazon Pumps Resources into Alexa to Maintain Dominance as Competition Heats Up…
Case Study: How an Unusual, Soft-Sell Sponsored Post Turned Readers Into Customers
“I tried to think about everything I hated about sponsored posts and do the opposite,” says Aaron Seyedian, the founder of Well Paid Maids. “As a reader, I find that sponsored posts on blogs are often lengthy, impersonal and overly centered on sales. I set out to write a post that would be succinct and personal.”
Latest Posts
Topix Expands Emphasis on Local Races in Runup to Election
With just a couple of weeks remaining until the election, hyperlocal news aggregator Topix is going all in — covering the smaller elections that don’t get national press or, for that matter, any press at all. In July, the company recruited David Marks from Politico to be editor-in-chief of its local politics coverage. Last week, the company launched a new offering that gives a granular look at local races. Street Fight recently caught up with Topix CEO Chris Tolles to talk about his site’s deepening focus on local politics…
Place Off: A Week in the Life of the Mobile Local Revolution
A couple columns back, I covered the collision of big data, mobile and local (please refrain from acronyms… “BiDaLoMo”!). That covered some location analytics players like JiWire and Sense Networks. But since then, the action has picked up. In the last week alone, I’ve had in-depth conversations with others defining this space including Placed, PlaceIQ, and Telenav…
Getting ‘Real-Time’ Into Hyperlocal Advertising
We’ve seen a demand to not only bring local advertisers back into the mix on mobile and online advertising, but a need to provide more relevant and more timely information within those ads. This is because consumers crave “new” at a pace never possible before now – and this desire shows in the response rates measured in multiples of a standard static banner ad…
Sense CEO: SMBs Must Reach Consumers at Decision-Making Points
“The mobile experience is a very personal interaction with the consumer.” says Sense Networks CEO David Petersen. “It’s one that you can interact with consumers and lots of times, when they’re on the go. I think it’s less formal than online. I think it’s a great medium for connecting with consumers and I think today it’s also exceptionally cheap.”
SFD: DNAinfo.com Heads to Chicago, Slow Adoption of Mobile Payments
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal content, commerce, and technology...
Hyperlocal News Site DNAinfo.com Readies November Launch in Chicago (Crain’s Chicago Business)…
Mobile Payments: A Solution in Search of a Problem? (CNET)…
Google’s Woes Show Mobile Isn’t Just a Facebook Problem (Wired)…
True Innovation in Local News Organizations Still Lacking
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…
Broadcastr’s Lindenbaum on ‘Putting the Web Back Into the World’
“The expectation for discovery of content is one that continues to rise,” says the company’s co-founder. “At a certain point people are expecting content that is perfect for them to just already be there for them. So, the more factors we can take into consideration in order to deliver on those expectations, the better we’re going to be. Location is one of those things”
Openings & New Hires at Constant Contact, Facebook, Groupon & More
Ever more personnel changes at Groupon, a new hire at Constant Contact, plus shifts across the industry in business development, sales and product management. On the move this week: Dalip Tyagi, Shagun Vatsa, Joshua Scherman, Sean Smyth, and more. Openings at Yext, Yahoo, Ebay, LinkedIn, Manta and more…
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