News and Analysis

Borrell: Too Many Local Newspapers Remain Stuck in Their Newsroom ‘Church’

Facebook collected $13.6 billion in local ad spending in the U.S. in 2016, according to the report — more than all local media put together — $12 billion. The report says Facebook, Google and other global pureplays will continue to dominate digital ad revenue that comes from merchants and other businesses at the community level.

Street Fight Daily: SMBs Struggle with Social, Pinterest’s Appeal for Brands Climbs

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Small Businesses Are Missing the Boat on Social… Pinterest is Quietly Gaining a Foothold Among Marketers… WaWa, Walgreens and Others Try to Clean Bad Map Data…

Street Fight Daily: Twitter Boosts Brands, Facebook Equips Publishers with Data-Based Ad Tools

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Twitter Created an Ad Format to Help Brands Directly Message Users… New Facebook Tool Handles Media Companies’ Video Ad Sales… Uber to Repay Millions to Drivers, Who Could Be Owed More…

Latest Posts

Street Fight Daily: 01.09.12

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...

Microsoft Finally Dumps Deal Provider Now Owned by Google (AllThingsD)…

Groupon’s New Year’s Resolution? To Make Money on Yours! (AllThingsD)…

Politicians’ Spending on Digital Ads Skyrockets (Mashable)…

In 2012: Local Loyalty Flameout, 2nd Wave of Hyperlocal News Sites

Last column, I wrote a quick end-of-year wish list for hyperlocal advertising and related matters. This column, since it’s already far too late to make predictions, I am going to go ahead and make some. Because, I think, 2012 will be a year of many changes for hyperlocal. Post-haste, here are my three predictions.

Local Quotables: Moyal, Mims, Tolles, Lessin and more…

As the first week of 2012 commences, everyone is speculating about what will happen this year in the hyperlocal industry. Jonathan Moyal sees Lucky Ant helping communities play a bigger role in local business. Jeremy Mims predicts growth for Groupon and Michelle Jones hopes to create an alternative to Yelp. Also, Sam Lessin describes how Facebook’s check-in with timelines is an entirely new kind of LBS and more.

PODCAST: This Week in Location-Based Marketing — LBS in 2012

In this episode of This Week in Location Based Marketing, a video podcast from the Location Based Marketing Association, hosts Rob Woodbridge and Asif Khan try to make sense of the rapid-paced location based world that was 2011 and cobble together a few thoughts on what 2012 will look like…

Street Fight Daily: 01.06.12

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...

Armstrong: ‘Really Large Amount’ of Patches to Be Profitable by End of 2013 (Dow Jones Newswires)…

GoLocal24 Expands Into Massachusetts, Hires Veteran Newscaster (Boston Globe)…

Groupon Still Chasing $25 Billion Mirage (Forbes)…

Case Study: Delaware Coffee Shop Sees 50% Return for Daily Deal Customers

At The Java House Café in Middletown, Del., (pop. 18,871), Cleo Clarke has run promotions with a couple of daily deals sites. She’s managed to turn 50% of those group coupon buyers into repeat customers. Clarke is now exploring Foursquare as a way to tap into her tech-savvy customer base — 90% of whom currently use smartphones…

Local Spend on Social Media to Increase Seven-Fold by 2016

A new report from Borrell Associates indicates that local merchant spending — not simply presence — on social media will explode over the next four years. Total local online social spend is estimated to grow from $1.1 billion in 2011 to $7.8 billion in 2016, with the local’s share of the total spend doubling from 12 percent to 24 percent over the same period…

Street Fight Daily: 01.05.12

A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...

Groupon Merchant Center Now Shows If Customers Love or Hate Your Deals (TechCrunch)…

Groupon’s Drop Below IPO Price Reflects Daily-Deal Risks (Bloomberg BusinessWeek)…

PayPal: Mobile Payments and Location-based Offers Go Hand-in-Hand (GigaOm)…

The Problem With Local Online Advertising — It’s Ugly

Advertising can really be an eyesore, and a lot of local online advertising elicits consumer aversion. It’s only a matter of time before it becomes obvious to local merchants that bombarding local residents with “visual pollution” in the form of banner ads on hyperlocal sites is on the way out…

Case Study: Southwest Airlines’ Time Limits on LBS

Platforms like Foursquare and Facebook haven’t had any trouble attracting attention from national brands, but what’s the secret to attracting interest from these brands in lesser-known start-ups? According to Southwest Airlines emerging media specialist Christi McNeill, it all comes down to persistence, innovation, and a little bit of hand-holding…