News and Analysis

xAd Introduces Pay-for-Performance Model, Guaranteeing Offline Store Visits

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Location intelligence company xAd today launched a new media buying model called “Cost Per Visit,” which is intended to ensure offline visits at stores by customers — and offer better ROI for brands. Marketers who use “Cost Per Visit” only pay when targeted customers physically go to a store after seeing a mobile ad.

Google’s AMP Pages Speed Mobile, But Publisher Control Remains a Big Issue

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Mobile page-loading issues are so pervasive that 59% of users click off content that takes more than three seconds to load, costing news publishers numerous opportunities to lengthen pageviews into sessions and monetize their articles and videos. Google’s AMP addresses the problem, but at what cost?

Street Fight Daily: Walmart Acquires ModCloth, Marketing Tactics Divide Consumers by Generation

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Millenials Follow Brands; Gen-Xers, Contests; Boomers, Promotions… Walmart is Acquiring ModCloth, the Online Women’s Fashion Retailer… Introducing Marketing-Stack Management, Powered by Enterprise Machine Learning…

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Case Study: The Benefit of Being First

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Amsterdam Falafelshop in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington, D.C., has been first with a handful of deals companies, including Scoutmob and LivingSocial Instant Deals when each rolled out. Now, it’s first with Google Offers. A seasoned deals customer, Amsterdam has not seen much differentiation among the companies. Their pitches are similar and their results are similar. Only their payments differ, slightly. “But we like to partner with people who are starting out. … Once you’ve been around for awhile, we don’t really need to help you. You’ve got your shit together.”

Street Fight Daily: 09.15.11

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

Groupon is planning to put its initial public offering back on track even as markets remain rocky. After postponing presentations to potential investors early this month, the online coupon giant is now aiming to go public in late October or early November, according to people briefed on the matter. (New York Times/Dealbook)…

Foursquare’s magical tool that will allow developers to build apps that can remind you to buy milk when you walk past the grocery store or notify you when a friend is in the area is being publicly released. (BetaBeat)…

Where a Yahoo-AOL Merger Would Leave Patch

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Rumors surfaced again last week that AOL and Yahoo were in talks to merge. Where would such a move leave Patch? Or Yahoo’s own local efforts? It all makes for compelling drama for sure, but one area likely to ‘pop’ in both categories is ‘local’ — i.e. Patch, Yahoo’s ‘Neighbors’ beta product, and a litany of other products on each side that are heavily reliant on local advertisers and audiences…

BIA/Kelsey: U.S. Deals Marketplace to Hit $4.2B by 2015

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The daily deals industry in the U.S. is growing so quickly that local media research firm BIA/Kelsey has revised its March 2011 forecast to reflect the expanded market. The revised report — which measures daily deals, flash sales and instant deals in a single metric — finds that consumer spending on deals will grow from last year’s figure of $873 million to $4.2 billion by 2015. This is a bump up from their March estimate of $3.9 billion (for 2015), and now represents a 36.7% compound annual growth rate…

Street Fight Daily: 09.14.11

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

Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman claims that a 54% traffic growth this year has led the service to 63 million monthly unique visits. 21 million reviews grace the site and the app, and 1 million are being added every 30 days. He also calls Google’s acquisition of Zagat “a funny move. (The Next Web)…

Groupon’s Chinese joint venture Gaopeng is not doing so well. It has apparently closed 10 offices and fired at as many as 400 employees over the past three months. (ReadWriteWeb)…

Can Hyperlocals Help Solve the Jobs Problem?

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The stock market is falling, Europe is teetering and for many Americans, there are few jobs in sight. On Monday, the National Association of Business Economics issued a report underscoring what many Americans already know: jobs aren’t coming back in any substantial way any time soon. The panel of 52 economics experts said they expected GDP to grow just 1.5% this year, too low to move the needle on the 9% unemployment rate…

Case Study: Creating Loyalty Program on the Cheap Using Check-Ins

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The game dynamics of location-based services like SCVNGR aren’t just for consumers’ kicks. Fajitas & ‘Ritas proprietor Brad Fredericks in Boston, for one, has paired SCVNGR, as well as its spinoff service, LevelUp, with social advertising company LocalResponse to create a loyalty program that rewards customers for repeat visits. And if anyone’s counting, LevelUp is winning by at least a mile…

Street Fight Daily: 09.13.11

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

With Foursquare having won the battle for the check in, Gowalla has undergone a serious transformation. Technically version 4.0, the new version bears little resemblance to the previous versions of the app. Gowalla is no longer predominantly a check-in service. That’s still one aspect of it, but the idea is now to focus on two key areas: travel and storytelling. (TechCrunch)…

The daily deals market is still a bit chaotic, but it’s opening up opportunities for companies that can make sense of it all. That’s true of CityPockets, which offers a digital wallet for storing past deal offers as well as a secondary market for buying and selling discounts. (GigaOm)…

Loopt CEO: Turning the Deal Around

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When Loopt introduced its new U-Deals program earlier this year, our guest columnist, Doug Stephens hailed the concept as a “profound” shift in the consumer dynamic. Street Fight recently caught up with Loopt’s founder and CEO Sam Altman to talk about U-Deals, location privacy, and where he sees location-based services headed.

Foursquare’s Merchant API Lays Groundwork for Monetization

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Amid the fanfare over Foursquare’s new features, the July release and August update of the company’s Merchant API went largely unnoticed. Eric Friedman, Foursquare’s director of business development, talks about why the offering marks a big step toward improving merchant services and laying the groundwork for future monetization.