News and Analysis

How Publishers Can Improve Their Revenue — Ezoic’s Experts Spell It Out

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Local news publishers are often able to pull together a decent share of pageviews in their communities — but many can’t wring enough revenue out of them. For practical solutions, I went to two experts at Ezoic, whose artificial-intelligence platform aims at helping its thousands of publisher clients to deliver better user experiences.

Street Fight Daily: IBM and Salesforce Share AI Tech, Consumers Still Tepid About Connected Home

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A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… IBM and Salesforce Will Start Sharing Their AI Technology… Most Consumers Not Turned On By Connected Home, Study Finds… Mobile World Congress 2017: Main Enterprise Themes…

Why Google Is Becoming the ‘New Homepage’ for SMBs

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“So many things are happening right on Google; clicks to call, driving directions, etc., and even more so than a website,” Mike Blumenthal tells David Mihm. “For a business to do well there, things like photos, reviews (everywhere) and other visuals are becoming ever more important.”

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Street Fight Daily: 08.10.11

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

SinglePlatform has raised another $3.25 million to launch new products. “If you want to monetize local, you will need to go through SinglePlatform one day, because they’ll own the best, trusted relationship with the merchant,” a confident venture capitalist says. (Business Insider)…

One year after the launch of TBD, the local news project barely exists. Journal Register’s Steve Buttry quietly lifts a glass to his TBD colleagues and shares some lessons for other digital pioneers from his TBD experience. (SteveButtry.com)…

LivingSocial Data Shows Which Deals Are Hottest

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When the clock is ticking, deal hounds prefer yoga to pizza, Botox to the zoo, and massages to pretty much everything. In a study released by LivingSocial yesterday, the daily deals company gave a snapshot of its U.S. sales data collected during the second quarter of 2011. “We really wanted to share with everyone the trends which we are seeing,” says LivingSocial Communications Director Maire Griffin about the report…

Case Study: Daily Deal Pitches Overwhelm SF Restaurateur

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If daily deals haven’t already reached a tipping point, then San Francisco restaurateur Joe Hargrave believes that day is coming soon. The Tacolicious owner gets between four and nine pitches from daily deal salespeople each month. He struggles to understand why businesses would want to target potential customers who are only after a good deal…

Street Fight Daily: 08.09.11

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

Bloomspot has secured $40 million in new funding. The company focuses on offers from high-quality merchants looking to connect with their best customers and deepen loyalty. The offers they serve are highly tailored for specific interests and demographics. (TechCrunch)…

In its quarterly earnings report, AOL said that Patch has added 44 towns to end Q2 in 846 towns and is on track to have about a 1,000 coverage areas by year’s end. (PaidContent)…

Hyperlocals: ‘Use Facebook Like the Rest of the Planet’

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Facebook, with its semi-walled set-up, is where it’s at for indie hyperlocal publishers like the Valley Independent Sentinel.
We’re in a market with two of the three largest newspapers in Connecticut. The two dailies are in no way ignoring the Web. It’s their top priority, from what they keep saying. Yet we have more followers on Facebook then one of the big fellas — and we’re not too far off from the other heavy hitter.

So here are a few Facebook tips that can help independent publishers rack up the “likes”:

LocalVox Launches White-Label Local Marketing Tool

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LocalVox, the local marketing platform built by hyperlocal publisher Nearsay, has launched a white-label advertorial publishing tool. The widget will allow larger hyperlocals and vertical niche publishers with existing sales and marketing teams to host and syndicate advertorial content from their clients across the LocalVox publishing network — and will help them push that content to social media outlets…

Street Fight Daily: 08.08.11

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

Groupon’s subscribers have more than doubled to 115 million so far this year, according to a person familiar with the situation. Groupon had 50.58 million subscribers at the end of 2010. That jumped 64 percent to 83.1 million at the end of the first quarter. Since then, the number of subscribers has climbed to 115 million, the person said. (Reuters)…

While it may be curious that advertisers, investors, and Foursquare’s ever-growing horde of users continue to maintain faith in the company’s fortunes, this allegiance has almost entirely to do with the enchantments of a single person: founder Dennis Crowley. (Ad Age)…

Relying on Facebook When Google+ is Rising Looks Risky

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Over the past year, an awful lot of small businesses and hyperlocal media players have bet the farm on Facebook, ditching traditional standalone websites and go all-in on a Facebook presence. I wonder whether they are reconsidering that decision now that Google+ is on the rise.

Foursquare Dominates the Week

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The best or biggest deal, assertion, investment or other strategy this week. Who: Foursquare What: A revenue plan, a growth strategy and a (small) design upgrade A slew of developments came out of location-based social network Foursquare this week, just days after the company announced it would partner with Groupon to share the daily deal […]

Street Fight Daily: 08.05.11

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

“Location is no longer a service like maps or navigation, but increasingly an enabler of new product experiences,” writes Forrester’s Thomas Husson. “In a nutshell, the very notion of location-based services doesn’t not mean much anymore.” (Moco News)…

Mayorships, stickers, badges — these are the rewards new mobile apps confer on us for supplying them with the data of our daily activities. But there’s one potential stumbling block which could stop this gamification going global: the rest of the world might not be as competition-crazy as Americans are. (PaidContent)…