Street Fight Daily: 08.10.11
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)…
Case Study: Daily Deal Pitches Overwhelm SF Restaurateur
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: 08.08.11
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)…
Foursquare Dominates the Week
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: 08.04.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Location-based media company JiWire reports seeing increases in the sharing of and the demand for local deals, like those offered by Groupon, LivingSocial and others, since last quarter. According to data from a recent survey, sharing of deals has increased by 21% and demand is up 20% from Q1 2011. (ReadWriteWeb)…
LivingSocial’s Groupon Now-killer, LivingSocial Instant, appears to now have an ad unit that promotes specific deals. This adds a new layer to how daily deals can be promoted or sold. (Business Insider)…
Street Fight Daily: 08.03.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Foursquare has launched an update that allows anyone to sign up for a brand page that can push tips and check-ins to followers on Foursquare, as well as to Facebook and Twitter. Users had already been able to add new locations to the service, but, until yesterday, there was no good way for most places to actively reach out to users. (ReadWriteWeb)…
Despite the regular carping from pundits on the sidelines, LivingSocial believes it can show that daily deals are a good deal for businesses, and thus a sustainable long term industry. The company has released the results of a recent survey to bolster its argument. (Business Insider)…
Street Fight Daily: 08.02.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Google has snapped up The Dealmap, an aggregator of nearby shopping deals, in an acquisition that furthers its Google Offers ambitions. The purchase, whose price was not disclosed, shows that Google is proceeding even without its unsuccessful $6 billion bid for Groupon last year. (GigaOm)…
The original Yankee Stadium was demolished in 2010, but some of the seats have survived and are now being used in a novel Facebook Places campaign for MasterCard that uses QR codes to establish location. (Mashable)…
Street Fight Daily: 08.01.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Foursquare is looking to cash in on all those check-ins. The company is nearing a decision to start charging the 500,000 registered merchants which access a suite of Foursquare services that are now free, but won’t be forever, the company said. (New York Post)…
More than 91 million US consumers will use the internet through a mobile device at least monthly by the end of this year, and research shows that the increase in on-the-go web usage goes hand in hand with more search activity for local content. (eMarketer)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.29.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Foursquare users in the U.S. and Canada will start to see Groupon’s daily deals in the Explore tab of the application and on Foursquare.com beginning today. Groupon has become Foursquare’s sixth and latest daily deals partner. (Mashable)…
Are targeted local deals services cutting news organizations out of the market that used to keep them afloat, just like Craigslist did to their classifieds? (ReadWriteWeb)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.28.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups.…
Google is trying to keep abreast with Groupon in the mobile e-commerce wars and Tuesday released an update to its Google Shopper for iPhone app that appears to be going straight after the daily deals service mobile location push, Groupon Now. (ReadWriteWeb)…
When Groupon filed IPO documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission in June, its use of certain financial accounting metrics raised eyebrows. Now, regulators are prolonging the company’s pre-IPO review over concerns about the metrics, specifically “gross profit” and “consolidated segment operating income.” (PaidContent)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.27.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Groupon has filed for a $10,288,416 offering of equity in connection with its acquisition of Chilean startup Zappedy. However we don’t know if there was cash involved in addition to equity in the Zappedy acquisition so it’s not clear what the final price of the transaction was. (TechCrunch)…
BuyWithMe has announced the launch of their new Android application, which provides merchants with the ability to reach out to mobile consumers with location-based offers. (Daily Deal Media)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.26.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Goshi, a marketplace that aims to disrupt Craigslist by adding a local and mobile component to buying and selling items in your community, debuted its service in Chicago yesterday. Basically, Goshi’s iPhone app allows you to take a photo of an item you want to sell, describe the item, put a price on it and then post it to the marketplace. (TechCrunch)…
Expect plenty of consolidation in the daily deal industry over next year or two. But that isn’t the only change coming to the business. By this time next year, you may be finding the best daily deals via search and social networks rather than email blasts — and you could be redeeming the deals with a swipe of your credit card. (Paid Content)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.25.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Conquering “local” remains one of the largest opportunities on the Internet today, and it seems as though Twitter’s unique position has gone largely unnoticed, writes Victor Wong of PaperG. “If Twitter chose to focus more on location, higher user engagement and even monetization would likely follow.” (TechCrunch)…
OpenTable, the restaurant reservation Web site, will offer 30 percent off some dinner reservations through a new partnership with Savored, a start-up that offers daily deals for high-end restaurants. (New York Times/Bits)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.21.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Groupon Inc’s rapid growth has attracted rivals and regulators, a twin threat to the largest online daily deal company as it gets ready for an initial public offering. (Reuters)…
A former LivingSocial sales guy says the industry is setting itself up for an “implosion and a major shakeout.” (Business Insider)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.18.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Yelp now has over 20 million reviews, up from 10 million in March, 2010 (and 17 million in April). The reviews bring in the visitors, and visitor growth tracks pretty closely with the growth in reviews. Yelp hit 53 million visitors in June, according to its own stats. (TechCrunch)…
Connecticut law-enforcement officials are looking into whether Groupon is breaking consumer-protection laws that prohibit gift cards from expiring. (Wall Street Journal)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.15.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Over the past six months, daily deal sites such as Groupon, Living Social and Gilt Groupe have attracted more than $1.69 billion in venture capital and other investments. Globally, there are more than 3,000 total daily deal companies, including more than 1,000 in China, more than 900 in Europe, and more than 600 in South America. (Daily Deal Media)…
Groupon has filed new S-1 from for its IPO where it is looking to raise at least $750 million. The daily deals site has added new underwriters Williams, RBC, Loop, Citadel, JPMorgan, Allen & Co, BofA, Citi, Barclays and Deutsche in addition to previous underwriters Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse. (TechCrunch)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.14.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
When EveryBlock was launched in Chicago in 2007, the site’s mission was to fill people in on everything going on in their individual neighborhoods. Now, with new community features in place and a presence in 16 cities, the MSNBC-owned site is planning to expand out nationally. (American Journalism Review)…
Location-based Q&A platform Localmind has raised $600,000 in angel funding. The service differs slightly from fellow Q&A apps like Opinionaided or Locql, because Localmind’s real-time, location-based platform sits on top of existing check-in services like Foursquare and Gowalla. (TechCrunch)…
Street Fight Daily: 07.13.11
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal media, technology, advertising and startups...
Zaarly, which just launched an app for Android, connects buyers and sellers in a localized market place, reverse Craigslist-style, by allowing users to post what they’re looking for (beer, a massage, or an iPad), how much they’re willing to pay for said good or service, and how soon they need it. (TechCrunch)…
AT&T Interactive has announced the formal launch of in-app local ads on its mobile ad network. The rollout will allow developers to target ads based on a user’s location and potentially earn more revenue from higher ad rates. (MediaPost)…
Is the Local Deals Industry Heading for Segmentation?
Some companies are betting on a major specialization of the deals market. Signpost CEO Stuart Wall believes that the “stack” — a term used to describe the spectrum of companies in a single industry — is dividing into three major segments: distribution, exchanges, and merchant specialists…