Mobile barcodes have been prevalent in certain Asian markets for years but are beginning to pick up in the West. We're seeing them pop up more and more in magazines, billboards, store windows -- even on bikinis. Through all this,…
JiWire is out with its latest Insights report, offering user behavior and survey data (n=2,000) from its location-based ad network. One of the biggest takeaways from the data-rich report is that 53 percent of its U.S. users will share their location in exchange for…
It's hard to believe it's already time to vote for sessions for South by Southwest 2012. Before we know it, the actual conference will be here. Seems like SxSW 2011 just ended. The good folks at Loopt have put together…
You've likely heard by now that Google made a surprise bid today to acquire Motorola's Mobility group for $12.5 billion in an all-cash deal -- its largest to date. There are lots of implications for this deal, and Moto's patent…
From the Friday just-barely NSFW department comes the newest mobile marketing phenomenon -- barcode bikinis. U.K.-based Olympic hopeful volleyball pair Shauna Mullin and Zara Dampney (ranked 26th in the world) have posted QR codes on the backs of their bikini…
Today I had the chance to catch up with London-based mobile app and website development outfit Golden Gekko. The firm has lots of top global brands as clients (Jack Daniels, Coca-Cola, Nokia), but has crossed our path by working with…
We've just confirmed Urbanspoon Biz Dev lead Fred Dimesa for our iPad demo session at next month's DMS conference. One of the reasons this is cool -- besides the fact that we like Urbanspoon -- is that the company just…
Mobile data continue to pelt us. This is a good thing, as ad networks (with promotional intent) release the data they're seeing for ad placement. See, Millennial, JiWire, Jumptap, et al. I usually internalize these data but don't write about…
Mobile marketing company HipCricket has announced it will be acquired by Augme Technologies for $44.5 million. Of that total, $6 million will be cash, the rest stock, in addition to a $27.5 million earnout over the next year. For Augme this…
Following our coverage of Google's Chromebook launch, I got the chance to use one of them today. As advertised, Google has set up stations at Virgin America gates in certain cities to loan them out for full flights or just…
With the the collision of deals, mobile and payments, we're witnessing an important transformation in local. Closing the loop on ROI has long been the holy grail of advertising, not just digital advertising (insert John Wanamaker quote). This was a…
Yext announced today that it closed a $10 million D round led by Right Media founder Michael Walrath, and existing investors (SV Angel, Sutter Hill). The funding will help Yext to continue to build out its Power Listings product. At…
An afternoon session at Deals 3D focused on social media's impact on deals. The panel titled "Social Media and Deals: The Saturday Night Play" featured Cityvoter CEO Josh Walker and Signpost CEO Stuart Wall. Signpost features "deal scouts," which are…
Today at Deals 3D The Dealmap VP of marketing Dan Visnick shed light on his network data, as a directional representation of the trends we're seeing in local deals. The Dealmap, for those unfamiliar, aggregates 350 deal sources for its…
Today at BIA/Kelsey's Deals3D conference, Gary Kearns, MasterCard group executive for information services, was all about the data. The volume of purchase data that flows through MasterCard puts it in a unique position to target offers in ways that boosts…
Yelp reached a sizable milestone today, hitting 20 million reviews. More notable is the rate of growth. It reached its first million reviews in about 2.5 years. Then it took another three years to get to 10 million. That was…
Just in time for next week's Deals 3D conference, we've published a new report on mobile deals. The idea is that as deals collide with mobile, it will represent the Act II of the exploding space (although deals go back…
Foursquare announced today that it will add pre-purchased daily deals to its roster of nearby specials. These will come from a cluster of new partners and will operate under a rev share. They'll show up just like its current specials…
Just short of reaching its first birthday, Shopkick has reached the 2 million user milestone. The company emphasizes these are active users, in response to recent industry outcry (and comments by Mark Zuckerberg yesterday) that measuring registered users is irrelevant.…
Continuing a recent string of acquisitions that tie together mobile capabilities, eBay announced it will acquire mobile payments provider Zong for $240 million in cash. Naturally, Zong will join the PayPal unit and strengthen its position in mobile payments. This…
