Soon after launching v2.0 of its mobile app, Shopkick got a little more local today by extending its mobile in-store rewards program to 1,000 SMBs in 10 U.S. cities. Known mostly for working with big-box chains like Target, Best Buy…
Soon after announcing 10 million users, Foursquare is out with an app refresh that makes it easier to check in. This is simply a repositioning of the check-in button, and a further streamlining of the process. But with growing volumes…
Four-month-old, Cincinnati, Ohio-based SmartyTags has a decidedly different approach to the technology of QR codes. Rather than just focusing on the technology, its focus is on how best to use them as a marketing tool, track uses of each code…
I don’t know about you, but I’m not sure my glasses are working anymore. Every morning, I find myself cleaning my glasses as I skim the huge number of news bites about local commerce and media. The nicely drawn lines…
The Internet services and online marketing solutions provider Web.com launched a new interface this week that may eliminate the need for SMBs to create two websites, one for Internet local search and another for mobile. Web.com's mobile website detects when…
Today at the MMA Forum in New York, a panel of local broadcasters broke down the opportunities at the crossroads of television and mobile. So far, the way this has played out is mostly through positioning mobile as an extension…
I'm at the MMA Forum in New York today, where a hoarse-voiced Tim Westergren keynoted after a "late night" (much props) in the immediate wake of Pandora's successful IPO (at the time of this post, the company's stock price is…
Product launches in mobile LBS are reaching ridiculous levels. Without exaggeration, there are many per day, prompting what I've started to call NAGS (Not Another GeoLocation Service). Many are good, but most are opportunistic bolt-ons to a hot segment with…
Yellowbook announced the launch of its new Android tablet app today. The new app features map-based business listing results. This feature allows users to find a business by searching the business name, popular categories, nearby businesses or by browsing their…
YPG Canada announced today that it will join Foursquare's venues project. This will provide Foursquare with the 1.5 million business listings in YPG's YellowAPI. Existing YellowAPI developers will conversely have one-stop access to Foursquare's API. The venues project is meant…
I was surprised this week when Google Offers didn't get more of a media blitz. It did get some coverage, and to be fair the news had leaked weeks ago so the thunder was effectively stolen. But what coverage there…
Today we held a webinar to preview our upcoming Deals 3D conference and to touch on the biggest issues facing the emerging sector. This drilled downs on a few areas where deals are taking form in different ways, such as…
A few weeks ago, Peter Krasilovsky and I were pre-briefed by Meporter, a mobile local UGC news app that just launched at TechCrunch Disrupt. Led by 7Mainstreet founders Andy and Ron Leff (father/son team), the app lets users read or…
Today at TechCrunch Disrupt in NYC, Google's Marissa Mayer revealed that 20 percent of searches across Google properties are local. What's more (literally), that number bumps up to 40 percent when we're talking about mobile searches. Of course numbers like…
JiWire is out with its latest quarterly Insights report, uncovering user demand and adoption for location based services, mobile shopping, and deals. For those unfamiliar, JiWire operates a location based ad network via public wi-fi and mobile. Highlights include 79…
Gearing up for our Deals 3D conference in July, my StreetFight column this month looks at some of the recent developments in the collision of local deals and mobile, otherwise known loosely as flash deals. As we've written, these independently…
During BIA/Kelsey’s ILM East conference in March, a series of mobile sessions were held in which leaders of the mobile industry were interviewed on stage (see previous post on Foursquare GM Evan Cohen’s keynote). WillowTree Apps CEO Tobias Dengel was…
The EADP conference in Mallorca was treated to the insights and good humor of Yellow Pages Group Canada's Matthieu Houle and the company's very funny ad campaign. Mobile, Houle said, gives directories the appeal local advertisers are looking for. His…
We've written a bunch about Shopkick and its strategy to monetize location-based services and check-ins -- an area where there's still lots of question marks. Its biggest claim to fame is automatic check-ins that make it more mainstream friendly. For…
There were lots of announcements made this week at Google's I/O developer conference in San Francisco, but the thing that stood out most for me was the unveiling of the Chromebook. Running on Chrome OS, it represents a computing paradigm…
