The headlines about 2011 being "the year of local" are everywhere, and as the curtain lifted on ILM:10 (with a record 600+ local-focused attendees filling the master ballroom), BIA/Kelsey President Neal Polachek encouraged the audience that as more media ad spend tilts…
Google is reportedly set to pay $5.3 billion for Groupon, a spectacular investment that would give The Big G a compelling way to get close to local businesses, leverage Gmail and really rev up a social media paradigm (as opposed…
Local media brands continue to look for ways to populate their sites with local bloggers and Twitterers. In return, they provide them with a bigger platform. The latest to jump into the game is NBC Universal, which paidContent reports has…
Group software seems obsolescent in the social revolution. Or is it? A few weeks ago, John Battelle’s Federated Media acquired Big Tent, the women’s group enabler with 1.3 million users. It apparently plans to target women with very specific advertising.…
Many of you have heard by now that Google has launched a social "layer" onto local search with the new Hotpot feature. -- Rate and review local businesses. -- Add friends from Google contacts (based on Gmail contacts). -- Both…
After all of the speculation over the past week about a new Facebook e-mail client, the company today announced a more broadly defined "Modern Messaging System." Explicitly positioned by CEO Mark Zuckerberg as "not an e-mail killer," this will include…
The tech media, blogosphere and Twittersphere are abuzz over what Facebook will launch during its announced press event tomorrow in San Francisco. Few doubt that it will be a new mail client. We speculated at our DMS conference and more…
Group buying platform LivingSocial has taken another important step in differentiating itself as more than just another deal a day, building on its recent acquisition of social adventures company UrbanEscapes to unveil LivingSocial Espcapes. The new travel-focused offering segments getaways into three…
American Express has recently been leveraging its powerful relationship with SMBs on the Web, including a tie to search engine marketing and lead generation via a deal between American Express Open and Clickable. Now Amex is going deep with social…
Judging by the name alone, many would think of Badgeville as just the latest in the swelling line of social gaming and check-in companies (Foursquare, Gowalla, Zynga) that promote shared online experiences through status updates and virtual currency. CEO Kris Duggan…
Ironically, on the same day Facebook sprung a major announcement -- the unveiling of Deals as a natural extension of Places -- that could have thunderous effects on popularizing social location tools, the Pew Internet & American Life Project released…
Small businesses seeking to pick, choose and install Web applications for their Facebook Pages and Places can now easily do so with Appbistro, a new site that provides app makers an iTunes Store-like model (right down to the 70/30 revenue…
Online "ad versioning" has taken on heightened significance as national and regional brands vie for their own piece of the sizable local advertising pie. However, as SEM becomes more sophisticated and consumers expect smart targeting from commercial messages, basic…
Media General is the latest traditional media franchise to partner with a deal-a-day provider, launching a partnership with Groupon to open a new revenue stream in the much-hyped group buying space. Media General owns both local television stations (18 total)…
Show biz marketing accounts are huge, and their agencies are always looking for more ways to localize them. They've now inspired efforts by ValPak, the promotions giant, and Eventful, the local events site that boasts an audience of nearly 20…
Groups have been using the Web since the mid-1980s for a wide range of activities, such as scheduling, discussions, photo sharing, referrals etc. Groups have been a special strength for Yahoo. BigTent, a group software company based in San Francisco,…
The deal-a-day model thrives on the power of its e-mail list, sales channels, promotion, clever copywriting and vendor selection. Newspapers and TV stations should be especially well positioned to leverage these strengths, right? Many, in fact, are diving in to…
With 200+ deal-a-day sites and vendors, the only way to carve out a niche is to find dramatically different takes on group buying (i.e., focusing on verticals or integrating with other content). How about making your buys visible to your…
Some people (like me) don’t like games. Game mechanics-driven “check in” media like Foursquare, GoWalla, Loopt and BrightKite mostly leave them cold. But what if check-ins triggered group buying discounts? That’s the concept behind GroupTabs, a new service launching in…
Center'd's The DealMap, which serves up more than 350,000 "live at any time deals" from over 150 daily deal and offer/coupon sources, has released an iPhone app that "mobilizes" the service's top features, including game mechanics, real-time discovery, crowdsourcing and…
