One of the homespun stories of interactive local media is the rise of HelloMetro, a city guide company that started in 1999 as an entrepreneurial effort in Louisville, Kentucky, and has since grown to include 15 staffers, including five direct…
Placeblogger, a 2007 recipient of $220k from the Knight News Challenge, has recently been revamped by its founders to encourage more personal interaction. Why? Location-based blogging without the context of a person is just kind of stale, says founder Lisa…
EveryBlock, the six-person Adrian Holovaty “micro-local” project funded to the tune of $1.1 million by the Knight News Challenge, is preparing to go “for profit” when the two-year Knight grant ends in June. The Chicago-based site, always registered as a…
We’ve just announced the lineup for our Marketplaces 2009 conference, which is March 16-18 at the historic (and excellent) Century Plaza in L.A. We hope you find it as compelling as we do. It is probably a “must attend” event by any…
Pegasus News, the Dallas hyperlocal site, was seen as a great model for other markets when Fisher Communications, a leading broadcaster in Seattle and the Northwest, bought the site in July 2007. But the roiled market in broadcasting apparently stifled…
There is still some life in many newspapers, but recent results have encouraged a basic question: What would it be like if newspapers left the scene? Would our information needs be met by NPR? Blogs? The common belief is that we…
We’re out with our predictions for 2009. But what’s the final word for 2008? Truly, it was a very stimulating and thoughtful year for our local media and commerce industry. But speaking for myself, it’s hard to say whether it…
Hyperlocal sites aspire to grab headlines from everywhere and be a one-stop for the neighborhood. That’s been accepted practice, providing the site links back to the origination site, and too much copy isn’t exposed. It tends to build traffic for everyone.…
The impact of mobile access on media is still being sorted out, but some preliminary data suggests it extends consumer research to the weekends and at night -- and that news is a real driver. The first data we saw…
Citysearch has just completed a full revamp of its product and strategy that it hopes will position it in the long-term battle for local. Elements of the revamp include a more intuitive interface, an embrace of social media, a major…
National Public Radio is going to try anew to rev up hyperlocal on the Web sites of its affiliates, according to a paidContent.org interview with incoming CEO Vivian Schiller, who was recruited from a leadership position at NYTimes.com. Schiller is…
Presidential elections always represent sea changes in the use of marketing tools (including local marketing tools). The Internet is an increasingly big part of it. Mostly, it is used for raising money. This time around, it has also been exciting…
Today at the Canadian Marketing Association’s Digital Digital Marketing Conference, there was quite a bit of buzz around Blyk, a Finnish mobile phone company with an interesting hybrid model for distribution. Blyk is a free mobile operator targeting young people…
Mark Cuban, the dot-com entrepreneur who has launched Broadcast.com and HDNet and now has greater renown as the colorful owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has given the entire local ecosystem a big shot in the arm by investing in CitySquares,…
When Topix first came on to the scene in 2003, it primarily crawled local news. These days, the 30-person company has largely remade itself into more of a local portal, especially for smaller markets. It still isn’t profitable, but CEO…
Eventful, which competes with Zvents for leadership (and affiliates) in the fast changing local event marketplace, has just completed a new $10 million C round lead by Telefonica Capital. Also participating are alumni investors, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Bay…
We’re just about ready to go with Interactive Local Media 2008, which is Nov. 19-21 in Santa Clara, in the heart of Silicon Valley. It should be a very important, game-defining event -- and the first one for The Kelsey…
Neighborhood-level intelligence isn’t always easy to find, for residents, travelers or resettlers. We have neighborhood boundaries, courtesy of the sociologists and mapmakers at Urban Mapping. But other information can be scant. Now we have another view from the real estate…
OK, we’ve got the format(s) and “best and brightest” speaker roster set for Interactive Local Media: Extending Local Channels, which is Nov. 19-21 in Santa Clara, California, next to San Jose. At the top of the list is Angie Hicks,…
Since launching self-service EZ Ads in April 2007, Zillow.com has set a new standard for simple-to-buy, one-price ads, and 13,000 (mostly) local advertisers responded. Typical ad spends were about $50. Now as Zillow begins to have its inventory sold to…
