The Super Lineup at ILM East March 26-28 (Boston)

ILM East is coming back to Boston March 26-28 with a lineup of doers and innovators who are transforming and redefining the local space. Highlights include a featured keynote from industry legend Ted Leonsis (Groupon vice chair/AmEx board member/sports team…

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ILM East: National Advertisers and Local Search

Executives from two well-known brands talked about how they are attacking local, social and mobile in the panel, National Advertisers and Local Search.

Moderator Andrew Shotland walked the two marketing execs through a series of questions aimed at understanding how these companies are using new media options to support their brands and drive leads.

The panelists are:

Elnora Palms, director, local search initiative, U-Haul

Matthew Marko, marketing process manager, Progressive Insurance

Both companies work with large networks of dealers or independent agents, which means accurate data about their locations is a constant challenge.

Here are a few highlights from the dialogue:

How should vendors approach you?

Elnora Palms: “Come prepared. Have an understanding of what we are trying to accomplish. Know we are more than moving trucks. That allows us to say this is a business that seriously wants to partner because they have done the legwork.”

This year, where are you prioritizing your online marketing efforts?

EP: “We manage data in-house. We have centralized all listing and data management. Once data is clean, then we are in a position to look at ad words, getting ourselves out there, but accurately. That was the objective this year. Now partnering to make sure we are managing where we are listed. Our objective this year is a good selection of partners.”

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ILM East: Is Hyperlocal Now Hyper-Relevant?

A powerful panel of local media players talked this morning about the challenges of doing hyperlocal effectively and profitably on “The New Wave of ‘Hyper-Relevant’ Media.” Hyperlocal has long been a vexing challenge, for publishers, from a content creation standpoint as well as making money.

One panelist compared it to mobile, an opportunity filled with anticipation and promise, but that always seemed to be a year away. Finally, mobile is living up to its promise. So when will hyperlocal follow suit?

Here are some panel highlights:

David Haupt, Director, Local Revenue, Examiner.com

Haupt describes Examiner.com as the biggest network of citizen journalists. The business started with a national focus, moving increasingly to local, both in terms of content and revenues. The site began with celebrity and nationally focused examiners and has moved down the line to “backyard poultry examiners.”

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