The Brand-to-local playbook is constantly changing in a multi-screen and millennial-impacted world. This was one of the underlying themes at the recent BIA/Kelsey BRANDS. But making this perennial challenge more complex is the need to establish or track down brand advertising…
Size matters, when it comes to small- and medium-sized businesses, according to BIA/Kelsey's Local Commerce Monitor™ (LCM) survey of SMBs. While the vast majority of SMBs surveyed prefer a Do-It-Yourself (DIY) model for digital advertising, there's a remarkable difference in preferences between…
One important trend we've followed closely is the compression of local search. Instead of search queries, results pages, links, listings and reviews, we're seeing an end-run directly to the action. Driven by macro-factors like smartphones, immediacy-oriented millennials, and the on-demand movement,…
BIA/Kelsey's ENGAGE conference next month in Austin, Texas, is about innovating and executing in the local and SMB digital marketplace. The local and SMB space isn't just about creating tools, it's also about building audiences in order to drive engagement, leads and transactions.…
Even as messaging apps and chat bots take over the world, people still have a biological urge to communicate by voice. This applies to commerce, especially where there is complexity. And complexity tends to happen in high-consideration, high-value products like…
Abid Chaudhry and I discuss the fall of Shuddle, the Bay Area-based "Uber for kids" startup that closed its doors today after raising $12.2 million. What does this suggest for high-value vertical on-demand services? Can they differentiate enough to separate…
Conversational commerce is suddenly the hottest topic in tech. It combines popular messaging apps with emerging AI to make for a sexy topic that everyone is eating up. But despite the hype cycle, we believe it has real legs for local commerce.…
The Brand-to-local playbook is constantly changing in a multi-screen and millennial-impacted world. This was one of the takeaways from a morning panel at the recent BIA/Kelsey BRANDS. To crack this code -- borrowing from the session's title -- some brands opt for…
In Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, digital* media outperformed over-the-air broadcast** in generating revenue in 2015, according to BIA/Kelsey’s new Local Competition Report for the Philadelphia television market (see chart above). Broadcast, which combines over-the-air radio and television, accounted for $855 million…
What are best practices in today's Local Commerce Universe? What are lessons in helping local businesses acquire and retain customers, especially in today's evolving multi-screen world? We want to hear from you. During next month's BIA/Kelsey ENGAGE, we'll spotlight these…
In BIA/Kelsey’s Local Commerce Monitor survey of small and medium businesses, we divided SMBS into three groups: 1 employee (very small businesses), 2 to 9 employees (small businesses) and 10 to 99 employees (medium businesses). When comparing the SMBs in these three groups, it becomes…
Innovation, execution and re-invention are some of the common themes among the headline speakers at BIA/Kelsey's upcoming ENGAGE conference in Austin, Texas. ENGAGE runs from May 16-18 at the Austin Hilton. Opening headliner (May 17) Steven Johnson is a leading thinker on…
The universe is expanding -- the Local Commerce Universe (LCU) that is. Comprised of companies that derive revenue from local commerce and advertising, it will reach $440 billion by 2021, up from $285 billion today. Digital media & advertising has…
Messaging apps and chat bots are all the rage. They were a highlight at Microsoft's recent Build conference; Kik's bot store announcement last week; and they could dominate Facebook's F8 developer conference this week. If you have no idea what I'm talking…
Very small businesses (VSBs) compete on digital channels because they take advantage of the large amount of free digital advertising and marketing available. In our Local Commerce Monitor™ (LCM) survey of small businesses, VSBs are defined as small businesses with one…
Even as messaging apps and chat bots take over the world, people still have a biological urge to communicate by voice. This applies to commerce, especially where there is complexity. And complexity tends to happen in high-consideration, high-value products (i.e.…
Locally targeted mobile advertising* in the San Francisco bay area is forecast to be $373.3 million in 2016, according to BIA/Kelsey’s new Local Competition Report (see chart above). Google is expected to take the largest single piece of the pie at…
The Brand-to-local playbook is constantly changing in a multi-screen and millennial-impacted world. This was one of the takeaways during the kickoff panel of the recent BIA/Kelsey BRANDS. But in this quickly changing world, many longstanding brand goals persist. Reaching the…
Of the SMBs in BIA/Kelsey’s Local Commerce Monitor survey of small and medium businesses that use video* for advertising and promotion, nearly half (45.6%) say they made it themselves, a quarter (24.4%) say they have a custom produced video, and less than 20%…
YP, despite the Yellow Pages heritage still evident in its name, now regards itself as being in the same competitive set as large audience generators like Facebook and Google. David Lebow, YP's chief revenue office made this point during a…