Media sellers are increasingly focusing their revenue growth initiatives for local businesses on a mix of digital marketing solutions. While traditional media spend will grow, more and faster growth is occurring in digital. To explore the dynamics of this growth…
Like a lot of emerging tech, conversational commerce is making its way through the typical Gartner Hype Cycle. And now we're in the "trough of disillusionment." That's not to say that the sector has cratered... but that things slow down as…
Scheduling software programs for SMBs have had their ups and downs since they were initially introduced in the 2008-2009 timeframe. But the emergence of cloud platforms and the use of scheduling as an anchor for loyalty and leads programs suggests…
Today Marchex launched an analytics tool to better capture what it quantifies as a $4 billion opportunity for call-based mobile advertising. Call Analytics for Search is the newest addition to its mobile ad measurement product suite, and it targets…
On Monday, BuildZoom announced it has raised $2.2 million. With the latest round of infusion, we asked the Co-Founder, Jiyan Wei, where the company is headed next. "Our goal is to bring transparency to consumers who are shopping for…
BIA/Kelsey launched Future Stars several years ago, with the idea of highlighting startup companies in the local space that needed a little boost to hit the big time. Future Stars get to participate in Future Stars Alley at our events;…
The "Big Data" revolution has hit every strata of the economy, providing insights into users and customers for everything from B2B materials to entertainment and travel. But what's the impact of Big Data on marketing to small businesses? The use…
The "Big Data" revolution has hit every strata of the economy, providing insights into users and customers for everything from B2B materials to entertainment and travel. But what's the impact of Big Data on marketing to small businesses? The use…
Day 2 of Leading in Local: Interactive Local Media conference opened with BIA/Kelsey's VP and Chief Economist, Mark Fratrik, who shared some exciting pieces of information from BIA/Kelsey's Media Ad view. Media Ad View is BIA/Kelsey's research product that offers…
Amidst all the talk at the second day of SMB Digital Marketing, challenges faced by small businesses and hard recommendations on the best practices for lead generation was offered by Chris Mancini, CMO of Reply.com. Citing the need for easier…
Fast, efficient service leads has been a goal of numerous companies since the commercialization of the Internet. Richard Rosen and his team at FastCall411 pioneered the space seven or eight years ago, although their service was initially limited to hiring…
Is email still the anchor for customer engagement, given the rise of mobile, social media, texting, websites and big data? With people joking that they don’t even know what email is, you have to wonder. ExactTarget, which specializes in email…
Telmetrics, a call measurement provider, has released pay-per-call best practices designed to optimize the number of quality, billable calls delivered to advertisers. "With mobile it is all about being there at the time of action -- whether it is a…
We have been meeting with a number of media salespeople, tracking articles about the transformation of the sales process, developing a number of theories specific to transforming the media sales process plus what is needed to support the transformation. We…
Search engine marketers are no longer selling calls to merchants but conversion. Prior discussions among industry insiders focused on calls, but according to a Manta survey, 49 percent of merchants named referrals as the most valuable lead source. This was…
TargusInfo, a major direct marketing tools provider and the parent company of Localeze, a "Big 3" provider of business listings, will be acquired by NeuStar for $650 million in cash. The deal enhances NeuStar's positioning as a leader in authentication…
MerchantCircle last week quietly added free Request for Quote services for its large base of 1.6 million local merchants, immediately sending out more than 180,000 quotes. The quotes are based on category and locale. Logistically, consumers who ask for quotes…
The home and trade leads space was getting a lot of attention a year ago, with a number of social media driven leads companies hoping to cut in on longtime leaders such as ServiceMagic and Angie’s List. Among the contenders:…
If you are a small business, what do you do after you run the daily deal? Or how do you run a daily deal-like promotion “safely,” without hurting your brand? These are the questions a number of start-ups have posed…
I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Brooklyn-based Pontiflex, which describes itself as “the industry’s leading mobile, email and social acquisition platform.” The real power behind the Pontiflex approach is the ability to capture email and consumer data…