By now, much of the connected universe, and certainly all of technolphilia, is aware of Facebook’s IPO, which seeks to raise up to $5 billion (and perhaps eventually $10 billion) when its shares go public this spring. The net effect is a valuation of $75 billion to $100 billion for the 8-year-old social network.
Mining the …

Dan Hess, CEO of deals aggregator and research company Local Offer Network, played mythbuster at ILM West, using data to set the record straight on where the market is moving…and where it isn’t.
Hess is convinced that there is still ample room for “specialization” across geography, demography and interests…rather than the doomsday consolidation/roll-up  scenarios forecast by …

When Bob Pittman launched his career in radio decades ago, he touted the virtues of advertising’s “big three” — radio, TV and newspapers. All these years later, during his keynote address at ILM West 2011, Pittman was still bullish on radio’s position in the hierarchy.
“Radio is your companion,” he noted. TV operates as consumers’ “hobby,” …

Much of the focus at DMS ’11 centered on the acceleration of performance-based local ad models across new platforms to drive measurable results. Mobile is leading the way with its ability to geotarget intent-driven consumers and spur “secondary actions” (click to call, click for directions, etc.).
In a panel on mobile local ad networks, Verve Wireless CMO …

Just when the DMS ’11 audience thought it knew everything there is to know about group buying, Groupon Regional Sales Manager Brett Truka lifted the curtain a little higher. He also noted that the big G itself continues to gather important learnings that shape new, best practices.
Even though it’s a seemingly dead simple and compelling …

For all the recent negative bluster in the deals space, including one report of its imminent demise, BIA/Kelsey has a decidedly different message for the dissenters: “We still like ’em.”
At DMS ’11, Marketplaces Program Director Peter Krasilovsky painted a sunnier picture of the robust and still-rising group buying industry. Among the notable growth signals are …

What does digital transformation truly look like? And how far along the path to a new revenue model are directional publishers? Those questions were front and center at DMS ’11, as Dex One Chief Strategy Officer David Sharman, YP New Zealand CEO Scott Pomeroy and Local Search Association President Neg Norton debated “the future of …

In true McLaughlin Group style, Greg Sterling moderated the final session at Deals 3D — “Deals: The Next Stage” — more as a rapid-fire roundtable than a traditional panel. He dished, they debated. So, consistent to the theme, here are samples of how Closely’s Perry Evans, Wantsa’s David Strebinger and Deal Current’s Jimmy Hendricks see …

Facebook touts itself as a platform that allows and encourages partners to further build out its social graph. In Deals, it has now found its most significant partner yet, inking a deal with American Express to push socially curated deals to cardholders.
Cardholders will link their AMEX accounts to Facebook’s “Link-Like-Love” application. They will then …

Group buying is growing up…and growing more complex in the process. It has long-outgrown the Groupon-and-the-seven-dwarfs phase and has added new layers reminiscent of other, more mature digital sectors, expanding into vertical niches, attracting media companies and necessitating aggregators. Now, as deal originators seek scale and publishers look for relevant offers to serve their audiences, …

Writing about Google+ wasn’t an option. When an 800-pound gorilla makes a frontal assault on Facebook, Skype AND Twitter, sending the tech punditry into breathless buzz and sparking curiosity about the potential seismic effects on social networking, well, that warrants ink. The question wasn’t if…but how. What hasn’t been said already (10 times over)? Where …

Not a day passes without the question “Can Google Get Social?” popping up in the tech punditry. After several ill-feted answers (Buzz, Wave), the search leader has a new social reply: Google+.
Actually, it’s the Google+ “project.” VP of Social Vic Gundotra says that’s an important distinction, as this is an evolving set of tools and …

Over the past year, American Express has embarked on a series of initiatives centered on digital advertising intelligence for SMBs. These include SearchManager (via Clickable) for SEM and multiple social media experiments with Facebook and Foursquare. Now, its small business-focused OPEN division is rounding out the suite with AdManager, which utilizes AdReady’s dynamic display capability …

Mentions, reviews, blog comments, tweets, posts and now check-ins. It’s enough digital noise to lead local business owners to throw their hands up in despair. As Internet fragmentation accelerates, a host of reputation management providers have carved out an important foothold in the digital landscape by aggregating merchants’ online activity through a single dashboard that …

BIA/Kelsey projects that total U.S. social advertising revenues will surge from $2.1 billion in 2010 to $8.3 billion in 2015, growing at a 31.6 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR). Driven by Facebook, social networks will command a majority share (51 percent) of all display ad impressions by 2015.
The inaugural social advertising forecast is part …

As it turns out, the daily deals landscape is more sophisticated than many first thought. New contours are emerging, each replete with opportunity and threat. Bluntly branding the space as “the next big thing” or a “can’t-miss opportunity” lacks the necessary strategic discernment in an industry replete with competitors and fortressed with high barriers to …

Groupon gets much of the credit for “making coupons cool again.” But it’s the smartphone, with its inherent social, geo and touch capabilities, that may make them cooler than ever. By “cooler,” we mean discoverable and relevant.
The St. Petersburg Times believes there is no better way to unlock the city than through the mobile device. …

 
Even as preprint circulars continue to account for a hefty chunk of newspaper revenues, the race to migrate these FSIs onto digital platforms that provide compelling shopping experiences and command premium CPMs is revving up. Associated Press will soon release iCircular for mobile devices, Gannett’s PointRoll operates ShopLocal, Local.com has a local option and several deal/offer aggregators …

“Content is king.” It’s one of the oldest, most frequently trumpeted maxims in media. Original work commands a premium, while aggregation and curation are merely commoditized collections for easy distribution…or so the thinking goes. Only, what happens if the script is flipped? That’s the question that Martin Nisenholtz, senior VP of digital operations at The New York …

In two short years, LivingSocial has blossomed from a Facebook application development shop into a leading group buying platform in 230 markets and 12 countries. But the question du jour in deal a day isn’t “what have you done?” but “what’s next?” At ILM East, LivingSocial Chief Operating Officer Eric Eichmann mapped a diversified plan …