Author Archives: JKNews

About JKNews

Jason E. Klein is an experienced media CEO and builder of digital and traditional businesses who has led two successful turnarounds. He is founder and CEO of On Grid Ventures, an advisory and investment firm in digital media, marketing, and information; a member of New York Angels and Harvard Business School Alumni Angels; and a mentor at several NYC-area “incubators.”

Beyond ZocDoc, four more ways to schedule your doctor online

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ObamacareHyperlocal vendors are changing the way consumers navigate the healthcare industry, offering tools for finding local providers who are covered by specific insurance plans. Not only do these platforms benefit patients by providing a streamlined way to secure appointments with qualified local physicians, but they also benefit healthcare professionals by filling empty appointment slots and decreasing the percentage of no-show patients. From Stephanie Miles, an associate editor at Street Fight, here are five hyperlocal platforms that consumers can use to find and purchase local healthcare services.

1. ZocDoc: Get real-time availability information from local physicians.
Since its debut in 2007, ZocDoc has become the proverbial 800-lb. gorilla of the hyperlocal healthcare industry. Patients in more than 1,800 cities can find doctors and make appointments online, browsing by location, specialty, and insurance coverage. ZocDoc provides users with real-time physician availability information, allowing them to book appointments with an average of 24 to 72 hours notice. The company’s mobile app even uses geo-location to automatically pinpoint available doctors within close proximity to a user.

2. Patient Fusion: Book appointments with local healthcare providers.
An offshoot of Practice Fusion, an electronic health records tool used by more than 150,000 physicians, Patient Fusion launched in 2013 as a way for patients to search for healthcare providers by location or specialty. Users can read reviews from “verified” patients who have booked past appointments through Patient Fusion. Patients can see which time slots a provider has available and request appointments entirely through the booking portal.

3. Medicast: Find a doctor who makes house calls.
Medicast is a “doctors on demand” tool that people can use to find physicians who can provide care at their homes, offices, or hotel rooms. Medicast matches users up with physicians who are generally available to come by in two hours or less.  Medicast does not currently accept any domestic insurance plans. Instead, patients can opt to pay-as-they-go for $199 per visit, or set up a monthly membership for $29 to $49 per month.

4. DocASAP: Secure an appointment with a doctor today.
DocASAP users in New York, Philadelphia, and New Jersey are able to schedule appointments with providers in a number of medical specialties in seconds using the company’s online portal. DocASAP is free for patients.

5. HealthLeap: Connect to a healthcare provider’s practice management system.
Acquired by Vitals, the doctor online reviews and rating platform, in 2011, HealthLeap is an appointment booking tool that people can use to find available physicians in their local areas. Appointments are made in real-time using data from physicians’ existing practice management systems. HealthLeap is also free for patients.

 

The Falling Knife in Newspapers is … Rising?

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In a booming year for the stock market, newspaper stocks actually more than DOUBLED the return of the S&P 500.  Newspaper stocks rose by 79% in a year when the S&P 500 rose by just under 30%, a whopping performance few would have predicted.newspaper stocke

While there are many one-off reasons for this, including solvency concerns at the two companies at the extremes, Lee and McClatchy, the bottom line is that Wall Street thinks the long term decline of revenues may be near bottom as print declines are close to being outweighed by consumer and digital revenue increases.

Rick Edmonds at Poynter also points out that Gannett, Journal Communications, and E. W. Scripps also benefited from their re-surging local TV businesses.  But, take a look at the graph below from Google finance– the growth in stock prices was broad-based and steady throughout the year, with every newspaper company except McClatchy beating the market.Capture gchartWith Warren Buffet and Jeff Bezos buying into the industry as a long term play, the broader financial markets are following suit.  The newspaper industry is getting some of its most positive signs in years.

But what is the reality?  Newspaper companies are increasingly refusing to share their detailed revenue data, so the fact base is thinning.  And many newspaper executives still do not see the end of inexorable revenue declines.

Falling Knife

Falling Knife Rising?

But there is a growing optimism that a new, stronger, multi-media newspaper is emerging, building upon a resilient core of loyal print readers, and that the falling knife in newspapers can, indeed, be caught by the best operators who can pick and own the best markets, and discard the rest.  As we begin 2014, this is the prevailing belief of today’s newspaper investor. The challenge is on to see which newspaper operators can deliver.

Implications for Local Digital Entrants.  The strongest newspaper companies have the lead position in local digital content in their markets, with some even pursuing a broader footprint like nj.com from the Star-Ledger.  As I wrote about five years ago, the consolidation of the newspaper industry is inevitable and ongoing, and now is extending to a consolidation of local online with the retrenchment of Patch and others.  Local digital entrants face a choice:  build your own local sales channel, or partner.  For those players who thought the knife would fall through the floor, and newspapers were headed to fast destruction, the choice was clear — go it alone…why partner with a loser?  If, as some of the “smart money” seems to believe, the knife’s decline is slowing and about to reverse, then local digital entrants’ best route to scaling may be finding the right legacy partner.

The Billion Dollar Opportunities in Hyperlocal

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With Google’s acquisition of Waze earlier this year, local tech is back in the limelight. During a panel at Street Fight Summit in New York last month, Matt Turck of First Mark Capital, Ben Siscovick of IA Ventures, and Jason Klein from On Grid Ventures discussed where the Billion Dollar Opportunities are these days in the geo-space.

Click to play the Street Fight Summit 2013 panel on You Tube.JEK StreetFight 2013

GeoIntent: Going to Where the Puck Will Be

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GeoDisruption

reposted from Streetfight

BY JASON E. KLEIN

04 SEPTEMBER 2013

In my last column for Street Fight, How the GeoWeb Will Change Consumer and Business Behavior, I talked about how location-based technologies will continue to be a dislocating force across B2B, B2C, and C2C Markets.  So what can make a business geo-disruptive?  Beyond location awareness, it is far more important to know where a person is headed and his needs and wants at the destination.  Let’s call this “GeoIntent.”

Consider OpenTable, the dining reservation booking engine. It’s an excellent example of a multi-platform application that requires users to express their intent for dining — in terms of travel distance, timing, type of cuisine, and potentially many other factors. OpenTable is opt-in, and the user readily volunteers his geo-intent in as much detail as he or she is willing to share. While restaurants may dislike splitting a booking fee with OpenTable, isn’t this better than a world where geo-intent is unknown, and mobile devices are bombarded with tiny, irrelevant banner ads when you are within range of a seemingly clueless advertiser?

For the geo and mobile world to move towards its promise, web designers should be focusing more on creating engaged, opt-in behavior, and gaining robust information on GeoIntent.  With better information on geo-intent, solutions can be well targeted, and privacy concerns are more likely to fade.

I recently came across a very clever early stage company called Transit Chatter that’s a wonderful illustration of using predictive analytics to determine geo-intent. Transit Chatter is designed to be the app for everyone riding the Chicago Transit system, which, unlike New York, has most of its riders above ground getting a live mobile signal. The app knows where you are going and when you will get there, and provides timely information and advertising based on this geo-intent. Plus, it reaches commuters when they are highly likely to be engaged in their mobile devices, without a TV in the background. Once the commuter is disembarking from the train or bus, and caught in the rush of the crowd, it’s too late.

Waze, the Israeli crowd-sourced navigation app that Google just purchased for $966 million, also has real-time information on where you are headed, but an engaged mobile user on a traditional mobile device should not be in the driver’s seat of a moving vehicle. There is geo-intent in the app, but engagement at the wrong time can be life-threatening. Waze, of course, offers other advantages to Google in terms of keeping its geo-data robust, and Google wants to replace human drivers anyway.

Other notable examples of geo-intent include weather.com, which elicits information on your destination and activities, and, of course, numerous travel sites.  All these companies are a great example of Wayne Gretzky’s advice: “Skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”

The risk of focusing myopically on where the puck, or an individual, is at a particular moment, is that by the time you message gets there, it’s marginally relevant at best, annoying and creepy at worst. Poorly targeted mobile ads, particularly ones that are supposedly more clever and disruptive, are the enemy of enterprises that relay on consumer’s opting in to truly useful geo-applications.

One final note, congratulations to Jumptap, cited in my last column as strong “geo-infrastructure” provider who offers marketers new ways to make location relevant, which was sold to Millennial Media in a deal valued up to $225 million in August.

JEK Goodman Headshot Compressed SquareJason E. Klein is the founder/CEO of On Grid Ventures, an investment and advisory firm focused on the startup and reinvention of businesses capitalizing on digital and location-based technologies.  Follow him on twitter @JKNews.

Here’s How Hyperlocal Can Work

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With the highly visible explosions at AOL’s Patch over the past week, a deeper dive into other sites reveals several success stories, albeit at a small scale.Westchester_Chappaqua1-527x375

The common themes:

  1. Local ownership, local scale, low overhead
  2. No National Ads
  3. Only local advertisers with fixed banner positions and sponsored content.

Some examples, from Ad Age:

Plus my local favorite:  http://www.newcastlenow.org/.

This isn’t the formula for a big business, but it is a model for local communities and an opportunity for national service providers with useful and low cost offerings to the local sites.

Mobile Devices are really “Mobile Home”

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girl-couch-using-mobile-phone-10815076A new Nielsen study puts to rest the common theme that mobile use is typically “on the go,” particularly with regards to shopping behavior.

A whopping 95% of tablet shoppers and 72% of smartphone shoppers who actually use their devices for purchasing do it on devices in their home.  Some other uses of smart phones in the home:

  •  86% of writing product reviews on a smartphone is in the home
  • 71% of posting comments on a product to a social network on a smartphone is in the home
  • 62% of reading product reviews on a smartphone is in the home.

What shopping behaviors on smartphones are done on the go?

  • 50% of price-checking on a smartphone is on the go
  • 56% of store locator usage on a smartphone is on the go

So, as pointed out in Mediapost, mobile is not mobile:

“Home is where the device is most of the time and where people have the time and inclination to drill deep. They also remind us that devices have become the go-to point of entry for online information, replacing the most uncomfortable way yet devised for consuming content — the desktop PC.  But most of all, they remind us how much of shopping is an iterative, multi-screen process that occurs over time.”

Image - couch potatoAny couch potatoes out there?  What is easier when reclining, browsing on your mobile device or tapping on your laptop?

How the GeoWeb Will Change Consumer and Business Behavior

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Reposted from Street Fight.

How the GeoWeb Will Change Consumer and Business Behavior

30 JULY 2013 BY 

The new Google Maps personalized interface.For about 2000 years, ever since Ptolemy wrote his treatise Geographia, maps and geography have helped humans understand their surroundings in the context of their neighbors, their town, their country, the Earth, and the Universe. For about 400 years, since Mercator figured out how to portray the curved Earth on a flat piece of paper, not much changed in the world of geography — until the launch of 24 GPS satellites by the U.S. Department of Defense about 30 years ago.

Digital location-based technologies are now a transformative force for consumers and businesses, particularly when coupled with the rapid adoption of mobile and the growth of big data. I’m a big believer in the future for “GeoDisruption” — the potential for consumers and businesses to interact in fundamentally new ways to take advantage of increasingly precise location-based technologies.

This is the debut of a column I’ll write for Street Fight exploring the growth of the “GeoWeb” and the emergence of GeoDisruptive trends and companies. When I’m not writing columns, I am the CEO/founder of On Grid Ventures, an investment and advisory firm focused on digital and location-based technologies.

GeoDisruption:  Where we are
Location-based technologies have already been a dislocating force in many industries.

  • Automobile marketing at the local level used to be all about newspapers and television, and companies like Autotrader, Cars.com, and Autobytel have used geo-based lead generation to irrevocably shift in-market auto buyers and local car marketing spending to the GeoWeb.
  • GPS has made paper maps obsolete.
  • General B2C platforms like Yelp are changing the way we evaluate local services.
  • Vertical B2C platforms like OpenTable are changing the way we find and book nearby restaurants.

The major portals and aggregators are all making increasing bets on the potential for GeoWeb.  Google, with Google Maps and Places; Yahoo, with its leadership position in local news and content aggregation; IAC, with CityGrid and UrbanSpoon; and AOL with Patch.Google’s recent acquisition of Israeli startup Waze for over $1 billion is a high-water mark in the development of the GeoWeb as it affirms the importance of user-generated, location-based content.

GeoDisruption:  Where we’re headed
While the growth ambitions of Google, Yahoo, and others will continue to be fed with more acquisitions of GeoWeb companies, the application of location-based technologies is increasing more broadly in three areas: Business-to-Consumer, Business-to-Business, and Consumer-to-Consumer.

  1. B2C marketing (i.e., GeoMarketing) will continue to be transformed as innovative companies apply location-based technologies to how they acquire, transact with, and retain customers. GeoMarketing will be essential for most local retail and service businesses, and the landscape is ripe for vertical players in areas beyond automotive and restaurants, across the entire local landscape. Early stage companies like BeautyBooked are already trying to become the dominant search and booking platform in verticals like place-based salon services. ReachLocal and Yodleare growing fast as companies that help local businesses reach consumers, and national marketers are increasingly shifting dollars to locally targeted digital marketing and promotion.
  2. C2C interaction (i.e., “GeoSocial”) can also be further shaped as individuals increasingly become comfortable with sharing their location with family, friends, colleagues, and people with similar interests. Foursquare has jumped to an early lead as the platform for consumers to share their location, but Facebook, Google, and others are gaining fast.
  3. B2B companies that enable location-based innovation (i.e., “GeoInfrastructure”) continue to be a hotbed for venture investment.  Location itself is nice, but it needs to be in the context of an individual, the surrounding locations, time of day, and other factors.  This all needs to be accomplished respecting an individual’s privacy. Companies like Jumptap and Place IQ are finding new ways to provide marketers with context that makes location relevant.

While I have a background in computer science, I’ve never been a fan of pure technology. I am a believer, however, in the potential for increasingly accurate digital, location-based, real-time data to better inform the decisions we all make every day on where to go, with whom, what to buy, and other areas. The rapid proliferation of mobile devices is certainly an enabler, but the greatest innovation will come from insights into how a consumer’s behavior varies based on his or her specific location. We’re now a long way from zip-code targeting, and more GeoDisruption is on its way.

Jason E. KleinJason E. Klein is the founder/CEO of On Grid Ventures, and investment and advisory firm focused on the startup and reinvention of businesses capitalizing on digital and location-based technologies.  Follow him on twitter @JKNews.

Angel Report 2013: 207 companies funded in 1Q 2013

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The Halo Report is out for the first quarter of 2013, and covers 207 deals totaling $222 million dollars invested.angel-statue-1725x810_19365

Here are some of the key findings: 

  • Median investment is $680k per angel round. Median angel round sizes reached another five quarter high at $680K in Q1 2013 up from $550K a year ago and $650K last quarter.
  • $2.5 million valuation holds.  Pre-money valuations in early stage companies remain steady at $2.5M.
  • Close to Home: Eighty-one percent of deals were completed in the angel groups’ home state over the past 12 months.
  • New York Grows Again. Year over year, companies in the Great Plains region and New York saw the largest increase in angel group deals. 

 

HBS Angels of NY Announces a new VC Advisory Board

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HBS Alumni Angels

The new Venture Capital Advisory Board for the HBS Alumni Angels of New York is comprised of leading, senior-level, NY-area venture capitalists who are advising HBSAANY on its growth and development.

  • Chip Austin, Co-Founder & General Partner, i-Hatch ventures
  • Jordan Bettman, Principal, Bain Capital Ventures
  • Deborah Farrington, Founder & General Partner, StarVest Partners
  • Matt Gorin, Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Contour Venture Partners
  • Rick Heitzmann, Managing Director, FirstMark Capital
  • Jim Robinson, Managing partner, RRE Ventures

Meet the Committee

Chip Austin, Co-Founder & General Partner, i-Hatch ventures
Chip has advised and built companies in Technology and Media for his entire career. In addition to founding BOL.com, Bertelsmann’s E-commerce division, Chip was a member of the senior executive team leading the buyout and restructuring of Prodigy, and was a co-founder of McKinsey’s Interactive Practice, where he spent seven years advising Fortune 500 companies on their media strategies.

Most recently, Chip was President and CEO of Bertelsmann Online, where he was responsible for building Bertelsmann’s global e-commerce business. Chip was the first employee at BOL, and built parallel services in the UK, Germany, Spain, Netherlands, France (via joint venture with Vivendi/Havas), and the US (via Bertelsmann’s 50% investment in BarnesandNoble.com). Chip served as Chairman of the Board of BOL France, and was a Board Member and officer of Doubleday Direct, BCA, BOL, Inc., and Bertelsmann’s E-commerce Control Board. BOL has been the recipient of several industry accolades, including CeBIT Innovation of the Year Winner and the highest rated European e-commerce site by a Forrester Research.

For the launch of BOL, Chip secured internal capital of over $400 million, built a world class team totaling over 200 people in six countries, partnered with strategic vendors such as Oracle, Don Peppers, Ogilvy & Mather, Fleishman-Hillard, Net Perceptions, Cambridge Technology Partners, USWeb and Sun, negotiated major strategic and marketing alliances with major Internet portals such as AOL, Compuserve, DoubleClick, EMS and Earthlink, and established back-end operations, including call centers, fulfillment, logistics, financial clearing, and warehousing, in each country of operation.

Chip maintains an advisory and investor relationship with Bertelsmann Ventures, an independent venture capital fund capitalized by Bertelsmann. Chip also served as Acting CEO of European-based DealPilot.com, a Bertelsmann Ventures portfolio company. DealPilot.com, the first commercial Internet-based comparison shopping service, subsequently sold a majority of its shares to Bertelsmann and then merged into Shopping.com (NASDAQ:SHOP).

Prior to Bertelsmann, Chip was a member of the management-led buyout of Prodigy, where he was SVP of Sales and Business Development and General Manager of Prodigy’s first Internet Service. While at Prodigy, Chip built an ISP from scratch, launched Prodigy Internet, which replaced Prodigy’s Classic proprietary service, and was responsible for all customer acquisition and subscription revenue. In addition, Chip was responsible for all major account relationships, including OEM channels such as Packard Bell/NEC, and technology/distribution providers, such as Microsoft, Netscape, and Excite. Prior to sale to SBC, Prodigy’s initial public offering had a market capitalization that had exceeded $3 billion dollars.

Before joining Prodigy, Chip spent seven years at McKinsey in the Media and Interactive practices advising clients out of New York, Los Angeles, Australia and various European offices. While at McKinsey, as a co-founder of the Interactive Practice, Chip shaped the New Media strategies of the world’s largest media companies in the fields of newspapers, magazines, yellow pages/classifieds, cable programming, network TV and film studio production.

Chip is a frequent keynote speaker and panelist on Technology, Media, and Angel Investment-related topics as well as serving on the boards of several public and private companies. Chip has also worked at Morgan Stanley’s Investment Banking division and IBM’s Personal Computer division during the launch years of the IBM PC. Chip has a degree in Computer Science and Economics from Duke University, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Jordan Bettman, Principal, Bain Capital Ventures
Jordan joined Bain Capital Ventures in 2008. Since that time, Jordan has worked on both early-stage and growth-equity investments in a variety of industries, including data services, marketing services, financial services and technology, and digital media. He has also worked closely with numerous portfolio companies on senior level recruiting, strategic planning, business development, and company exits. Prior to joining Bain Capital Ventures, Jordan was an associate consultant at Bain & Company, focusing on a number of strategic and operational issues for clients across a handful of sectors. He also worked in Bain & Company’s Private Equity Group, performing diligence on multi-billion dollar companies.

Jordan received a BS in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Outside of work, Jordan enjoys outdoor sports, especially skiing and golf. Additionally, Jordan is a member of the Social Investment Council of Echoing Green, a Board Member of the Boston MS Gala, and a part owner of a restaurant. He and his wife, Lauren, now reside on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

Deborah Farrington, Founder & General Partner, StarVest Partners
Deborah Farrington is a founder and general partner of StarVest Partners, a New York City-based venture capital firm founded in 1998.

StarVest invests in technology-enabled business services companies with a focus on software-as-a-service, ecommerce and internet marketing. StarVest was an early investor in the software-as-a-service trend: in 2000, it invested as the only venture firm in NetSuite (NYSE: N) whose December 2007 IPO, at the time, was the highest market capitalization for a venture backed company since Google. Other noteworthy investments where Ms. Farrington served on the board include Fieldglass, acquired by Madison Dearborn, and Insurance.com, bought by QuinStreet. Prior to founding StarVest, Ms. Farrington held positions including: President and CEO of Victory Ventures, LLC, a New York-based private equity investment firm where she also served as chairman of Staffing Resources, Inc.

Ms. Farrington currently sits on the Boards of NetSuite, where she is lead director and chairman of the Compensation Committee, Xignite, Host Analytics, and PivotLink on behalf of StarVest. She is also a director and chairman of the Compensation Committee at Collectors Universe, Inc. (NASDAQ: CLCT). She was named to the Forbes Midas 100 List of top venture capitalists in the United States in 2008, 2009 and 2011.

She is a graduate of Smith College and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, where she is a member of the Dean’s Visiting Committee. She is also a member of the President’s Advisory Council and investment committee of Smith College; a board member of the Harvard Business School Club of New York City; a member of The Committee of 200 and the Economic Club of New York; and a board member of Opportunity International, a leading international microfinance organization.

Matt Gorin, Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Contour Venture Partners
Matt Gorin is a co-founder of Contour Venture Partners and has experience in technology operations, start-ups, venture capital and turnaround management. He is passionate about helping to build early stage companies, with a focus on the financial services, internet and applied technology sectors. Contour invests in seed and early stage technology companies in the northeast United States with a focus on the financial services, digital media and the internet sectors.

Matt was previously with Promontory Financial Group, a merchant banking firm focused on the financial services sector. He was part of the launch team at Promontory Interfinancial Network, a financial services technology platform company which has subsequently grown to over one hundred employees. Prior to this, Matt worked for Red Hat in its Strategic Planning & Corporate Development group where he was responsible for starting Red Hat’s Independent Software Vendor (ISV) Partnership Program, ultimately establishing extensive business and technology partnerships with many of the top global independent software vendors. Matt also worked at Morgan Stanley in its strategic venture capital fund, concentrating on making investments in early-stage financial services companies. Earlier in his career, Matt was a turnaround consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers, where he helped devise and implement operating strategies for troubled companies in various industries.

Matt is the Founder of StreetWise Partners, a nonprofit focused on providing low-income individuals with a path to a successful career through mentoring, job skills and professional experience. He co-authored a Harvard Business School case study analyzing the origins of free trade and a paper in the World Economic Outlook on the economic and political risks in the Middle East.

Matt received his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and B.A. in Economics and American Studies from Brandeis University, where he was co-captain of the tennis team.

Rick Heitzmann, Managing Director, FirstMark Capital
Rick Heitzmann, a founder and managing Director of FirstMark Capital, focuses on investments in the media, adtech, gaming, and mobile sectors. Prior to founding FirstMark Capital, Rick was a Partner with Pequot Ventures. Rick also serves on the Board of Directors of the New York Venture Capital Association.

Current ventures include: dashlane, Live Gamer, Meteor Entertainment, Pinteret, Playnomics, SneakPeeq, Sulia, Tapad, Tubular, WePlay. Historical investments include: Clickable (acquired by Syncapse in 2012), Riot Games (acquired by Tencent Holdings in 2011), FirstAdvantage (acquired by First American in 2009), StubHub (acquired by eBay in 2007), and US Search (acquired by First Advantage in 2003).

Rick received a B.S. from Georgetown University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Rick has traveled all seven continents and is a huge Philadelphia sports fan. Friends claim he has seen every movie on Netflix.

Jim Robinson, Managing partner, RRE Ventures
Jim Robinson is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at RRE Ventures. He has been active within the technology community for nearly 30 years as a venture capitalist, entrepreneur, banker, and futurist. Jim received his B.S. in Business Administration from Antioch College, and his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. He is an MBA program lecturer at Columbia Business School and Stanford Business School, and a PhD / Master’s program lecturer at CUNY Baruch and The New School.

Ex-Officio members
David Teten, Chairman, HBSAANY; partner, ffVC
Jason E. Klein, Chair, External Relations, HBSAANY; founder/CEO On Grid Ventures

StarcomMediaVest: The Agency Customer View of GeoTargeting

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Derek Thompson is global managing director of mobile practice at ad agency StarcomMediaVest’s (SMG).  He was interviewed by Steven Jacob of Street Fight, and here are a few excerpts.  The full story is here.  In his words, somewhat condensed:

starcom

  • Broad appeal. Across Starcom MediaVest’s portfolio, I cannot think of one client that is not interested in this space. You have consumer-packaged-goods…auto manufacturers…travel companies.  Across the board, brands are curious about location.
  • KFS:  Integration with ad serving, real time optimization, scale vs objective.  The ability to integrate third party ad-serving is a critical component. And the ability to manage and optimize accounts in real time in real time in terms of delivery, execution and results is also extremely important…the minimum requirements to get going. The other one across this space is to have access to the right inventory…if you cannot get distribution of that great idea because your first-party publisher partners are not there or you’re only working with a certain segmentsof applications, then you’re going to be limited. 
  • Location trumps third-party reporting: To identify where a consumer is at a special time and message them based on that information. to help us understand audience based on where that device has been seen.  We can try to do it through third-party reporting, likes, and content but that’s often misleading.
  • Complexity.  The space is so fragmented, there are so many different offerings, or alleged offers, for brands, that they need help understanding it, they need reasons to get behind it…to test and learn.
  • In April, SMG announced a partnership with PlaceIQ to build out a new KPI.