Category Archives: Ad Tech/Location

Big Data and the Local Mobile Promise

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Local content and ad delivery continue to get smarter with more context around people, places and how they’re connected, says Michael Boland of BIA/Kelsey.

With smartphone penetration breaking the 50 percent barrier, there is an explosion in geo-data, and various alternatives are emerging to make sense of it.

One approach getting traction is to combine location data with “Big Data” on users (demographic, behaviorial, historical) and contextual data to help marketers extract more useful information.  Examples are Localeze, Sense Networks, PlaceIQ, Placed, Locu, Factual, Urban Mapping, and mobile local ad networks xAd, WHEREads, JiWire.

Read more here.  Are there other approaches possible?  A topic for another day…

October 22 update:  Mike Boland provides an update on the some of the players here.

 

Yodle Challenges the Conventional Local Sales Wisdom

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NYC-based Yodle is perfecting a telemarketing approach to small businesses across the USA.  Yodle sells digital advertising solutions to 30,000 customers and generates about $130 million in revenue.  This post from Kelsey Group explains some of CEO Court Cunnigham’s methods:

Cunningham tells us that by analyzing the metadata around the call activity (call duration, outcome, etc.) it generates for customers, as regular analysis of nearly 150 million keywords has led Yodle to a number of insights that have led Yodle to make tactical decisions that defy conventional wisdom.

One such example involves the number of times a company can contact a sales prospect unsuccessfully before “burning” the lead. Yodle has determined from statistical analysis that it is possible to contact a record (sales prospect) considerably more times (more than 2X) than conventional wisdom suggests.

Cunningham also has a lot of unconventional things to say about sales effectiveness.

“Drive, persistence and optimism are the attributes that equate to success in a sales reps, and everyone knows that,” Cunningham says. “Yet most companies don’t interview for these attributes.”

ReachLocal Adds Retargeting for SMBs

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ReachLocal is getting nice traction with its one-stop approach for small businesses to advertise on the web.  MediaPost reports today that ReachLocal is launching a new retargeting platform to bring more advanced tactics to its small business customer.  With 2012 revenues expected to be $450 million (and adjusted EBITDA of around $20 million), ReachLocal is the leading pureplay today in local advertising.