Its all about location. Google and Facebook rolled out their own places apps and now Facebook daily-deals are added in several cities.

From WARC.com

Facebook takes on Groupon

PALO ALTO: Facebook, the social network, is trialling a new “daily deals” service, putting it into direct competition with early category leaders like Groupon and LivingSocial.

The Web 2.0 pioneer’s latest initiative expands on the geo-location tools developed for the company’s Places platform, and augments the promotional offers provided through Facebook Deals.

Daily deals will initially run in Austin, Atlanta, Dallas, San Diego and San Francisco.

Visitors can view a dedicated page detailing all the current discounts, money-off schemes and other enticements pursued by marketers, accessing this section of Facebook via a link from their personal homepage.

Similar to Google’s search engine, Facebook may have found a way to successfully monetise the long tail of small enterprises, by promising a large audience on a comparatively modest budget.

“Local businesses will be able to sign up to use this feature soon and people will be able to find deals in the coming weeks,” a Facebook statement said.

Emily White, Facebook’s director of local operations, further suggested Facebook’s social focus could now extend offline.

“You won’t get your legs waxed with friends,” she said. “You dine out, you go to concerts, you do outdoor activities. We want to make sure those experiences are maximised.”

Alongside its in-house sales unit, Facebook is working with nine firms, like restaurant booking specialist Open Table, family-orientated social shopping site Plum District and high-end equivalent Gilt City, to source offers.

Zozi, which prioritises holidays and adventurous travel trips, is another member of this group.

“We are very excited about the Facebook partnership. They are an extraordinarily strong company with the largest number of page views on the web,” said TJ Sassani, Zozi’s chief executive.

“That’s helpful when we talk to merchants.”

One problem to be overcome by Facebook, and the whole sector, is the fact many organisations, particularly smaller businesses, cannot match demand, and therefore actually make a loss.

“There are some downsides to having a huge audience,” said Greg Sterling, a senior analyst at Opus Research.

“For national advertisers, it’s double-edged as well. The minute something appears that’s any good, people will be all over that.”

Lou Kerner, a Wedbush Securities analyst, argued such a strategy pushes Facebook to the forefront of an increasingly intense online battle.

“Local is the last frontier that the internet has not conquered, and everyone is going after it with a vengeance,” said Kerner.

“This news is just kind of an evolutionary moment in Facebook’s drive to be a major player in local.”

Consultancy BIA/Kelsey predicted US consumer expenditure on “deal a day” goods and services would rise 35.1% a year in the near term, climbing from $873m in 2010 to $1.2bn in 2011, and hitting $3.9bn by 2015.

Based on an optimistic reading – where the amount of featured cities, registered users, average transactions and price beat current forecasts – BIA/Kelsey anticipated the 2015 total might reach $6.1bn.

“We expect to see some shift in local media spending resulting from the adoption of deal a day by local advertisers,” said Peter Krasilovsky, BIA/Kelsey’s vp and program director, Marketplaces.

“We also believe that deal a day doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It will become a part of the growing deals and offers landscape.”

To gain a meaningful foothold, Facebook must take on LivingSocial, which has previously received investment from Amazon, and Groupon, thought to be considering an initial public offering.

“Some investors may get spooked,” said Sterling. “In the old days, everybody worried about Google entering every segment of the market. And now Facebook is another concern.”

Data sourced from Reuters, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal, Financial TImes; additional cotnent by Warc staff, 16 March 2011

Reach out to ApolloBravo for the latest geo location coupon campaign tools.

Eric Schmidt Google’s chairman and CEO presented Google’s mobile first vision of the future both at the MWC in Barcelona and the IAD meeting below.  The vision makes sense as younger developers think mobile first as there are more of these devices than televisions and PCs combined. Mobile is quickly becoming the most important platform as smart phones continue to dominate new technology purchases among consumers.

Via WARC

PALM SPRINGS: Marketers will be presented with a huge range of opportunities in the “mobile first” era that is resulting from increased smartphone use, Eric Schmidt, Google’s chairman/ceo, has argued.
Schmidt was speaking at the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s annual leadership meeting, covered in more detail by Geoffrey Precourt, Warc’s US editor, here.

“The smartphone is the iconic device of our time,” he said at the event.Having projected in 2010 that mobile usage would surpass the PC equivalent in two years, Schmidt revealed this shift had actually already beaten such a schedule.

“It happened two weeks ago. And the PC is not going to catch up,” he said.Indeed, Schmidt stated the uptake of mobile media is “happening faster than all our internal predictions”, shown by the fact 78% of mobile web users already utilise their handsets while shopping.

Further data directly linked to advertising demonstrated the power of what Schmidt described as the “mobile first” age.Chrysler, the automaker, ran a 60-second TV spot during the recent Super Bowl, and related mobile search traffic climbed 200% after the commercial aired, measured against a 48% leap on desktop PC.

These figures hit 315% and 50% respectively regarding GoDaddy’s execution made for the same event.Perhaps the greatest potential of this medium, however, is to provide highly localized marketing and communications.

“A RadioShack ad can tell you where you are and how to get to the nearest store,” Schmidt said.Once consumers have been tempted into branches, retailers can also create barcodes to be scanned using wireless devices, and allow buyers to obtain products through contactless payments.

Permission-based services are an essential tool, and Schmidt also suggested targeted deals should prove especially attractive to shoppers.”Let’s say you need a pair of pants. [Your smartphone] tells you there’s a store on your left with a 20% discount,” Schmidt added.

“The store on your right has a 30% discount, but it’s for a brand you don’t like. The phone can, in fact, tell you what to buy. And, again, it’s tap-and-pay and off you go.”"Think of the offers mechanisms for advertisers … We’ve spent 20 years trying to get here. And now there’s an explosion in commerce.”

Elsewhere, he estimated internet ad revenues currently stand at $62bn (€45bn; £38bn) worldwide, including $26bn from the US alone.Turning specifically to online display, Schmidt valued the global market at $17bn, incorporating $9bn generated by American advertisers.Looking ahead, Google’s chairman forecast the display category could deliver $200bn in returns “within the next five to ten years”.

The largest obstacle constraining this expansion, and possibly even more rapid growth, is a simple, logistical one.”It’s too hard to get campaigns up,” said Schmidt.The advent of systems like trading desks supplying instant access to inventory, and constantly updated prices, may change such a situation.

“The new online advertising model is real time,” said Schmidt.”“It’s iterative. You don’t press the button and see what happens in the week; it occurs literally live.”Overall, Schmidt suggested that, just as the term “color television” was quickly replaced by just “television” when viewers got used to the new technology, a parallel shift is soon set to take place.

“Today we speak of digital media. The average American spends about a third of their media time online and kids are always online.”

“All media will be digital media … All this will happen within all of our lifetimes.”

Data sourced from Warc March 2011

Contact Apollobravo for  more information and a mobile ready evaluation.