The Near Memo

Send us a textAfter dozens of failed messaging starts, Google has been on a campaign to get Apple to integrate with their telco favored RCS messaging service. It's not clear why Apple would want to do that and the campaign by Google is almost laughable.Local growth highlighted in Axiosacquisition by Cox for $585 million. With the ascendance of Google and Facebook advertising, local newspapers have been on the ropes. Cox, originally a newspaper company, exited that world for digital properties and broadband services. It appears that they are making a jump back in with the Axios acquisition. Axios Local, highlighted in the press release for the acquisition, currently operates in 24 cities and plans to expand its coverage to 30 U.S. cities by the end of 2022. Eventually, it hopes to be in hundreds of cities. It will be interesting to watch if a nationally run local news organization can find a successful monetization strategy. B2B targeting has always been complicated and expensive or both. Facebook's newly updated offering seems to resolve both of these issues. Their focused entrance into the space could provide some price competition for LinkedIn and put pressure on other players in the marketThe Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 77Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textSegment 1: Shopify’s investment in Klaviyo improves Shopify’s enterprise cred & may signal acquisitionIn a move to protect and enhance their core product with enterprise, Shopify’s strategic investment in Klaviyo indicates a Segment 2: The golden era of hyper detailed location data intelligence is coming to an endThe marketplace for highly granular location data, fed by smartphones, cars and cell companies, is coming under scrutiny by both Congress and regulators. Despite the value to society that this data might have, its abuse and invasive practices seems to have finally led to some constraints and oversight. If we are lucky, we may be given the ability to opt into surveillance instead of just having to accept it. Segment 3: At Covid start  E-commerce was eating retail, turns out it is retailIn early Covid, pundits talk up the idea that e-commerce had leaped 5 years ahead in its “battle” with retail only to talk up the idea that in store shopping has returned and the e-commerce lost all that it gained. But a closer examination of the data shows that e-commerce did make and sustains real growth but that retail has returned stronger as well. The problem seems to be with comparison between the two. In the end, e-commerce is not really a separate segment from retail but one in the same. Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a text Instagram evolves (?) to target Gen Z but leaves others behind Instagram and Facebook are attempting to cater to the consumption patterns of Gen Z but in doing so are alienating their traditional users. Might these apps be better served by bifurcating their products and developing more focused apps. Google prevents reviews on listings that offer reproductive servicesGoogle has stopped allowing reviews on Planned Parenthood as well as a limited number of businesses offering abortion & reproductive services. While the Planned Parenthood stoppage was probably a manual action, shutting of every business in the categories noted appears to be algorithmically implemented. Why? Google Commerce SERP TrendsFour major trends in commerce serps on the desktop: increasingly  visual, there are a greater variety of serp features to cope with ambiguity, there an increasing number of Local Packs and Ads dominate the space. Local Packs show for 77% of Google commerce query SERP results.The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 75Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textAmazon AND Google both try to demonstrate their anti fake review bonafides. Both fail to do their job and offer little in the way of substantive reform to prevent review abuses. The American Data Privacy and Protection Act (.pdf) looks like it will make it out of committee, a watershed moment and a step toward a floor vote. This moment is a byproduct of significant compromises and amendments. Instagram has introduced an upgraded, interactive and searchable map experience. Users can now search, browse and drag maps to find things nearby. Results can also be filtered by categories such as restaurants, hotels, cafes, sights.The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 74Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textIn the past year somewhere on the order of 300 independent bookstores have opened. The need for discovery, serendipity, community and increased opportunities are all likely factors in this resurgence Amazon is illegally sharing Ring data with police while ICE is accumulating dossiers on 3 out of 4 Americans with no oversight.  Google’s disclosure that 40% of Gen Z’ers prefer Tik-Tok & Instagram to Google when searching for lunch restaurants, surprised many but puts their long term emphasis on images in the search results into meaningful relief. It also explains new search units that are primarily visual like “Find places through photo”. While the comment appeared to be off-hand it likely reflects an intentional effort to offset antitrust scrutiny as well.The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 73Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textThe Digital Markets Act attempts to create a new framework for understanding and regulating digital monopolies to improve competitiveness and create opportunities for smaller online businesses. Amongst its targets: self preferencing, access to alternative payment systems and messaging services interoperability. The fines for non-compliance are a non-trivial 10% of annual sales. Dark patterns that mislead consumers will be banned, ads that target children or on the basis of religion, gender, race and political opinions will also be banned. “Users will have new rights, including a right to complain to the platform, seek out-of-court settlements, complain to their national authority in their own language, or seek compensation for breaches of the rules.”The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.EP 72 Near MemoSubscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textTime to stop lamenting “zero click” search and to embrace the “messy middle” of Google’s entity search and barnacle SEO. Understanding how Google has remade all of search from inventory to brands into entity search as a way to help consumers make a decision is key to building out a successful search optimization strategy. Google is leveraging ever more granular product entities and product information to create a local product search experience that Amazon can’t compete with. Privacy should be a right not a convoluted opt out process. Most users, in choosing to not allow Apple’s app tracking show the way forward on privacy - opt in not opt out. While it is unlikely the federal government will go there states will. Hopefully sooner rather than later. The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 71Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textThere's a growing perception that Google is in decline or dying. In an article in the Atlantic, Charlie Warzel interviews Marie Haynes, Dannie Sullivan and Rand Fishkin to try to understand his growing dissatisfaction with Google’s results. Is it too commercial, too corporate or too sanitized? He is not sure but he does know its not what it used to be.What would Google local search results look like if Google couldn't put the Local 3-Pack at the top of search results? A recently discovered test may give us a clue. New 'Local Cards' have appeared in organic results. They offer less information but still link to GBP pages, not local websites.Even if this test is abandoned, we need to be prepared for change in local SEO and local marketing if the anit-self-preferencing act passes Congress. . There is growing anecdotal evidence that users are switching to alternative methods to discover local goods and services. Is GenZ ready to abandon Google? Have they already moved on to TikTok and Instagram? Google has lost other search battle before but have managed, by hook or by crook, to stay relevant. The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Near Memo Ep 70Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a text Chewy’s provides great CX and it goes viral: When a dog owner’s pet died and they asked Chewy to refund their unused food, the company went above and beyond. In doing so, they demonstrated the incredible viral value of great customer service. A simple customer service act provides bountiful returns. A look at the top 1000 Google queries on the desktop and what it says about local: Kevin Indig of Shopify looked at the top 1000 searches on Google Desktop. Interestingly at least ⅓ were local in intent and most of those were branded local searches.John Oliver & Rand Fishkin look at the two antitrust bills that might pass this summer: John Oliver, like many comedians these days, does a  better job of explaining the antitrust bills in front of Congress than the news does. And he is more fun to listen to. Rand Fishkin looks at how the bills will dramatically change what we do as marketers.The Near Memo, with David Mihm, Greg Sterling & Mike Blumenthal, is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textAmazon has been posting new job positions for “rare opportunity to join a start-up business within Amazon Ads and play a strategic role in building the future of Local Ads”. It is hard to know exactly what it is they are building but talk of building relationships with agencies, clients, and service providers to scope solutions, partnerships, and business opportunities that result in the acceleration of Amazon's Advertising growth in New York City, Washington DC, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago. Regardless, it is clear that they are looking to grow their ad business via local and looking to take Google (and perhaps Walmart) on directly in the space. Can Yep It get off the ground and sustain an income stream or is it just another “ankle biter”. There are many wannabes in the search space with many different models, Yep It is trying to partner with content creators first and foremost. Although the question remains how will they get consumer uptake to make it work?There was a great deal of speculation about an “Apple Search Engine” with dreams of a Google competitor that actually had consumer support. What Apple in fact did do was elevate Spotlight to a place of prominence and use AI, the Siri Knowledge Graph and local access to deliver on an improved “federated” search as a feature not a destination. While they were at it they rolled out an incredibly consumer friendly buy now pay later plan that apparently does not get reported to the credit bureaus if you drop the ballThe Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.EP 68 Near MemoSubscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/