1. Report: Amazon Led Big Retailers in Digital Ad Spend Increases during Early Holiday Season
“Digital and linear TV each saw gains among half of the retailers measured.”
“The e-commerce giant increased digital ad spend during the holiday push by 224 percent year over year. Linear TV ad spend also rose – by 76 percent – while its print investment dropped 10 percent.”
2. Lenovo Debuts Amazon Alexa-Powered Smart Speaker at CES
“The device will retail for less than the Amazon Echo.”
“Like Microsoft is doing with Cortana, Amazon is making Alexa available to third-party developers and hardware makers to voice their connected products. Amazon is also making Alexa’s several thousand ‘skills’ (voice apps) equally available to developers.”
3. Amazon Launches Digital Day, a New Sales Holiday for Digital Products
“The timing for this new sales day appears to be flawless as it not only leads into a long holiday weekend but it also coincides with a time of year when people may have more gift cards to use (and new products to use it with – like the Echo.)
4. Individualization: Mobile Marketing’s Next Step
“Most notably, we’ve seen companies begin to embrace segmented push messages while increasingly avoided the dreaded broadcast messages (aka spam).”
“By the numbers, Localytics’ research has shown a 10% increase in the number of segmented push notifications.”
“Segmented, targeted messages see improved click-through rates, conversion rates and overall engagement. Your average segmented message sees a 7.4% click-through, while broadcast messages yield only a 4% click-through rate.”
5. Periscope Launches Live 360 Video Broadcasting
“The live videos work similar to other standard 360 integrations where users can physically rotate (or swipe/drag) to see the full scope of a moment.
“The 360 videos can currently be viewed by all users, but only a select group of partners are eligible to broadcast.”
6. Top Smartphone Apps of 2016: Google and Facebook Control 8 out of the Top 10 Slots
10. Amazon App
9. Apple Music
8. Instagram
7. Gmail
6. Google Play
5. Google Search
4. Google Maps
Click the link for the top 3!
7. YouTube Labs Pairs Brands and Agencies with Creators to Produce Platform-Relevant Content
“The initiative aims to help brands and their agencies produce episodic content designed to build an audience, while executing a ‘test-and-learn’ approach.”
8. Google Launching Free Mobile Site Creation Tool in India, Will it Come to North America?
“Roughly six years ago Google introduced its own DIY, free mobile website builder and then launched a portal with several partners offering small businesses mobile web development services.”
“Helping Indiana small businesses get online provides that content for Indian search users and simultaneously enables business owners to reach this massive but still not fully mature digital markets.”
“Red Bull had more than double the number of shares earned by the No. 2 most popular brand Samsung, which earned 124 million shares. In third place, McDonald’s videos had 8.6 million shares.”
10. Amazon Alexa Now Has More than 7,000 Voice Apps, Google Assistant Coming to TV
“Competition among virtual assistants heating up as they move to a broader range of connected devices and appliances.”
