Foursquare Splits In Two; Yext Acquires Citrrus

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Foursquare Transforms

Location-sharing app Foursquare is splitting in two. The “check-in” function that defined it from day one will be rebranded as Swarm. Meanwhile a rewritten version of Foursquare will support search and discovery. Foursquare’s VP of product experience, Jon Steinback, said, “Mobile forced this fundamental switch. We were born in mobile but we were born in this idea that each mobile app was kind of like a Web property bundled up for mobile.” The Verge has the story. And more from Greg Sterling.

Services On Top

Yext has decided to add a professional service team to its SaaS offerings with the purchase of Citrrus – its first acquisition. So says Yext CEO Howard Lerman, who tells TechCrunch that “getting the product to work for enterprise customers can require more customization.” Hence, the acqui-hire of sorts. Read it. How long until an ad tech firm buys an agency?

Instagram’s Video Ads

ClickZ’s sources say Instagram is testing sponsored video ads with advertising partners, and has not yet confirmed a specific launch date. Adweek reports that Instagram’s early advertising partners include Burberry, Ben & Jerry’s and Levi’s. Chaney Marketing Group founder Paul Chaney comments, “In my experience, Facebook’s standard operating procedure is to test with a small sample, then roll out changes on a broader scale. I wouldn’t be surprised if that wasn’t the case with Instagram as well.” Read more via ClickZ.

The White House On Big Data

On Thursday, the White House released a highly anticipated report that details the tech industry’s collection of big data and how it affects the online privacy of Americans. In a parallel report from the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, co-chair John Holdren writes, “In light of the continuing proliferation of ways to collect and use information about people, PCAST recommends that policy focus primarily on whether specific uses of information about people affect privacy adversely. It also recommends that policy focus on outcomes, on the ‘what’ rather than the ‘how,’ to avoid becoming obsolete as technology advances.” Read The Washington Post.

The Rise Of Tablets

Tablets are becoming more important for advertising and ecommerce, according to an eMarketer report released Thursday. Findings detail that consumers use of tablets will grow an estimated 11.3%, reaching 147.2 million users this year. “Despite the growth of mobile video viewing and the relative stagnation of video viewing on PCs, ad spending still skews heavily toward online video. … [I]nvestments in online video ads in the US will reach $4.45 billion this year, dwarfing mobile video ad spending, which will total $1.44 billion.” Read more.

Pardot’s Popular For Programmatic

VentureBeat reports that the fastest-growing marketing automation system is Pardot, Salesforce’s subsidiary. According to the stats, Pardot is gaining customers faster than Hubspot, Marketo, Act-On or DemandForce. Although Pardot has steadily been raking in new clients at a rate of 200-400 monthly, the data from April saw Pardot’s new client figure swell to 1,128. Marketo, for comparison, gained 518 new clients that same month. Get the full story.

Earnings