STUDY: Facebook beating out niche sites for local search + MORE

Many apps and websites have found success using Facebook as a login platform. A recent study and infographic by Gigya, a Facebook Preferred Marketing Developer in apps, examines just how prevalent Facebook login is across the internet.
Gigya found that 52 percent of social logins happen through Facebook, with Google taking 24 percent (and that figure is rising), and Yahoo at 17 percent…

It was only a matter of time until Yelp outgrew its partnership with OpenTable and stepped up to offer reservations on its own.
Today Yelp announced that it has purchased SeatMe, a startup that lets bars and restaurants offer online reservations, for $12.7 million ($2.2 million in cash and 263,000 shares of stock)…

Less than a month ago, Facebook introduced several new requirements for developers submitting applications and Open Graph actions for approval. Now the social network has updated its documentation with best practices and an updated list of actions that are no longer being approved.
In general, Facebook recommends using common actions when possible, only creating a custom action if it’s not one already provided…

Through Facebook’s Graph Search, the company is trying to become a player in local search. As Yext discovered in a recent study, Facebook is already a more popular local search engine than TripAdvisor and other niche sites, yet still has a long way to go to catch up with Google.
When more than 1,000 people were asked about websites they access to find local business information, 12…

According to a report from Reuters, Facebook mobile usage for June showed an 18 percent increase in the U.S. and 22 percent in the U.K.
At the first quarterly earnings report in May, Facebook reported a worldwide monthly active userbase on mobile of 751 million — 189 million of whom are mobile-only…

Facebook is making serious strides in enhancing its mobile product. Earlier this year, it purchased Parse, and now the company has acquired Monoidics, a U.K.-based code verification software developer. The firm will join Facebook’s office in London.
Facebook software engineer Phillip Su announced the news in a Facebook post:
I’m excited to announce that we’ve agreed to acquire certain assets of Monoidics, a leading pioneer in code verification software!
This asset acquisition represents our investment in the quality of our mobile applications platform and also our people, as members of their talented engineering team will join us to work at Facebook’s London office once the deal closes (pending certain closing conditions)…

Apple has acquired Locationary, a Toronto-based startup that organizes data on local businesses, for an undisclosed sum.
Apple confirmed the deal to AllThingsD, which also reported hearing from sources that the acquisition included Locationary’s team and technology. Apple did not immediately respond to our request for comment…

Did you know that 87 percent of business to business (B2B) marketers now use social media?
And with good reason: social media is one of the most effective marketing tactics in the arsenal of the B2B brand, with these firms using platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to raise awareness (79 percent), acquire customers (74 percent) and generate leads (71 percent)…

Maker’s Row, the startup that wants to put US businesses back in touch with US manufacturers, has successfully nabbed a cool $1 million of seed funding.
The cash injection comes from a round led by Comcast Ventures and Index Ventures that included follow on funding from prominent angels such as Joanne Wilson and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian…

Have you built your own platform? Are you wondering how to monetize it? To learn how you can use your platform to generate real revenue for your business, I interview David Siteman Garland for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast. More About This Show The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from […

A month after Facebook introduced photo comments for users, the site is implementing this technology for pages. Now people can leave photo comments on page posts. Page admins can also respond to comments with a photo. This is rolling out gradually and globally starting today.
A Facebook spokesperson announced this capability to Inside Facebook:
For businesses, enabling photos in comments, both on Pages and elsewhere on the site, allows for conversations with customers to be more expressive and engaging than ever…

88% of of social strategists, according to Altimeter Research, are not confident that their social plans look beyond the next 12 months. And 66% of them have not connected their strategies to business outcomes.
Umm, Houston, we have a problem.
Charlene Li and Brian Solis, of Altimeter Group, just released a new ebook, The Seven Success Factors of Social Business Strategy, that aims to help social strategists get back on track…

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How You Can Save Your Soul: In 140 Characters or Less (USA Today)
Following Pope Francis’s Twitter feed may be good for your soul — both in this life and the next. The spiritual leader of the Roman Catholic Church plans to grant plenary indulgences by Twitter during the World Youth Day 2013 event, which will be held July 23-28 in Brazil…