The GroupMe app was designed to solve a very basic problem — group decision making. If you’ve ever tried to plan a night out with four different you understand the issue. Fred calls Joe and suggests sushi, Joe calls Mary who says she doesn’t like sushi, so Joe texts Fred to say pick somewhere else, but in the meantime Fred is on the phone trying to talk Louise into coming out for sushi with him, while Mary texts Louise telling her Fred’s a loser and they’re all going for pizza. Next thing you know it’s 10:00 at night and no one has left the house yet.

Now, with the GroupMe app, Fred, Joe, Mary and Louise can all get their own private mobile chatroom where they can hash out the details in time to beat the dinner crowd (and with a 50% off coupon from Foursquare!)

According to FastCompany, GroupMe already handles more than a million messages a day, and they turned down a $30 mil offer from Twitter. Seems like Skype is a better fit anyway as both companies are more about two-way conversation. Twitter thinks they’re two-way, but mostly, they’re not.

GroupMe with or without Skype is an excellent tool for the small business as it allows all the members of the team to get on the same page at the same time. As far as using it for marketing, there are possibilities. Lollaplooza set up a GroupMe number for folks attending their music festival. Kind of like a Twitter event hashtag, but more direct.

For the time being, GroupMe will continue business as usual but the goal is to add their functionality to Skype’s system. It all goes to Skype’s ultimate goal which is to become the switchboard for all of planet Earth. And if we ever discover intelligent life on other planets, we’ll probably use Skype to contact them, too.

Do you use GroupMe? I’d like to hear about your experience.

You know, the one designed and sold by Google. A complete Android package from the search giant.

So what better way to celebrate the one year anniversary of that failed experiment than by coughing up $12.5 billion, in CASH, for Motorola and jumping feet first into the handset manufacturing business?

I know, you’re checking to make sure it’s not April 1st, but this is hot off the wire:

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Motorola Mobility Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: MMI) today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Google will acquire Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or a total of about $12.5 billion, a premium of 63% to the closing price of Motorola Mobility shares on Friday, August 12, 2011. The transaction was unanimously approved by the boards of directors of both companies.

The acquisition of Motorola Mobility, a dedicated Android partner, will enable Google to supercharge the Android ecosystem and will enhance competition in mobile computing. Motorola Mobility will remain a licensee of Android and Android will remain open. Google will run Motorola Mobility as a separate business.

Big news, huh? Now Google’s heading for uncharted waters with this acquisition. So many questions are raised, including:

• How will other handset makers react to this? Will they go running to Windows?
• How will Microsoft react to this? Will it go running out to buy its own handset manufacturer?
• How will Apple react to this?
• And, how will the FTC react to this?

That last question seems to be the one that Google CEO Larry Page is most concerned with–going on the offensive in a blog post announcing the acquisition (emphasis added):

We recently explained how companies including Microsoft and Apple are banding together in anti-competitive patent attacks on Android. The U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene in the results of one recent patent auction to “protect competition and innovation in the open source software community” and it is currently looking into the results of the Nortel auction. Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies.

In other words, this is just poor little Google trying to bring a little balance to the Microsoft/Apple dominance.

What are your thoughts Pilgrims?

The AdGrok system included a GrokBar, the Grok-o-Matic and the Groknoculars, all of which made you a Pro-Groker for only $59.00 a month. And I tell you all of this only because I like the word Grok as much as they do. But now, sadly, the time has come to move on to a world where everything happens in under 140 characters, which is enough to say Live long and prosper six times in one Tweet, so it’s all good.

Actually, things aren’t good in the Grokingdom. According to their blog, AdGrok will be shutting down their servers on June 30, leaving all of their current customers weightlessly floating in space. Sounds like the perfect time for a competitor to swoop in and save the day.

This is how it goes in the internet world, start-ups happen, they do good, they get bought and they close. Great news for those who transfer over, but not so much for the rest of the staff and the customers. In this case, it’s been confirmed that two of the AdGrok men are now working at Twitter’s HQ, while a third is working for Facebook. Kind of like how the Romulans split from the Vulcans and in turn, the United Federation of Planets.

The good news for any marketer who wasn’t using AdGrok software, is that Twitter is fast becoming a viable option for an online campaign. They still have some growing to do, but it looks like they could be eating into Facebook’s 4 billion dollar ad revenue sooner than expected.

But Andy, I hear you ask, you’re happy that one of Trackur‘s competitors has been acquired? How so?

Well, it completely validates the social media monitoring industry and, when companies like Radian6 get acquired by companies like salesforce.com, you can’t get much more in the way of validation than that.

The deal is expected to close at the end of July and will be worth $276 million in cash and $50 million in stock. In addition, Radian6′s founders get another $14 million in cash and stock. I pause here to note that it’s interesting that the earnout for the founders is singled out. I also wonder just how much equity Radian6 had handed over to venture capital firms, to be earning a comparatively small percentage of the total sale price.

Marketing Pilgrim’s Reputation Channel is sponsored by Trackur’s social media monitoring tools. Plans start at just $18 a month and you are up and running in just 60-seconds!

So, just how big is Radian6? Here’s a few of the facts I’ve pieced together–yes, I love keeping a close eye on Trackur’s competitors.

• Founded in 2006
• Around 300 employees
• Will add $45-50 million in revenues to salesforce.com over the next year
• Sale price estimated at 6-7 10 times annual revenue

So, yeah, a big congrats to Radian6 on a successful exit. The company will reportedly remain an independent company, but that tends to be the de-facto statement in acquisitions–to prevent clients from scattering in fear of being assimilated by the acquiring company.

As for Trackur? We’re going to keep on doing what we do. Trackur grew 110% in 2010. Trackur is now the largest social media monitoring tool with 32,000+ registered users. And, sneak peek here, we’re planning new features that will so severely shake up the pricing model in the industry, our competitors are going to be glad they sold when they did.

Disclaimer: Andy Beal is the CEO and founder of Trackur, the worlds best social media monitoring tool, so he’s obviously biased when it comes to this subject–even in his disclaimers!

Sorry, it will…take a little…longer to…type this sentence…with just one hand.

On the back of a recent $200 million investment–and a reported $80m secondary market purchase–the Wall Street Journal is reporting that both Google and Facebook are sniffing around Twitter.

Both Google and Facebook have discussed buying Twitter in the past and have kept their lines of communication open, people familiar with the matter said. One of these people said companies including Facebook and Google have expressed “latent interest” in an acquisition.

When it raised the $200m in December, Twitter’s valuation was only $3.7 billion. Now it appears that Google and Facebook are kicking around valuations anywhere between $8 billion and $10 billion.

Twitter’s estimated revenue for 2010 was just $45 million and this year it is rumored have around $100 million in revenue.

10,000,000,000 ÷ 100,000,000 = a multiple not seen since the dot com heyday.

It’s no wonder the WSJ says Twitter is a “tech bubble barometer” – 100 times revenues sure looks like a bubble. Then again, Twitter is not going away anytime soon and this valuation is not based on this year’s revenue–or even the next 2 years–but the company’s future revenues. Remember, its ad platform has not yet opened up to the general public–which that in itself should see Twitter’s revenues hit the $500m range in a just a couple of years.

Still, 100x is a multiple that would surely ignite a mini-dot com boom (or bust).

Sources say that Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase all took meetings with Linkedin back in November and the timing couldn’t be better. With the financial world all a flutter at the thought of investing in a social media site, Linkedin would be smart to jump in before Facebook steals the spotlight once again.

Of course, comparing the two social media sites is like comparing Kim Kardashian to Oprah. Like Kim, Facebook is all about connecting with friends and realtives for fun — share photos, play games, swap stories over a virtual cup of coffee. Linkedin, however, is all business. Connections are developed through working relationships and the chatter is career based. Linkedin is where you go if you want to find a professional partner, Facebook is where you go if you want a partner of a different kind.

Linkedin may not capture the headlines like Facebook but behind the scenes, they’ve got it all going on. Says the LA Times:

LinkedIn, which has more than 1,000 employees, may not have the explosive growth of Facebook but it is one of the first social media websites to become profitable, making money from premium services and advertising. LinkedIn does not disclose financial results but estimates of 2010 revenue are $200 million.

Which goes to prove that publicly popular doesn’t always mean profitable. 

Check out these current facts from their “About” page:

• LinkedIn has more than 90 million members in over 200 countries around the globe.
• A new member joins LinkedIn approximately every second, and about half of our members are outside the U.S.
• Executives from all Fortune 500 companies are LinkedIn members.

Now imagine where they could go with an IPO.

According to an SEC filing (reported by Fortune.com), Groupon has found $500M of the $950M it is hoping to raise. What’s the purpose of such funds? Well, a good chunk of it will go towards a cashout for shareholders…

One purpose of Groupon’s massive new round is to provide liquidity for existing shareholders, including those who may have been ticked off that the company spurned Google. Fortune has learned that all Groupon shareholders recently received a letter offering to buy back up to 15% of current stock holdings, and the SEC filing indicates that $345 million of the $500 million will be used to cash out insiders (both investors and management).

Yes sir, there it is in black and white:

Of course, this is where we get to insert some random joke about how Groupon’s investors are subject to the same ridiculously high revenue split as the coupon company’s customers.

Oh, and I appear to be in the wrong business. Brokering venture capital deals is where the easy money is. Check out the amount of commission being paid to the company that put this deal together!

Nice!

Says the Wall Street Journal:

According to people close to the FCC negotiations, those conditions would require that Comcast make NBC Universal and its other Comcast-owned video content available to pay-TV competitors at reasonable, nondiscriminatory terms. He also wants to impose conditions that would require Comcast to offer NBC Universal programming to other online video providers.

Right now, Hulu is the preferred carrier of all NBC programming online. They do syndicate out the video feeds to other third party sites, but they still get a piece of the pie and control of what and where it goes.

Under this new condition, that relationship would have to end — maybe. Some people are saying that we’re not getting the full picture, so to speak. That the condition may only mean that Hulu has to continue with the third party offerings. That’s a far cry from telling NBC they need to sever their exclusive ties with Hulu.

Why the confusion? Because right now, it’s all supposition based on news leaking from the hill. In a press conference, reporters were told that this was just a starting place and that the conditions would likely evolve as they moved through the process.

Whatever decisions are made, the FCC says they’re only looking after the public interest. There will be no more denying the public’s right to watch The Office when and where they wish. Now, that’s democracy in action.

Other times, they’re a lame duck and you wonder why anyone–let alone Reuters–would waste the time writing the story.

Exhibit A:

Exclusive: AOL mulls breakup, then merger with Yahoo

Ooh, that’s a BIG story, right? AOL, trying to reinvent itself and Yahoo, looking at a boatload of options to survive.

This is a huge story for a Monday in December. Let’s examine the “smoke” to this “fire” shall we?

…The plans are still in the exploratory stage…

Oh, OK. But I am sure the two sides are deep in talks, right?

…and Yahoo has not been contacted, the sources said…

Oh well, I’m sure Reuters has someone reliable that can be quoted here.

…The sources declined to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the media…

OK, well perhaps AOL offered some kind of confirmation that it’s considering buying Yahoo.

…AOL declined to comment…

What about Yahoo?

…A spokesperson for Yahoo also declined to comment…

Yeah, but surely Yahoo would love to be acquired by AOL–if this were all true, right?

…a source close to the company reiterated that it is not seeking proposals or in any buy-out discussions with AOL…

You can’t make this stuff up! Oh, wait! Apparently you can!

There’s actually a page “2″ to this article, but really, why would you bother to read it? C’mon Reuters, we know it’s a slow news season, but if I wanted speculation, tenuous connections, and lack of citation, I’d write it myself!

According to Business Insider, eBay payed $75 million for the company and they seem to think it’s a good buy. It may be because, as we all know,  when it comes to deals and shopping, local is everything these days. Local isn’t even a buzzword anymore, it’s a god marketers must bow down to every morning and I don’t like it.

I’m a huge eBay fan, but of the old, original eBay where I could find a rare Japanese Lost in Space doll for $400. A steal at twice the price. These days, eBay is all about electronics and brand name shoes and perfume, the kinds of things you buy in a department store. They’re becoming just another deal site and that’s sad.

But I digress. Milo.com is a cool tool, especially during the holidays when you’re looking for that special item that’s sold out all over town.  I used Milo to find a toy that is sold out at my local Target store. If a mom and pop toy store in town showed up next to that listing with an In Stock label, I’d be over there right now with the cash. That wasn’t the case as all of my searches turned up big box retailers such as Best Buy, Sears, Office Depot and Toys R Us. Though it does appear that Milo accepts one-off stores, I didn’t come across any in my test runs.

Overall, Milo.com is a good idea. I often take advantage of the “in-stock” options on sites such as Best Buy and Walmart, and Milo lets me do that all in one place. A true time saver. The search engine needs a little fine tuning and the stores searched need expanding but I imagine all of that will come now that they’ve got eBay money to spend.

According to VatorNews…

Google has just purchased Groupon for $2.5 billion, according to an unnamed insider who spoke with VatorNews.  Neither Google nor Groupon could be reached for comment to confirm the report, but Vator’s source is reliable and the report falls in line with the recent string of Groupon acquisition rumors.

If that is true, then Groupon might just be a bigger acquisition than the monstrous purchase of YouTube back in 2006. Not only is the purchase price about $1B more, but unlike YouTube at the time, Groupon is said to be raking in as much as $50 million a month!

With such a whopping price tag, Google should have enough of an investment to turn Groupon into a massive part of our daily lives. It’s that price tag that might just prevent Groupon from becoming another Dodgeball.

The big questions is: did they get a discount on the price with a coupon?

Says Atkinson, it’s AOL’s online ad marketing mojo that is of interest to Facebook, and it’s enough for the popular kid on the playground to consider hanging out with the nerd.

“Think of Tim Armstrong’s former role running ad sales for Google and think of where Facebook needs help.”

In addition to the ad sales techniques, AOL also has a large amount of content and since there’s no such thing as too much content, it can only help sweeten the deal. Armstrong also worked with Facebook’s COO Sandberg and head of ad sales David Fischer so he’s already someone they feel comfortable with and that can go along way in business.

The New York Post article sums it all up with a quote by Internet consultant Shelly Palmer.

“Put them together, you get context, contact and content.”

Though neither party would comment on the rumor, Facebook has nothing to lose and AOL has everything to gain by teaming up. I can hear it now, the familiar, deep dulcet tone announcing, “You’ve Got Friend Requests.” Followed by the sharp squelch of a connecting modem.

Sounds like an influential CEO confessing to an elicit affair, but it’s really VigLink CEO Oliver Roup talking about how his company happened to acquire rival DrivingRevenue this past Friday. It began with an email from Revenue’s Raymond Lyle and Jack Bafia saying they should talk. That was in May, so it was quite a rush to the alter. Says Roup;

“We’re very excited to be joining forces. Ray is going to lead the sales and merchant relationship team and run our Chicago office. Jack will be moving to San Francisco to assume leadership of the product team. Everyone else is keeping their job as well.  They’ve all made a big bet on the future of the combined business. They are doubling down, not cashing out.”

Sounds like one big happy family, doesn’t it? VigLink has plenty of reasons to be happy. Back in January, the company, which works as an affiliate middleman between bloggers and merchants, got $800,000 in funding from Google Ventures and First Round Capital. Now, in the wake of the merger, Roup says the investors have doubled their initial offers.

What’s DrivingRevenue bringing to the table? Not cash, but the know-how. They’ve been at this for two years and have amassed a strong group of partners that will put them way ahead of their remaining competitor, Skimlinks.

We wish the lucky couple all the happiness in the world.

Yes, with Google! Not, Bing!

Before the word “mutiny” jumps to your prefrontal cortex–your “mind” for the rest of us–you need to know this: Yahoo holds only a 35% stake in Yahoo Japan, so the search engine couldn’t put its foot down and insist that Bing be the search engine of choice.

Still, what an embarrassment! I mean, Yahoo Japan basically just told the world that its US sibling has made a terrible mistake and it’s not prepared to make the same one!

Of course, Yahoo is having none of that, releasing its own statement on the deal:

Yahoo! Japan announced that it has chosen to implement Google as its backend algorithmic search engine and paid search infrastructure. Yahoo! Japan made this decision as an independent and separate publicly traded company, in which Yahoo! holds a 35% equity interest. We amended our agreement with Yahoo! Japan as a result of this decision, and we do not anticipate that this amendment will have a material financial impact on our revenues. We will provide support, as required by our agreement, for the search experience Yahoo! Japan has chosen for its business, and we will continue to partner closely with Yahoo! Japan in other areas including mail, messenger, mobile, our content properties and more.

This decision by Yahoo! Japan does not impact the global rollout and implementation of the Yahoo! search alliance with Microsoft, except in the Japanese market. We remain confident in our transition plans for the search alliance, are driving innovation in the user experience around search on the Yahoo! network, and continue to be committed to our alliance with Microsoft.

So, what can stop this black-eye for Yahoo and Bing? Well, Japan’s regulators just might hold that key. Apparently, Google’s 53% market share in Japan and Yahoo’s 38% share will create one heck of a monopoly. So, maybe Yahoo Japan will have to partner with Bing by default.

AdPortal is a spin off of Sportgenic, a sports ad network. Now, with today’s announcement, it all becomes quite clear.

Glam Media is now going after the male market with the launch of their new vertical “BrashSports.”

The press release states:

“Brash.com, owned by Glam Media, has acquired Sportgenic (www.Sportgenic.com) — one of the leading men’s sports vertical media startups based in San Francisco, and has added leading men’s publishers (including SportsFanLive and Bloguin), professional social media authors, and digital video producers.”

“This acquisition expands Brash.com vertical leadership in Men 18-49 to over 30 million unique visitors in the U.S., making Brash #3 after Yahoo! Sports and ESPN with a massive, passionate, and socially engaged male audience online. Brash has added over 25 new men’s properties — making Brash Media a leader in offering 360 degree “whole life” solutions for brands looking to surround and engage men online.”

In addition to sports, they’re also moving deeper into entertainment and lifestyle for men. They’re using the tagline “Big. Bold. Brave. Blunt.” along with a photo of Steve McQueen which suggests they’re going for an upscale audience that is classy with a bit of the rebel thrown in. But if you take a look at Brash.com you won’t see big, bold, brave or blunt. Right now it’s a bland blog with a flat, purple navigation bar that does nothing to draw in the reader.

Brash has been online since 2008 but only represented 10% of Glam Media’s business. Now it looks like they’re putting the site into high gear in hopes of making it a much larger component. The question is, can a company that’s known for their women’s content, become the preferred homepage for men?

I do!

So, after reading that IBM had agreed to acquire web analytics fim Coremetrics for an undisclosed sum, I was happy to find former IBMer Mike Moran share some information you may not know. Like the fact that IBM originally sold its web analytics unit to Coremetrics!

IBM doesn’t make too many mistakes, but I thought it made a big one four years ago when it sold off its SurfAid Web analytics business to Coremetrics. Today, IBM reversed course in a very smart move when it swallowed up Coremetrics to tap into its customers’ growing need for Web analytics.

Apparently, Google’s acquisition of Urchin–and the subsequent launch of the free Google Analytics–took the wind out of IBM’s sails, so it decided to get out of the space. Fast forward four years and paid analytics vendors are still going strong and the lines are blurring between business intelligence and web analytics. Hence, the decision to acquire Coremetrics:

Buying Coremetrics assures them of a way that their clients can keep their data and allows IBM to analyze it for them.

Web analytics…the new black!

I tend to reply with some smart alec comment such as “That’s like asking: what’s the ROI from my telephone!” Yeah, that doesn’t go down too well, but it’s true. Twitter is a channel, a tool. Just like your telephone, it has no ROI unless you put in place a strategy that can be measured.

Well, that may be all well and good, but Twitter’s not taking any chances. It’s not prepared to sit back and hope its business users are smart enough to figure out the “ROI of Twitter,” so it’s made an important acquisition. It’s just acquired an analytics company.

When Smallthought launched Trendly, a tool that helps web sites distinguish signal from noise in their Google Analytics data, we were among the first to try it…Therefore, it is with great pleasure that we announce the acquisition of Smallthought Systems. They have joined our analytics team and will focus on integrating ideas from Trendly into our current tools and building innovative realtime products for our future commercial partners.

Trendly is now closed to new customers, but according to its site, the service offered some pretty cool analysis. Stuff you can actual use!

The answer?

Don’t buy a risky start-up, when you can invest in it and share some of that risk with other venture capital firms. If it succeeds–and you happen to be Google–you can sweep-in and acquire the company. If it fails, you don’t have to put up with the press giving you a hard time about yet another failure.

And, that’s exactly the approach Google has taken with Invidi–a start-up that’s hoping to find a better TV ad model:

The search giant is leading a $23 million series D round in Invidi Technologies, a New York City company that works on “addressable” TV ads. Addressable ads are supposed to target specific viewers, using data from set-top boxes, in the same way that Internet ads sniff out specific Web surfers.

In other words, Invidi figures out what you watch and serves ads targeted to your interests.

Sounds like the kind of thing Google would naturally be interested in, right? So, why didn’t Google just buy the company outright? Well, it’s highly likely that the founders of Invidi believe they’re on to something and don’t want to be stripped for parts by the internet giant. By taking investment from Google, Invidi gets all the warmth of the sun, but has the option to continue building their company the way they want–as much as you can when you have VC investment–and then sell to the right company, at the right time.

Sounds like a win-win for all involved.

Of course, it may not have a whole lot to do with the US federal government’s deep-rooted concern for the mobile advertising industry. Reports AllThingsD:

“The federal government is looking for a way to discipline Google in some way, because of larger concerns about its search power on the Web,” said one source. “And this is where it looks like it will try to show that concern.”

Both AdMob and Google are preparing for the federal fight—but according to Kara Swisher’s interview with AdMob Founder/CEO Omar Hamoui, AdMob is in the worst possible position. The federal scrutiny of the deal is delaying the actual merger, and the company “has no currency now to offer engineers.” They can’t raise outside funds with the deal still pending, but they have yet to get the cash from Google. Meanwhile, they’re also caught between Apple and Google:

In addition, first pointed out by MediaMemo’s Peter Kafka, since Apple lost out on its attempt to buy AdMob to Google, [Hamoui is] also facing a less-than-cooperative company whose iPhone has been one of AdMob’s key devices to place ads on.

And Apple recently issued some new rules–thus far, unenforced–that could hurt AdMob’s ability to take advantage of the powerful iPhone smartphone platform.

Although a recent report says Google + AdMob = only 21% of the market, the FTC looks likely to act against the deal in the next two weeks.

What do you think? Will the FTC block the deal, or file in an antitrust proceeding? Or will Google & AdMob ultimately prevail?

Just last week, Google snapped up Agnilux, a startup founded by former Applers. While the LabPixies acquisition will help Google expand further across Europe, Africa and the Middle East, the most direct threat to Apple is that LabPixies also designs widgets and apps for the iPhone. MediaPost reports:

Though a bit player, the fact that LabPixies develops personalized Web gadgets for the iPhone won’t be lost on some analysts who’ve speculated that Google buys companies just to annoy Apple.

Who, Google? No way. Google wouldn’t buy the most popular advertising platform on iPhone apps, or a company that doesn’t even seem to have a product or strategy just to bug Apple, right? I mean, they’d just bring out one of the first real challengers to the iPhone, right?

What do you think? Is this just another jab at Apple, or is Google more motivated by LabPixies’ actual offerings?