• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, February 1, 2011

Local businesses will gain a tool Tuesday that allows marketers to quickly optimize local listings on sites like Google Place across the Web. OrangeSoda, an online marketing agency, will launch a service dubbed CitrusBlast, supporting searches for content across Place Search in maps, listings, and locations. The tool also supports a similar feature in Bing and Yahoo search that organize results by clustering specific locations.

Jay Bean, OrangeSoda founder and CEO, says the process and collection of data is automated, but that OrangeSoda reps update the listing when needed. The traffic gets tracked, reports are run, and results are handed to clients. Clients from attorneys to dentists to local auto mechanics rely on the tool. In fact, several hundred advertisers have been testing the tool since November. Results range from better phone call tracking or credible Web sites converting higher.

Local online advertising is expected to grow from $18 billion in 2010 to $35 billion in 2014, according to Wells Fargo estimates published in December that OrangeSoda cites.

OrangeSoda also will launch the offering as a white box tool. The San Diego Union Tribune will soon roll out CitrusBlast under their name. The offering also becomes available to American Express, Network Solutions, Gannett, CityGrid Media, Yellow Pages Group and Freedom Communications.

Half of small businesses don't have Web sites, and those that do were either built by the sole proprietor or a friend learning a Webmaster trade, according to Bean. "Internet marketing isn't always in the small companies' DNA, so we stand behind the scenes to do the heavy lifting," he says.