• by April 12, 2007

Demonstrating the growing influence of local search and its ability to deliver a decent return on investment, Superpages.com and eStara have signed on as sponsors of the Local Search Guide, a popular online resource published by the Yellow Pages Association.

Superpages.com, a brand of Idearc Media Corp., and eStara, a provider of call-tracking and conversion solutions, are sponsoring the nearly three-year-old Local Search Guide, an online directory of Web Yellow Pages providers, search engines, search tools and vertical directories.

"As a local search expert, it really made sense for Superpages.com to become a sponsor of the Local Search Guide," said Robyn Rose, vice president of Internet marketing, SuperPages.com. "I would say that in a lot of ways the Yellow Pages industry is the oldest form of local search and advertising. We're feet on the street."

The Local Search Guide offers an interactive home page survey, a vertical directories category, local search blogs and forums, and a glossary of terms with definitions of local search jargon such as "pay-per-call".

The Guide also tracks industry growth and offers news and updates via company profiles of Internet Yellow Pages, search engines, search tools and vertical directories. The profiles are updated weekly and include company information, advertising products and partnerships. ComScore, SEMPO and The Kelsey Group are partners on the Guide.

"We really felt like the local search space was a place where we wanted to play," Rose said. "We do have partnerships with Google, MSN and Yahoo and we like the term 'co-opetition'. The local search space is extremely fragmented and there are lots of opportunities, but the winners will be the ones who find the right partnerships."

Stephanie Hobbs, vice president of marketing communications, Yellow Pages Association, noted the significance of attracting eStara as a sponsor, since it's not a member of the Association: "They're part of the search space"--which, she said, points to the efficiency of Yellow Pages services.

"It's a $24 billion slice of revenue. The single most critical thing we offer is the whole measurement piece," Hobbs said. "eStara is helping to measure search. It's not enough that people [merely] came to your site.

"Local advertisers are looking for ROI [return on investment] and they're far more sophisticated than they used to be," Hobbs added. "[The] Yellow Pages [business] is going to continue to grow both in print and online and the Local Search Guide is indicative of that."

The Kelsey Group forecast the global print and online directory market is expected to grow 4.9% from 2006 to 2011, from $30.6 billion to $38.9 billion. The global interactive directory market (local search and Internet Yellow Pages) is expected to grow at 22.3% (compounded annual growth rate) from $4.1 billion to $11.1 billion.

Separately, Rose said SuperPages.com is relaunching on April 27 with more user-generated functions and features. The site currently offers more than 200,000 consumer reviews of local restaurants, plumbers, landscapers, and other service businesses. Consumers can currently rate, rank, review and comment on local businesses, which she said is an extremely popular feature.