• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer, December 1, 2005

An Overlooked Marketing Channel for Small Business Advertisers

A recent white paper by Joe Laratro, MoreVisibility.com, effectively describes Local Search, its place in the local advertising milieu, and its importance to service businesses in the community. This type of search has the potential for a better user experience with reviews and other interactive content about local needs.

The major search engines have realized the value of local search and have created new local destinations for the informed searcher. For instance:

• MSN's local is a blend of MSN and Citysearch, forming a localized portal page. Search results are primarily in a Yellow Pages type of format.
• Google's local begins with a map page. Searches yield results that combine a Web site, a yellow page type listing, and a point on a map.
• Yahoo's local combines attributes of both MSN and Google. Their search results provide subsets of information to address the intent of many different local searches.

Local search opens a new online marketing channel to many companies because the engines do not require a Web site, concludes the report. Since the traffic is highly targeted and relevant, in many instances a conversion would be a phone call or a store visit. Business categories that can benefit from Local Search include:

• Automotive - Dealers, Repair & Service, Trucks
• Computers & Electronics - Internet Services
• Entertainment & Arts - Bars, Pubs, & Clubs, Entertainers
• Food & Dining - Restaurants
• Government & Community - Family Services, Health & Beauty, Doctors & Clinics
• Home & Garden - Cleaning Services, Construction, Repair, Home Improvement, Lawn & Garden
• Legal & Financial Services - Financing, Insurance, Investment Services
• Professional Services - Employment, Animals & Pets, Storage
• Real Estate - Apartments, Real Estate Agents
• Recreation & Sporting Goods - Camping, Golf
• Retail Shopping - Clothing, Baby Accessories & Services, Florists
• Travel & Lodging - Hotels & Lodging

A significant benefit to a small, local company, is that services or products can be submitted to an online classified Web site without having a company Web site, and the advertiser's listing becomes "their content" on that site. This content becomes significantly enhanced classified,  taking advantage of the graphic opportunities of the Web. Growth in this niche sector, according to JupiterResearch, is forcasted  to be fast.

US Local Online Advertising Spending (Billion $)
	2004	2006	2008	2010
Local display	$0.2	0.4	0.6	0.9
Local search	0.5	0.7	0.9	0.9
Local classifieds	1.8	2.6	3.1	3.6
Source: Jupiter Research, July  2005

Read the complete PDF Whitepaper here.