Superpages and Marchex form Distribution Deal

Idearc Media announced today that Superpages will feed ads into the Marchex advertising network, Enhance Interactive. This clearly increases distribution for Superpages, thus strengthening the value it can provide its advertisers.

For Marchex it’s also a win, in that it adds content to its rather large network of sites. Last June, the company launched hundreds of thousands of geo-specific and vertical domains built on aggregated content from its OpenList subsidiary. This was the first shot in a solid effort to build a vast network of sites that go a step further than the meager amount of content and lackluster experience “Geo-domains” have traditionally been known for.

These are sites that get a great deal of direct navigation traffic (i.e. newyorkdoctors.com), but whose owners have largely dropped the ball historically with site functionality and depth of content. This is largely because many of these domains were scored by opportunists in the URL land grab game, rather than “product guys”.

But Marchex has brought the two together and, as we pointed out in June, is really on to something. Today’s deal represents a step towards populating these sites with more targeted content and feeding in more ad revenue. Other sources of revenue include the bundled clicks SEM packages that Marchex resells through channel partners such as AT&T and Yellowpages.com.