SMB reseller WebVisible went through difficult changes last year, downsizing from 320 to 130 employees and retreating from an ambitious direct marketing program. But it has kept core partners intact; key members of the CEO's installed executive team have stayed…
The Scandinavian directory and local search player Eniro has unveiled a pay-per-click advertising network, which it calls Scandinavian Ad Networks. The product leverages traffic from Eniro's own properties (including eniro.se, gulesider.no, krak.dk, and kvasir.no) as well as third-party partner sites…
Cars still need to be sold by salespeople and that never changes. And most people still want to get on the phone to talk to their dealer. What does change is the ability to find cars on the Web, notes…
Mobile now accounts for a third of AT&T’s local search, according to AT&T President and CEO David Krantz, who was speaking at the Borrell show last week in New York. “We truly believe that mobile is bigger than the Web,”…
Last week, the latest spree of entrants forayed into the deal-a-day arena, with AT&T and The New York Times announcing group buying platforms that appear to be almost identical to those popularized by Groupon and LivingSocial. The most interesting of the…
The Wall Street Journal reported this week that AT&T Interactive will join the growing list of directory companies to launch a daily deal site. AT&T Interactive CEO David Krantz told The Journal that he believes AT&T could be "fast followers"…
You've probably heard by now that AOL has continued its content acquisition streak by acquiring hyperlocal news and blogging network Outside.in. Outside.in will beef up Patch's hyperlocal content and also its team, as it continues the ambitious plan of cracking…
Questions and comments poured into our Social Local Media webinar last week, and true to our word, we're addressing every last one of them. This time around, let's crunch some numbers. What key data points are we using to frame our…
As promised, over the next few days, we will address your questions from last week's Social Local Media launch webinar. Among the topics we'll tackle: how traditional media can effectively participate, the growing role of social in search, the validity…
Groupon’s spectacular growth has now been quantified. According to an internal memo leaked to The Wall Street Journal, Groupon had $475 Million in revenues in 2010, and $760 million worldwide, with a presence in 35 countries. It also had 51…
Thanks to the 600+ who registered for yesterday's webinar on the launch of BIA/Kelsey's Social Local Media advisory service. And even bigger props for the nearly 50 questions and comments that poured in. Our pledge to you: We will address them…
Following a discussion of its 2010 full-year results, Dex One’s leadership team outlined a new strategy today that it says will restore the company to positive revenue growth by the second half of 2012, with print stabilizing to single-digit declines.
One of the key elements will be the Dex Guaranteed Actions, a performance-based model tested beginning last year in Phoenix and recently launched in Seattle and Minneapolis, with a gradual rollout in other markets. The program essentially guarantees advertisers a predetermined number of business leads.
Dex leaders say the program succeeded in changing the sales conversation from price to performance, and is seen as a key element in the company’s efforts to stability print revenue declines from their current high double digits to mid-single digits within two years.
CEO Alfred Mockett and his team outlined a number of key objectives and supporting initiatives, among them:
* The company projects it will move from 10 percent digital to 30 percent digital revenues by 2012.
* DexOne is planning to convert its 2.2 million free business listings into paid. Mockett describes free listings as an “historical anachronism.” Converting to paid will generate revenues and also direct more leads to paid advertisers, Mockett said.
* The company is investing in its sales force, arming it with iPads and launching the Dex One Sales Academy to improve both initial and ongoing sales training.
The Dealmap reports that after nine months, it is off to a healthy start as a source and distributor of local and daily deals. It reports 11 million daily API queries and 1.4 million users -- including the users of…
Reply.com has carved out a niche among online marketing companies by offering an auction marketplace for locally targeted consumer traffic for various verticals (home improvement, autos, real estate, insurance, etc.). Now, it is set on building a mobile strategy. The…
The program for ILM East March 21-23 in Boston is nearing completion with the addition of a great new keynote: Constant Contact CEO Gail Goodman. Goodman joins a roster of nearly 50 featured speakers, including opening keynoter David Weinberger, a…
My SearchEngineLand post on 9 Ways To Start a New Local Business Using Facebook, Twitter, Groupon & Google lays out how a new local business could effectively launch with a minimal marketing budget. From the post: A group-buying promotion can…
ILM East in Boston March 21-23 is shaping up to be one of the most substantive conferences we’ve ever put together. Leaders have been confirmed from most of the major companies in local. Just added is Google’s Ben Wood, who…
Google announced today that it has upgraded Google Social Search to now include social data from Twitter, Flickr and Quora. In the past you may not have even noticed social results as they typically showed up at the bottom of the SERP. Now they are going to be blended throughout the SERPs as you can see below:
About a year and half ago, I posited on SearchEngineLand that it was inevitable that Local Social Search would be the default search paradigm for local queries. We’re still not there yet, but it’s only a matter of time. I recall having a discussion at the time with a search engineer at Google who claimed this would be an impractical technical challenge for the search giant (never thought I’d hear that from a Googler). But with the continuing improvement of Google Social Search along with the pressure GOOG is feeling to compete with Facebook on the social front, I have a feeling we are going to be seeing a lot more local-social stuff coming out of the Plex. For those of you pondering the implications, here’s an excerpt from my old post that I think is still relevant:
…there is a large opportunity for businesses to increase awareness in their community by simply networking with other businesses via social media like Twitter. But now with the advent of Google social search, the simple act of following or being followed has a ripple effect that could yield dramatic benefits.
Here’s a pseudo-real-world example:
Listened to the replay of Yell Group's Q3 earnings call yesterday, which was my first opportunity to hear the company's new CEO, Michael Pocock, in action. Pocock joined Yell in November, eventually replacing longtime CEO John Condron, who retired. He…
Thus far, 2011 is revealing some notable announced transactions that could be signs of renewed interest in buying radio and television stations. The BIA/Kelsey monthly transactions report, which details the number of stations sold and their value, shows a marked…
