Local Corp.‘s Krillion has spent the last year and a half expanding its platform for local network and as a result, successfully launched its new Havvit app two weeks ago. Krillion is the localization engine that provides aggregated and structured local product shopping data to Local Corp.’s business customers and channel partners. Local Corp. recognizes the need to transform itself into a mobile-local company and the Havvit app is a step toward that objective.

The Havvit App is designed to help consumers track items they are looking to purchase at all of their favorite stores. They are able to check what other stores are carrying the product they are looking for and compare prices. The app also does not have to be open to work so it is on the lookout for the best prices all the time and it has a GPS feature to help customers get to the stores that have the product they are looking for. The app can also be customized so that consumers can select which stores to follow.

Local wasn’t offering on specifics on Havvit’s performance to date. “We are not giving out any numbers yet,” says Sherry Thomas-Zon, VP of Local Shopping at Local Corp.”Initial feedback has been really great. This app serves as a fantastic showpiece of what Krillion data can do through its API. Some of its most important features are the app’s ability to address the different types of shoppers and the ‘my stores’ concept.”

National retailers are taking local much more seriously than they have in previous years. Krillion is able to provide help on the demand side and the direct response side. “We are working on test campaigns with very tight geo-fencing and testing the transition from mobile to in store,” Thomas-Zon said.

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The ability to marry store inventory with search and promotions is an intriguing one for interactive local media. But what closes the loop on this vision?

Sherry Thomas-Zon, VP, local shopping, Local Corp. — the new name for Local.com — suggested this week at ILM West in San Francisco that inventory can serve as an anchor for a 360 shopping offering. The key is to break the components of shopping into functional departments instead of making it “one size fits all.”

“The opportunity is to add value across the retail mix,” said Thomas-Zon, former president of Krillion, which was recently acquired by Local. You don’t just want to have shopping content. “You want a shopping module. It is what product search looks like on site in a mobile context.”

Speed and convenience are key parts of it. Components include grab and go shopping, need it now, where to buy, nearby stores. Thomas-Zon noted that there are different types of shopping.

For instance, there might be high consideration items, contrasting with shopping types such as low-cost replenishment, habitual purchases with limited decision making, big-box stores, off-price stores and small format products.

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Finally, we have the long awaited merger of a directory with a retail solution. Today, prior to its earnings call, Local.com announced it would integrate product and store availability into its growing suite of women-oriented services by acquiring Krillion.com. The sale price was $3.5 million.

When it was launched in 2006, Krillion was a real pioneer in bringing search engine optimization to the fore for products. It was built on the idea of tying products closely to vertical shopping categories. Some of its initial ideas didn’t work. SEO, for instance, proved to be a poor substitute for destination traffic when it comes to retail. But the company has continued innovating.

Local’s acquisition cost appears to have been well below Krillion’s $9.1 million capitalization, per peHUB. But it is more than a good deal. It gives Local entry to shopping, and pits it against other shopping-driven initiatives, including eBay, via its $75 million acquisition of Milo.com. Other major competitors include JiWire, Wishpond and now SaleLocator, a privately funded initiative. ShopLocal, of course, remains the granddaddy in the space as it ventures beyond the traditional domain of weekly store circulars.

Krillion comes with a rich set of features that should help Local right away. These include an archive of product images, and information on current pricing, manufacturer/ retailer discounts and real-time in-stock information.

It also has a structured index of 70,000+ products for 1,200 brands across a number of vertical categories, which now include appliances, baby gear, consumer electronics, computers, tools, video games and home & garden. More than 50,000 retail locations are tracked.

Most of this can now be neatly tied into Local.com’s expanding suite of services, which include Local’s directory, the Octane 360 SMB network, the Rovion rich media ad network, and Deals (via Spreebird, the newly announced brand for its deal a day). In addition to the Local properties, Krillion can continue to serve its own network, which includes Consumer Reports, SuperPages, ShopSavvy, Topix, Yp.com and The Find.com.

Under terms of the deal, Krillion CEO Sherry Thomas-Zon becomes Local.com’s VP, local shopping, and the 13-person company remains headquartered in Mountain View rather than relocating to Local’s Southern California location.

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The ability to track retail inventory has been on the retail wish list for years. Retailers advertise goods, and then disappoint customers when they don’t have them in stock. Or they have loads of stock in the store, and don’t know they need to promote it to deplete it. Or they have a lot of inventory in one location, but can’t steer customers to the right store.

Solutions have been in the works for some time, for various functions and purposes. Some have been telecom-oriented. McDonald’s, for instance, started keeping track of Big Macs and Double Cheeseburgers in 1990 via ISDN. Most, however, have been relatively primitive phone-in efforts.

In 2006, for instance, StepUp, which is now part of Intuit’s Homestead, showed the way for online inventory management by letting stores fill out inventory on a spreadsheet. A sophisticated, contemporary effort has been mounted by Krillion, which provides inventory for computers, electronics, cameras, appliances and other goods, while selling advertising around it.

More recently, we’ve also seen Milo.com develop an inventory solution for both national and local players. Wishpond is pursuing a similar strategy. The timing for both companies appears to be ripe. Milo.com was purchased two weeks ago by eBay for $75 million.

Milo has integrated with various media partners, such as The Sacramento Bee. Today, Wishpond announced a partnership to do the same with PaperG, which builds display ads on the fly for a large list of newspapers. In this case, PaperG will be able to spec out a display ad based on inventory availability (i.e., “denim hats at Davey’s Army Navy store”). Customers of its PlaceLocal service can utilize the service.

PaperG CEO Victor Wong tells us that Wishpond’s solution lets PaperG and its media partners get down to the product level for both national chains and for local stores. Roughly a quarter of its advertisers are local SMBs, he notes. Using Wishpond, “toys are ads,” he says.

“The next natural evolution to local display advertising is to show what stores and products are available within driving distance of the consumer,” Wong added, in a statement. “Ad units that allow consumers to find information on local product availability can dramatically improve the offline conversion rates of shoppers.”

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