iBegin Source – a radical approach to local data

Ahmed Farooq of iBegin.com contacted me several weeks ago to alert me to a new product that his company is releasing today: iBegin Source, a free and low cost source for business data in the 50 states. Traditionally business data from InfoUSA and the like is expensive and very restricted in its use. For example, …

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Your mobile phone meets the ether

As a partner in a small firm that relies heavily on technologies that support and enhance telecommuting to maintain customer contact, I found three (totally unrelated) announcements of interest: Microsoft acquires TellMe. I have been a big fan of 877-520-Find as a safe and productive tool for cell phone calling. It demonstrates effectively how voice …

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Greg Sterling: Print Yellow Pages: What’s the Real Story?

Greg Sterling’s recent post: Print Yellow Pages: What’s the Real Story? is one of the best summaries of the issues and realities of the print Yellow Pages and their positioning vis-a-vis the internet yellow pages and local search. I have fallen into the “detractor” camp for a number of years but have recognized that my …

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Local Search is messy… but so is my bedroom

Business Week wrote a piece recently (03/08/07): Where Search Stumbles criticizing most of the local search engines. Greg Sterling has repeatedly pointed out that accuracy is the potential achilles heal of Local and there have been plenty of complaints elsewhere and here about quality and about complexity. But as I tell my relatives: I love …

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Ask shape announcement may shape the future of Maps

The Ask.com announcement, The New Shape of Local Search has been widely reported. However, not many commentators have noted how cool and useful this feature really is. OK so you can draw on the map, big deal I said to myself. Then I started drawing. When I noticed the email and permalink I thought, how …

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Recent Posts about Local worth reading

Greg Sterling does the best strategic analysis that adds to understanding the big picture of Local Search. Two of his recent posts about Local Search that I found of particular interest: •Yelp Becoming a CRM platform •Local Numbers: Setting the Record Straighter Bill Slawski of SeobytheSea also offers incredible insights on Local but from the …

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Traffic to Google Maps increased by 26% from Jan. to Feb.

LeeAnn Prescott at Hitwise reports: Traffic to Google Maps increased by 26% from January to February 2007. It appears that this increase was due to an increase in upstream traffic from Google, which occurred on February 7, according to this daily clickstream chart shown here. Did anyone notice a change in how Google drives traffic …

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England mobile search doubles since April

m-spatial, in its most recent quarterly Mobile Local Search Index, has found that mobile searches in England, have doubled in the last quarter of 2006 compared to the first quarter “with Fast Food, Pubs & Drinking and Cinema topping the search league tables”. The report also noted siginificant seasonal shifts.

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Local Search Engine Marketing White Paper

Mary Bowling at Blizzard Internet Marketing, Inc. has recently published a white paper: Local Search Engine Marketing – Profitable Tactics for the Lodging Industry. From their presse release: You need a strategy for Local Search and, in this whitepaper, you’ll get detailed instruction on how to: Optimize your website for Local Search using both on-page …

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