Yahoo Wants $12 billion Local Search Ad Spend, So Does CitySquares
For Yahoo, a “Smart Ads” concept is also a local one, so underscored Hillary Schneider, EVP Local Markets, in March, at the Kelsey Drilling Down on Local conference.
The Yahoo local advertising ecosystem is designed to show the “right ad to the right audience, in the right format,” Schneider boasted. Yahoo targets local advertising messages based on three types of user behavior:
Declared; Yahoo user registration data,
Observed; Click stream activity,
Inferred; Behavioral modeling.
Schneider joined Yahoo about one year ago, to develop an “overarching classified and listings strategy” and for creating “new ways of monetizing.”
Local monetization is big potential business; Schneider quantified the opportunity:
$4 billion local online ad spend today, $12 billion projected within 5 years,
130 million monthly unique users of Yahoo in 2006, 116 million of them came to Yahoo with local intent,
“Research online, buy offline,” component of local activities on the Web represents the greatest opportunity, a “$ 1.3 trillion marketplace.”
CitySquares, an angel backed startup, also is driven by a “buy local” Web-based strategy and, like Yahoo, is eyeing $12 billlion in local search ad spend.
CitySquares vs. Yahoo Local? Why not! I spoke with founder and CEO Ben Saren to get a first hand take on how CitySquares aims to capture its more than fair share of the ever elusive local merchant advertising budget.
A venture’s “about” page is telling: Not for company specifics, but for insight into where the firm’s priorities lay.
The CitySquares tag line is “buy local” and it’s philosophy, as stated in its “about” page is that:
You enhance local neighborhoods by strengthening the locally owned businesses. Local businesses are what make our neighborhoods unique.
All politics may be local; For CitySquares, all business is local!
At Yahoo, local content is a priority. Yahoo has data on 60,000 cities, 80,000 zip codes and 17 million businesses, Schneider said.
By taking a local business-centric approach, rather than being principally local content driven, CitySquares may have a better shot at gaining a strategic foothold with local merchant decision makers; The hyper-local venture’s team is hyper-small, but direct sales-focused.
Yahoo and Google excel at dazzling users with the latest map gadgetry, but underwhelm with database driven, IYP style listings.
Saren told me CitySquares is all about “digital delivery, but analogue relationships,” personal ones.
As I have oft said, real relationships in the real local world don’t come cheap, and certainly are not available at $10 a pop, as the mighty Google believes.
CitySquares is making the financial and human capital investments necessary to build local credibility with small businesses on the ground, the only way it can be done. While Google refuses to accept that there are no automated shortcuts to local ad sales riches, CitySquares is not taking any shortcuts.
Saren, himself, takes to the street to guerrilla market CitySquares within local communities. To scale its reach out efforts, CitySquares aims to partner with local civics organizations and chambers of commerce, Saren told me.
Does CitySquares have all the local answers? No, but what company does?
The real competitive advantage Saren and team do have is a direct, local “feet on the street” presence and real, local passion for the communities and businesses it serves.
Plus it has some angels on its side!
ALSO: Why Google Will NEVER Pay For a Local Ad Sales Force and Qmecom Mass Personalized Video Ad Platform: Yahoo SmartAds, Digitas Beware
PLUS READ MY EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: How Pegasus News Fuels Local Media Business Model for Fisher Communications