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Quote:ShopLocal, a multi-channel shopping resource, recently reported an 84-percent increase over the previous year in consumer use of the Internet for local shopping for the three-day period ending the day after Thanksgiving. Although these Web surfers planned on making their purchases offline, they were using local directories, community sites, and local search engines to find the best deals, check out reviews, and search for online promotions, sales, and specials at neighborhood stores and businesses. Acknowledging this trend, eMarketer expects local online advertising to jump 53 percent, to $2 billion in 2007.

Welcome to the brave new world of online local search. Consumers can not only find and map local businesses, but leave and read comments, find out about sales and in-store promotions, print coupons, and compare prices of goods and services — and merchants can maximize their local advertising budgets by targeting prospective customers with a search-engine optimized Web page, blogs and newsletters, and online promotions aimed at a particular demographic. It's a win-win situation for everyone, except maybe traditional print advertising vehicles like the Yellow Pages and newspapers.

Double-Digit Growth for Local Search
According to a 2006 JupiterResearch report entitled "Local Advertising: Blending Categories to Compete Effectively," local online advertising is expected to grow 11 percent through 2010. However, the report hints that that number could be a lot higher should there be "major innovations" in local online directories — some of which may already be occurring...