WSJ Discusses Borrell Local Report

The WSJ discussed the Borrell report I mentioned yesterday, although focusing on it from a newspaper perspective. The long and short of it is that they say newspapers are trying to train their sales forces to sell online ads, but when they do that, they cannibalize print (which as we know is higher priced and higher margin). Craigslist is eating their lunch on Classifieds, Google and others are taking share of local traffic and they are having a tough time. Doesn't sound good...

Newspapers Think Locally for Online Ads - WSJ.com

Marchex Launches New, Improved Ad Platform

Marchex has updated its private-label ad platform, including a new focus on calls. Key quote "Calls are the currency that small businesses want"...

Kelsey Group Blogs » Marchex Launches New, Improved Ad Platform

Borrell says YPs to lose $5 Billion in Revenues in 5 Years

Not sure I believe this one, but that's the headline. If you look at the comments of the post I linked to on Screenwerk, Borrell indicates the changes in each category over the next 5 years:
Directories -38.9%
Direct Mail - 32.0%
Telemarketing -28.9%
Newspapers -11.0%
Radio -7.0%
Other Print -3.4%
Broadcast TV -2.1%
Online +22.7%
Out of Home +30.2%
Cable +54.8%
Cinema +313.8%

Not to nit-pick one number and use it to impugn the whole survey, but the newspaper number strikes me as being off. They are losing share every day in classified advertising and are talking about raising prices, which should reduce their reader bases (print at least) and hurt their ad revenues more. I think directionally, these numbers are correct, but not sure about their magnitudes.

Borrell: YPs to Lose $5 Billion in 5 Years « Screenwerk

iPhone Apps - 4 of Top 5 are Local

There are now over 1000 apps in the iPhone store and if you look at the top 5, 4 of them are local applications:
1. Google (the only non-local)
2. UrbanSpoon, with its cool "shake me and get a surprise result" feature
3. BoxOffice, with an easy to use local movie time application and Rotten Tomatoes critic ratings
4. WeatherBug
5. Yelp, which in my view has the nicest local implementation, with the ability to easily search near you, a map view, and the ability to read every review in detail (so many apps do shortcut reviews, including the iTunes store, which doesn't give you anything beyond the star rating

It really seems that the iPhone is the platform that will finally drive broad acceptance of mobile applications and mobile search. Approx 10MM iPhones are out there in the US right now and with their ease-of-use and full-time access to the Internet, they will become the local platform of choice. And they're just scratching the surface of what they can do.

» Local Mobile Search

RH Donnelly (RHD) Announces Earnings

(One-year chart shown, same as Idearc below)

RHD earnings came out today and, based on the response of the stock market today, look pretty much as expected. There was a one-time charge of approx $600MM which put it in negative territory on earnings by approx $300MM, but other than that, they were positive and are making progress on paying down the debt (approx 3% paid off in the period). One potential area for concern is that sales were down 8%, which is an indicator of future revenues. If you're interested in more than approx $s, click the link below.

One interesting point is that RHD stock has been moving in lockstep with Idearc for the last year, and while RHD stock was down 13% yesterday, Idearc was down 40%, so that effect has somewhat lessened (most likely because of the differing results seen from yesterday's report to today's).

Yahoo! Finance Charts

Idearc's Earnings Were Not So Good

Idearc's earnings came in today and they weren't very good. Profit down 30%, revenue down 5.7%. And if you look earlier this month, you'll see a press release about them bringing in a former Private Equity person to be their CEO. That can't be good for the employees there. Any by the way, the stock is currently down about 35% on the news (RHD is down 20ish percent as well, and report earnings tomorrow).

IAR: 1.44 -0.76 (-34.55%) - Idearc Inc.

Oodle now powering MySpace Classifieds

This is Oodle's second major partner pickup, after Wal-Mart... Oodle really does have a fairly nice, simple platform to do classifieds... I'm not sure if Wal-Mart and MySpace are taking paid classifieds through their site or if Oodle is paying them, but out of all the classified aggregation sites, Oodle seems to be taking the lead...

MySpace Classifieds, Now from Oodle « Screenwerk

YellowPages.com Buoys AT&T in First Half

Kelsey Group Blogs » YellowPages.com Buoys AT&T in First Half

Selling SEM: It's Complicated

Some people think SMBs are just too busy or too confused to buy SEM, or its just too complicated in general, which is why they keep buying the old media and will keep doing so for a while at least (until the younger generation, who has grown up with the Internet, are the business owners)...

Kelsey Group Blogs » Selling SEM: It’s Complicated

Local iPhone Apps

Local iPhone apps are among the top downloaded apps on iTunes, with the YellowPages.com, Yelp, Where and UrbanSpoon apps near the top. Also, local social networking is getting some traction, with Loopt, among others, making progress. In my book, Yelp is the best local app out there...

Kelsey Group Blogs » After One Week, Lots of Volatility for Local iPhone Apps

What role will IYPs play in next generation mobile search?

They discuss mobile apps and how IYPs will integrate. One thing in here I don't agree with is that YellowPages.com launched with a nice app. There's no integrated maps in their app and its really kind of a subpar effort, in my estimation. Yelp has done a much better job and I think is going to be the local app to beat for some time.

Kelsey Group Blogs » What Role will IYPs Play in Next Generation Mobile Search?

Google Enables Local Reviews from Mobile Phones

Doesnt say anything about an iPhone app for this yet, though, which is where I would expect this kind of functionality to reside in the future. I'm actually kind of surprised no yellow pages or other local companies had a launch app with this included.

Google Enables Local Reviews From Mobile Phones

CityVoter Gets Bigger TV Deal

CityVoter is a site that focuses on Questions and Answers for local businesses and has just expanded their TV partnerships...

CityVoter Expands Hearst TV Deal « Screenwerk

Google Keyword Tool Adds Search Volumes

Search Volume Comes To Google Keyword Tool & Live Search Updates