Internet Yellow Pages experiencing strong growth

Here's an interesting article regarding the growth of Internet Yellow Pages sites.

I am often asked about the importance of advertising on the IYPs.

Here are my basic rules for IYP advertising.

1. Make sure you are at the top of the list for your primary search terms in your service area. Internet Yellow Pages are linear in nature, meaning that users start at the top and work their way down. They also tend to be much more structured than typical one box search engines.

If you can't afford to be in the top 3 search results, don't waste your money.

2. Users of IYP sites tend to be further along the buying cycle. So a click or an impression on an IYP is inherently more valuable than that of typical web search.

Pay more, get more.

Here's the article from Clickz

Internet Yellow Pages (IYP) searches grew 46 percent in the past year, which means a 43 percent local search increase across the Web. A two-part series on local search from comScore Networks details local search behavior as well usage of Internet Yellow Pages and directory listings.

In July, 68 million Internet users in the U.S. conducted searches at IYP sites. These searchs represent a 46 percent increase over the same month last year. Yahoo sites grabbed 23.9 percent of directory searches; Verizon SuperPages served 20.1 percent; and Google Sites held 12.5 percent.

Top Eight Internet Yellow Page Searches by Site, July 2006
Site	Total Yellow Pages Searches (%)
Total Internet	100.0
Yahoo Sites	23.9
Verizon SuperPages	20.1
Google Sites	12.5
Yellowpages.com	12.0
Time Warner Network	7.7
Local.com	5.9
InfoSpace Network	5.1
Dexonline.com	4.1
Total U.S. Home, Work and University Internet Users
Source: comScore, 2006

Across the Web, about 109 million U.S. Internet users conducted local searches in July. That's about 63 percent of the U.S. online population. Local search, including searches conducted on sites serving local interests and also IYP sites, saw a 43 percent increase over July of 2005.

Google sites garnered 29.8 percent of U.S. searches; Yahoo sites served 29.2 percent; Microsoft sites saw 12.3 percent of local searches; and Time Warner properties, including AOL, got 7.1 percent of search traffic.

Forty-one percent of local searches were conducted for users' home area. Of those searches, 59 percent were to locate a restaurant or an entertainment-related establishment such as a theater, theme park or sightseeing attraction. Just over half (52 percent) searched for a phone number or address. Forty-one percent searched for a local service in their home area like a car rental office, dry cleaner, or lawyer.

ComScore data are taken from a global panel of more than 2 million consumers. The research firm obtains explicit permission to confidentially capture the browsing and transaction behavior, including on- and offline purchasing.