This is sort of amazing. I was reading about pinot noir wines on the NYTimes' Web site (perhaps I was too influenced by Sideways). The Times liked a particular New Zealand pinot, Peregrine Central Otago 2001, better than the other wines they tasted.

Just as an informal test of whether I could find a store in my area where I could buy the wine, I cut and pasted the name of the wine off the Times' Web site and plugged it into several different search engines' local sites, as well as several YP sites, together with my city name to see what would happen.

Without going into the full details or the complete list of sites, I was able to get results on Google Local and MSN (near me). The Google results, which were imperfect, were better because there was a map associated with the listing, which MSN did not have. But remarkably I did find a few local places where the wine was availableâ€"a restaurant, a museum with a tasing event and a couple of wine shops.

So there are many criticisms to make of these results, but the point here is . . . this is the local search of the future. And it was remarkable that I was able to cut and paste a line of text into Google, add my city name, hit the "Local" link and get results. This probably took me less than 10 seconds.

The underlying data will become more complete and the relevance of results will get better. (The experience was even easier and more satisfactory on Google Maps because I saw immediately where the locations were in relation to one another.)

There's just no way for traditional offline media to match this performance. And IYP sites had better be able to match this ease of use. None of the IYP sites I tried could in fact give me results. Notwithstanding the current concentration of searches at the category level, this is the way that consumers will be looking for products in the future.

Two interesting articles, one by Brad Stone of Newsweek on the data providers behind mapping sites/functionality.

Another by the NYTimes about 3-D mapping. This is where it's going.

Just wrote about maps today and we'll be covering this at Drilling Down on Local at the end of Day 1. Should be interesting.

I recently noticed a press release on the merger of two relatively obscure publishers of Spanish-language Yellow Pages directories. The acquiring party is Hispanic Yellow Pages of America, backed by the private equity fund called Hispania Capital Partners LLC. The fund’s purpose is to build a Spanish-language directories business, and one of its chief backers is Verizon Communications. Other similar financial players have emerged to pursue this niche.

Do we think they will be successful? Yes, but only to a point. Too many of those supporting this business model read too much into the demographic data. Yes, a larger share of Americans will be of Hispanic origin in the coming years. This doesn’t automatically translate into a parallel Yellow Pages universe conducted in Spanish.

Published reports confirm that direct marketing company and database provider infoUSA (which provides the data for many of the top IYP/ local search properties) is seeking to buy online marketing firm Digital Impact.

Digital Impact, which previously acquired search engine marketing firm MarketLeap, offers a range of online marketing services. If the acquisition goes through it would greatly extend the range of services that infoUSA could offer its customers, including potential search engine marketing services that could be resold to the small business customers of so-called "aggregators" who buy infoUSA's database (a la Marchex, Inceptor, SGS).

But then again the interest may be more about the potential integration of DI's email marketing offerings with infoUSA's Yesmail.

Both MSN and Ask Jeeves have announced that they're going to spend money on TV to try and grab some search market share. Yahoo! has been spending (on TV, outdoor, etc.) for some time on search (and local). Several surveys have confirmed a tightening of the market in terms of usage (Kelsey Group data show that most people use "two or three" engines), but Google remains the leader, with Yahoo! in second position.

Despite its spending, Yahoo! has not be able to grab the lead from Google, which has famously spent nothing to market itself (though that will change soon). The Keynote data suggests that actual functionality is what has helped Yahoo! improve its position. (Of course, ad spending can drive awareness of functionality.)

Many argue that there's little difference in quality among the results offered by the major engines (AOL search is largely based on Google results). The logic goes that it's brand equity preserving Google's market position. That would argue in favor of some sort of mass market branding to make a splash.

But when users show up, there must be a differentiated experience to make them come back. Ironically, I think Ask Jeeves is in a better position in that category than MSN, although MSN has a stronger market position.

There's also the ROI question: Does the spendingâ€"and MSN has said it will spend "millions"â€"deliver a commensurate return? In the DA world, "dial-around" numbers (e.g., 1800-CALLATT) largely generate use when they're in the public eye vis-a-vis some expensive ad campaign. In other words, there's a short-term usage bump that doesn't translate into repeat business.

If there's an analogy . . . sustained national TV spending (which might be required to move the needle) by search engines will erode marginsâ€"more quickly for Jeeves than for MSN.

For a very nice overview of the entire local search space, check out the Local Search Guide. More profiles and resources have been added.

Here's the new stuff:

"The Search Tools section of the Guide, which now includes a Mapping category, profiles products and services that enhance the search experience. Mapping companies, such as MapQuest.com and Maps.com, provide targeted maps and driving directions that lead consumers to businesses identified through local search queries. This addition reflects increased mapping enhancements to search engines and IYPs."

I'm slated to write the next viewpoints piece. There are tons of things to discuss, but let me know any topics of particular interest.

DoubleClick and comScore released the results of a study about the relationship between search and e-commerce. This is similar to the comScore-Overture study conducted last year. The new findings underscore those of the earlier Overture study and reinforce the idea that branding will reshape search over the long term.

Here are the top-level findings:

• Search plays a role in roughly half of all online purchases
• The majority of pre-purchase search activity (searches and clicks) involves generic terms, not the merchants’ brands
• Branded terms peak in search activity closer to the purchase
• Most buyers complete their relevant search activity well in advance of the purchase

DoubleClick, which of course stands to benefit, argues that “generic terms represent an opportunity to attract and engage in-market searchers throughout the buying cycle. Search result analyses (sales and ROI) that consider only a short period prior to purchase do not account for the value of generic search activity earlier in the buying cycle.�

…In other words, don't worry so much about direct/traditional ROI calculations.

Couple of thoughts and conclusions:

• The product name or merchant represents something of a proxy for where the consumer is in the buying cycle. The fact that most search-engine users search on "generic" (read: category) means that product sellers will need to "own" those terms (i.e., lock them up for branding purposes) when the consumer is doing research at an early stage in the buying cycle.

• This is now the second study which has shown that search is and is not like Yellow Pages. And this also explains why YP generally delivers better conversion rates than search (but is used more narrowly). The legacy of offline YP buying/shopping behavior has translated online (consumers "ready to buy"), whereas consumers engage with search much more often and broadely (earlier in the buying cycle).

The potential impact of branding dollars on the search marketplace (especially) SMEs and local will be explored on day 2 of Drilling Down on Local.

Will telcos be able to do to cable TV (IPtv) what cable TV is starting to do to telcos with IP telephony?

And with the possible exception of SuperPages, will the remaining U.S. telco-YP owners spin off their directories to subsidize/retire debt associated with their sexier, expensive new ventures?

So Fathom Online reported a crash after the holidays in keyword prices. But over the long term, they're going up up up (so implied Google in a BizWeek article ). The trend of branding dollars entering search means continued price inflation.

In case you're skeptical . . . from the SEMPO survey: "Brand awareness was overall the #1 objective advertisers set for search marketing programs, just beating out sales and lead generation initiatives."

Here's an interesting piece in Wired News about the very real impact of ranking higher in search engine placement. It's mostly about optimization, but the same goes true for SEM. There's lots of data that show CTRs drop off significantly after the first set of results. As we've discussed before this creates an "inventory problem." (Search engines are trying to grow their networks to boost CTRs generally and create more "first page" inventory.)

Notwithstanding the recent, apparent drop off in the price of keywords, I believe that, given inventory shortages, over time most SMEs will be unable to compete with large enterprises that want to lock up and own "generic" or category-based keywords (read: branding), where most of the traffic is.