Are newspapers a good candidate to drive the free directory assistance  market? Say Hello leader Jim Geddes hopes so.
His theory, which I have previously reported on, is that newspapers are ideally positioned to rule free DA. They have the promotional power that comes with daily circulation, and they are closely identified with content that can …

GOOG-411 billboard sightings are getting to be as common as iPhone sightings (see recent TKG Client Inquiry Brief, Google Starts Advertising 800-GOOG-411). The most recent was found by Danny Sullivan on Lombard Street in San Francisco.
But beyond being just another sighting, this one hovers right above an Ask.com “algorithm” billboard, causing a veritable smack down …

While I am in Reston, VA, attending Kelsey’s Directory Driven Commerce conference, I thought it would be a good time to start talking about our next show, which I am co-producing: Interactive Local Media 2007. The show is being done in tandem with SES Local, takes place Nov. 28-30, and is at the Los Angeles …

As part of the mobile forecast we released last week, we thought it would be interesting to show a little detail about the ad-sponsored directory assistance portion of the forecast. As we wrote previously, we have been watching the market unfold for over a year. The predictions in the original report last October along with …

R.H. Donnelly announced today that it will launch a new free directory assistance product, powered by Call Genie, in four markets (Denver, Spokane, Phoenix and Tucson).
1-800-CallDex will include free local category search and provide addresses, phone numbers, business descriptions, hours of operation and payment methods. It will also allow callers to use landmarks, neighborhoods and …

Jingle Networks, the provider of 1-800-FREE411, has expanded its relationship with Nuance for speech recognition technology. Under terms of the deal, Nuance will also be referring its voice-enabled customers to the Jingle ad platform. Presumably, if Nuance does audio work for McDonald’s, for instance, it could easily be uploaded into the Jingle platform.
The Nuance announcement follows …

YouTube has launched a new video ad format it has been testing for months (see past post). These ad units, known as inline ads, involve translucent windows that are overlaid on video content for about 10 seconds near the beginning of a given clip.
Experimentation with more integrated and less cumbersome video advertising has flourished in …

White Directory Publishers, a division of Hearst Holdings, announced a marketing partnership with Jingle’s 1-800-FREE411 making it the first independent publisher to resell sponsorship products on the 1-800-FREE411 media channel.
The deal with White Directory comes on the heels of Jingle’s recent blockbuster announcement that Idearc Media would place its Superpages.com information on Jingle’s 1-800-FREE411 network …

Free directory assistance services, funded by pay-per-call ads, have been rolled out by a number of entrepreneurial companies, telcos and Yellow Pages publishers. But now comes The Florida Times-Union, which quietly rolled out a local version of Say Hello Inc. (formerly America Says Hello) four weeks ago. The FTU, which has a daily circulation of …

Yesterday, Idearc Media and Jingle Networks announced a partnership that counters AT&T’s foray into the free DA business with its 1-800-YellowPages product. According to yesterday’s announcement, Idearc’s performance-based advertisers will receive additional exposure to buyers via Jingle’s 1-800-FREE411 service.
It is a logical move for both parties, since the emergence of AT&T in the free DA …

Starting this fall, Idearc Media’s Superpages may be accessed via instant messaging as a result of a new relationship with Multiplied Media, the Calgary-based provider of Poynt, a local search service that operates over IM. Multiplied Media was formerly known as IllumiCell. Poynt currently hosts Yellow Pages Group’s Internet Yellow Pages and classifieds in Canada.
“It is …

The NewTeeVee blog has some interesting thoughts following comments made by Google’s Marissa Mayer at the Searchonomics conference going on today. Google’s free directory assistance product, Goog-411 (past commentary here), will assist in helping Google develop speech to text ability, which will in turn help it sharpen its ax when it comes to video search.
This …

Following in the footsteps of Jingle Nets’ 1-800-Free411 (and failed services, like inFreeDA), Verizon LiveSource has launched a trial of a free DA service in Boston and Denver. The ad-supported service boasts the catchy number: 800-THE-INFO. It uses Call Genie’s automated DA system, like Yellow Pages Group and Telus in Canada, and Jingle in the U.S. …

Consumers increasingly use the Web to search for services. But it is tough to complete the loop and actually order service. In many cases, businesses are either unresponsive to phone calls and e-mails, or their information is inaccurate.
All this was confirmed by an April survey of 5,000 L.A. businesses. Conducted in midday, when businesses ought …

Summary
Jingle Networks’ free DA service 1-800-FREE411 has discontinued live operators in some locations. Operator expenses in these markets have significantly cut into margins as the overall cost of providing these calls isn’t being offset by the advertising volumes. Free DA services built on automated voice search are also growing in number (see yesterday’s post), …

Summary
After completing a free DA call this week using Google’s newly launched 800-GOOG411, we were asked if a text message was desired in addition to the free voice and “connect me” features (the multimodal functionality that is standard in a growing number of free DA offerings). But what we also received, interestingly, was a link …

Following the post on the verticalization of mobile search, I was able to talk to mobile search startup GoUAskMe.
Unlike the SMS based local search tools cited in that post, the company is trying to ride the growing wave of free directory assistance. Microsoft’s acquisition of Tellme and Google’s entrance to the space has shed …

The recently acquired Tellme today announced that it will integrate a new local business search into its multi-modal voice search platform.
From the press release:
The free service launches today with local business search by business name or category. Designed to provide fast, accurate results, Tellme users now have three ways to access the service: Tellme by …

Google has officially launched its free 411 product. The number, 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411), makes business name and category search accessible from any U.S. telephone.
This is a product we originally uncovered in our report Wireless Voice Search: The Multi-Modal Revolution. At that time, Google was using the test number 877-520-FIND.
We have learned through other sources that Google …

Last week, my colleague Peter Krasilovsky wrote a blog about 1-800-Free411 launching category search and took the opportunity to update how Jingle is doing. According to SVP Lyn Oakes, Jingle is receiving 16 million calls per month, with 60 percent repeat traffic and 500 advertisers.
Peter wrote: “The path to self-sustaining revenues for free directory assistance …