Call measurement ad provider Telmetrics released its 2012 local search trends today, with a heavy focus on the role mobile is playing in local search and ad performance management. Here are Telmetrics’ top four trends/predictions this year in mobile innovation:
1) Pay Per Call Goes Mainstream With Mobile: An increase in mobile adoption rates has lead …

The Toronto-based call measurement firm Telmetrics today announced a major expansion of its business into Europe, launching its solution in 10 markets. The launch follows a six-month beta test in which Telmetrics proved out the value of its service for search engines, agencies, publishers and other local search providers.
Telmetrics has been provisioning call measurement services …

Last week I attended Opus Research’s Conversational Commerce Conference (a.k.a. “C3). The focus of the discussion was mostly on social media and its impact on marketing and customer care, at both the local and national brand levels. While there is a lot of interesting activity using social media for customer acquisition, the biggest surprise for …

If getting customers to pick up the phone is the first priority for SMBs, the second is vetting caller traffic to distill quality leads from noise … and to understand the drivers behind each activity. “Bridging the online-offline gap” is emerging as a critical component of SMB reputation management. VendAsta is now incorporating call tracking intelligence …

ZipLocal, the U.S. independent directory publisher, has launched a new “hyper local” leads-based advertising model called Local Leads that taps into a distribution network featuring 18 properties and 80 billion monthly impressions, according to ZipLocal execs who briefed us last week. The main players in the network are CityGrid, SuperMedia, Chitika and DiscoverOurTown.
ZipLocal is the publisher …

As local businesses increasingly transition their advertising dollars online, they expect agencies and publishers to furnish them with simple, consolidated solutions supported by tangible, trackable ROI. MerchEngines built its white-label “relationship generation” system to enable online marketing providers to do just that for their SMB clients.
In a crowded online marketplace, where bigger firms such as ReachLocal, Yodle and WebVisible also compete to …

SMBs are looking for their phones to ring and their doors to open, pure and simple. These cash register-related activities largely sway their perceptions of online marketing campaign effectiveness. Kenshoo Local, a division of SEM provider Kenshoo, aims to specifically meet these needs via an integration with Mongoose Metrics call-tracking platform. Using the platform, agencies and …

I had the opportunity to meet with Yext CEO Howard Lerman and President Brian Distelburger to talk about their recent product additions and approach to the SMB marketplace. What struck me as I entered their NYC loft-style office is the energy from the growing telephone sales team. The impression is that this is a company …

We’ve seen a marked increase in the number of inquiries we’ve been getting from clients regarding the use and implementation of call measurement platforms. We have long believed that the “call” is a critical element of any local search model since so many SMBs place significant value on the phone call.
Here in California, Valley Yellow …

I had the opportunity to speak with Brad Reynolds, CEO of Mongoose Metrics, a Cleveland, Ohio-based call measurement and conversion analytics company. Reynolds was quick to point out that it is not simply a call tracking company, but rather it is dedicated to linking online and offline conversion so clients can better understand what leads …