Breaking Web Marketing News
Yahoo! Releases Local Match

June 25, 2004

In a long-awaited release, Local Match now allows the bidder to specify the radius of a search to be found, from a half-mile to 100 miles. For example, if you sell shoes, you probably only want to advertise within a 5-10 mile radius, as not many people will drive 100 miles to buy shoes.

As the bidder, you choose the radius, which now gives mom-and-pop shops a real reason to be online and advertise. Not only that, but Yahoo! will also give the searcher not just your business name, but your address, your phone number, a description of your business and a map of how to get to your business! Wow. It is about time someone got local search right! Too bad CitySearch!

Yahoo! Add-On

There has been a tiny addition to the Yahoo! Search that appears on generic searches currently. It seems that Yahoo! is attempting to "educate" users into being specific in their searches in order to find what they need quickly. For example, if you do a search for "mortgage" you will receive a "Related" list underneath the search bar giving options for "mortgage calculator", "mortgage rates", "mortgage company", etc. However, if you do a search for "mortgage company" you do not receive the "Related" listings.