ReachLocal increases options for small businesses advertising online
Looking at the likes of L.A. companies such as SpotRunner, which is cutting staff and changing its business model to focus less on local businesses, you might think that businesses that deal in local advertising have a pretty bleak future. But Woodland Hills advertising juggernaut ReachLocal says that business is just beginning to heat up in the local online advertising marketplace.
The company today announced the ReachLocal Xchange, a platform that allows small business to advertise on a host of sitesrather than just major sites such as MSN, Yahoo and Google. As a result, different publishers will be able to compete for the $1,000 a month or so that ReachLocal's thousands of advertisers each spend on average buying ad space online.
"There's a flood of dollars moving online," said Zorik Gordon, co-founder and CEO of ReachLocal. "This will cause an explosion of more ad opportunities for small businesses."
He estimates that billions of dollars of local advertising are currently moving from the Yellow Pages and print publications to the online marketplace. ReachLocal will be able to help those advertise buy spots on sites such as Fox Audience Network and Ask Sponsored Listings, among 100 others.
"ReachLocal has done something potentially quite significant here, making local inventory more accessible to more marketers," wrote Greg Sterling, founder of Sterling Market Intelligence, on his blog.
ReachLocal was launched in Encino of 2004 with the goal of making it easier for small businesses such as dentists, plumbers and car dealers to advertise online. Advertisers liked the idea -- the business added 34 offices globally in 30 months. Venture capitalists liked it too: The company raised $55 million in a Series D round in 2007.
-- Alana Semuels
Online advertising is receiving a lot of bad press lately about its effectiveness.
It is not advertising that is suffering, since only the major players are exposed, the perception is that there is a decline. Coincidentally there is an economic recession which paints the doom and gloom for all industries. Online Advertising is on a major growth curve.
The appearance of an advertising budget decline, is actually the expansion of advertising space. The number of places businesses can advertise now is growing daily. This causes the advertising to be spread thin giving the appearance of the decline.
There are many new ad networks now experiencing rapid growth compared to the rate of growth of the existing well known networks. This is a normal occurrence during a major growth trend in any industry. Take the auto industry for example during the 1940s and 1950s. They had more brands of auto makers than we can even remember. The same growth is occurring with online advertising.
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Posted by: Online Advertising Network | April 21, 2009 at 09:13 AM
Another alternative to online advertising, if your business offers consulting or professional services, is expertmagnet.com.
Businesses can register free on this site, then whenever an organisation posts a request that matches their expertise, they'll be notified and can pitch for the work.
While it doesn't replace the proactive approach, it does provide another sales channel at a very low cost.
Regards,
Mark
http://www.expertmagnet.com
Posted by: Mark Bubner | April 22, 2009 at 07:06 AM
I agree with Mark Bubner above, alternative online advertising is of the utmost importance to small business today. Why is that so important? It's rather simple!
Sixty four percent (64%) of all consumers go on line to find a local business or purchase a product or service. What that means to a small or large business is, if they don't have a visible website presence their potential customers are buying from their competition. It's just that simple!
The above article talks about local yellow page advertisers are moving to online advertising. As a matter of fact, new statistics reveal that 54% of all American families never look a phone directory. You will also see DEX scrambling hard to survive with radio and TV ad trying to drive traffic and save their customer base...
Most small business owners would like to cut back on their advertising expense and yet get more customers into their store. Fortunately, their is a now solution and a way to do this!
Local Small Businesses now have an inexpensive website presence opportunity for local customers seeking information about their products or services on 100+ major search engines....Their new website would include a link to their present site, videos, photos, menus, Google map, coupons and more. This service is provide with NO Contracts, No Pay Per Click and for under $100.00 per month...Seems like a no brainer!
Hope this is helpful,
Duane
http://impacmedia.biz
Posted by: Duane Henneman | April 23, 2009 at 09:00 AM
Duane Henneman, this is a recruiting ad for Local Ad Link. They are terrible and don't give you any results for your money. I know first hand because I joined and they don't produce what they promise, so I got out.
Posted by: Sue Stack | May 19, 2009 at 01:33 PM
ReachLocal is by far the worst company I've dealt with since getting into ecommerce 3 years ago. They promise the world but their people and results are horrible. I wasted $8,000 with them and would have seen a better return if I had given Bernie Madoff the money.
Posted by: SJC | June 25, 2009 at 11:02 AM