in many ways, Citysearch is already the model of search and directory convergence. While not perfect, Citysearch presents a hybrid approach that combines pay-per-click advertising for local businesses, with a keyword search-driven interface over a structured local database. That provides the ease of use of search with the reliable structured data offered by Yellow Pages.
This is not to say that all "local search" will ape Citysearch, but conceptually this is where the market is heading. By the end of 2004 or early 2005 all Internet Yellow Pages will look and operate lot more like "local search engines" than they do now. Similarly, there will be a lot more Yellow Pages-like structured data behind search engines' localization efforts going forward. This is what I mean by "the hybrid future."
posted by Jen @ 6:30 AM
<< Home