Pay per call: Forbes.com: Search Engines Go Local
Forbes.com: Search Engines Go Local: " Searching For Dollars :Search Engines Go Local : Arik Hesseldahl, 11.08.04
" NEW YORK - Sure, the big search engines have pretty much figured out how to find anything you want in the world, but try looking around your local neighborhood....
So how to measure whether that Web site is drumming up any business? Link it to the phone. "For most small, service-based businesses, the transaction is done over the phone," says analyst Niki Scevak, an analyst with Jupiter Research in New York. "The call is more relevant than the click."
That's the idea behind Ingenio, a San Francisco-based startup backed by investments from eBay (nasdaq: EBAY - news - people ), Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) and Paul Allen's Vulcan Ventures, among others...Using Ingenio's technology, Findwhat's advertisers pay to plug their businesses under specific categories within a given area....those advertisers bid for the right to get the best placement...businesses pay for every phone referral generated via the ad. Potential customers call a special 800 number listed in the online ad that then routes the call to the business. When the phone rings at that business, a short message whispers that the call was connected via the search engine...results, Barach says, are pretty promising. "What we have found so far is that businesses are willing to pay ten times more for leads generated over the phone than for leads generated from a Web site...While businesses may pay 20 to 40 cents per lead online, Ingenio leads start at $2 and go up from there"
posted by Jen @ 10:20 AM
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