Newspapers & Yellow Pages Books On Their Way Out

After renewing my subscription to the Houston Chronicle this week for the next six months, I had to ask why? Sure, I like reading the sports in the morning in the form of a local newspaper, but even the sports section on the Houston Chronicle’s own chron.com website is more comprehensive and therefore, better because of the sports blogs it includes.

As far as national, world, and business news go, you can of course, get all you can read online with the likes of CNN, Reuters, or ironically enough, the New York Times online.

My copy of the AT&T Yellow Pages Book arrived this week and I’m happy to report that it gets progressively smaller every year. Never having been too much of a fan of the real yellow pages anyway, I can’t say I’m sorry to see the book version on its way out. Just a guess but AT&T has been gearing up for the loss of local yellow page book revenue by buying up more than its share of local online directories. Although their own smartpages.com never did quite take off, AT & T now owns or controls yellowpages.com, yp.com, and anywho.com.

Local Linkbuilding

A recent Search Engine Land newsletter states that “according to a comScore study, local search grew 58 percent in 2008, significantly outpacing the 21 percent growth in overall U.S. core web searches during the same period. As local search grew, Internet Yellow Pages and local online business directories saw double-digit growth of 23 percent over 2008.”

As local search continues to grow, so too will the demand for local business information, which is where Directory One comes in. An early entrant in the local Houston online directory scene, Directory One created its Houston online business directory, Check Houston, back in March of 2000.

And now in 2009 Directory One offers a local directory link building service that’s second to none. Although Google Maps is, of course, the leader in local directories, Directory One realized long ago that the more quality local directories that list your site and the more customer reviews published about your business, the better you’ll rank in Google Maps.

The Directory One local linkbuilding program is offered as a stand-alone, ala carte service.