Local.com Named Most Relevant Local Search

Interchange Corporation, owners of Local.com and a leading provider of local search services, announced that a recent white paper on the local search industry by TeleMapics reports that Local.com is a leader in highly relevant local search results.

TeleMapics' October 6, 2006, white paper, "Local Search - Time for a Tune Up?," which describes the local search industry, defines its core services and variants, reviews aspects of service that do not work well and offers observations on what needs to improve to make local search ready for "prime time." In the white paper, Michael Dobson, president of TeleMapics, reports that Local.com consistently provides highly relevant local search results.

"If you had to choose just one provider for your local search needs, our research has shown that Local.com is the service that uniformly provides relevant search results," said Dobson. "Local.com is creeping up on the Web's leading local search providers, due, in part, to the relevancy of its search results."

The white paper is available as a free PDF download at www.telemapics.com.

The results in the TeleMapics white paper underscore a recent report by comScore that documents significant growth in the local search market in the U.S. The comScore Survey, released September 28, says 63 percent of U.S. Internet users (or 109 million people) performed a local search online in the month of July which represents a 43 percent increase over July 2005. comScore Networks measures Internet usage and tracks Web site access results.

In addition to the growth of local search, comScore reports about half of all users take their local search to the next level by visiting a local merchant they found via search engines, like Local.com. With more than 849 million local searches conducted in July, executives at Interchange are encouraged by growth in local search as reported by both TeleMapics and comScore.

"The comScore survey underscores the growth we have anticipated in this market from the beginning," said Heath Clarke, CEO, Interchange. "While Google and Yahoo! remain the giants in search, we remain a leader in areas of local search relevancy and Local.com scores well ahead of our principal competition for local search. We are helping to connect businesses and advertisers with customers locally."

With an emphasis exclusively on local search, Local.com is the fastest growing local search engine site in the nation. The Local.com web site is a top 100 destination site for Internet users, according to comScore.

Interchange Corporation, owns Local.com (www.local.com), a leading local search engine (ranked #79 in U.S. website traffic with 6.2% reach -- July 2006 comScore). Local.com attracts more than 10 million monthly unique visitors seeking information on local businesses, products, services and people. Powered by the company's patent-pending Keyword DNA® and local web indexing technologies, Local.com provides users with targeted, relevant local search results. These results include special offers from local businesses, reviews from other users, local businesses' website links, maps, driving directions and more. Businesses can advertise on Local.com with subscription, pay per click, banner and pay per call ad products.