Smalltown, another company seeking to offer a Yellow Pages-like service with a more compelling online experience and community feel, is expanding to cover more cities.
The site launched in the cities of Burlingame and San Mateo in October, and now claims 3.5 percent of populations of those two cities visit its site at least once a week. That may seem small, but this isn’t bad for five months work. The Mercury News, by comparison, enjoys about 25 percent “penetration” in Santa Clara county, down from 45 to 50 percent in the 1970s, and it has been around for more than a hundred years.
VentureBeat wrote an extensive review when Smalltown launched, and pointed to a screencast about how it works. It takes a small time investment to learn how to use Smalltown. Store merchants can pay to upgrade their listings, and local residents can write reviews, leave messages and ask for tips.
Tomorrow, Smalltown announces the coverage of Foster City, Belmont and Millbrae. It also launches a “reply back” feature, which sends an email alert to merchants when someone posts a review on their listing page. Smalltown has also added the ability for people to — surprise! — upload video.
Smalltown has $3 million from Formative Ventures, and its expansion stands in contrast to consolidation happening elsewhere. Insider Pages, which offered local listings was struggling, and was just bought by CitySearch. Also, Smalltown has hired Daniel Payomo to run its sales efforts. Payoma, who has worked at several media companies, including Knight Ridder, was recently at Backfence, another community start-up that just laid off some workers.
Tags: co:Smalltown4 Comments
-
Howell Jones said:
Small towns can work…www.DiscoverOurTown.com which also has small/Medium & Large towns…we find that the advertising for these smallerr communities is sometimes better received,as they are not called as much for advertising.
That being said…a warning that we run into business owners that are non- techo..down home folk…whoses daughter owns a computer…but thet never say a need for one!
The good news is of DOT’s 2000 cities we have operational, most advertisers are tech savy..enough!
-
Greg said:
Someone is going to find the right model in this space. Smalltown’s chances look as promising as any. Our approach at ConsensusBest.com is not to be a comprehensive local directory, but rather to point people toward local stores that specifically carry what they’re shopping for. A big question is, ‘what’s the right blend of directory, product information, social network?’ Smalltown is wise to expand in the Bay Area, be a resource for people who may live in San Mateo and work in Foster City. That way, each new city helps make existing ones more valuable. I think Back Fence is doing some interesting things, but I think they should stick with expansion in DC suburbs instead of jumping around the country.
-
corey said:
I came here by accident, but just might stay :)
-
Edward Samourjian said:
LocalCensus.com is a completely free website that provides a plethora of statistical information about the United States of America and all of its cities, zip codes, and counties. LocalCensus.com also provides business listings from a wide variety of categories throughout most cities within the United States of America. Any business owner can simply log in after being verified and modify the content of their personal business listing web page. Customers can also post reviews regarding the quality of services the business provides.
