CEO Ethan Stock cites Quantcast data showing Zvents Media Network as the 250th most used net on the Web, ahead of Citysearch (#267) and Local.com (#291). “We’re a very large local property by any measure,” he says.

The company, which has raised $32 million over its five year history, also claims it has been averaging 12,000 monthly event listers. These use the site to promote a wide range of local events and activities, including live music, performing arts, sporting events and community activities.

Of those listers, roughly 1200, or 10 percent, are now boosting their presence by taking out ads via self–serve – a percentage that Stock thinks will climb to 20 percent in 2010. The company also sells regional and national accounts via telemarketing and national sales, with top categories including major concert promoters, sports teams, casinos and home and garden events.

High end shopping, with its sales-oriented events, such as Williams Sonoma cooking demonstrations, are also becoming more important to Zvents bottom line. “There is a significant segment of consumers who perceive shopping as entertainment,” says Stock.

The key to the company’s future in local, however, is to stay away from the trap of focusing on directory-type advertising. Instead, Zvents will stay focused on events and shopping, he says, which have the most highly motivated advertisers. “They are also relatively concentrated in terms of the volume of advertising.”

Indeed, the company’s focus on events and advertising puts it most in competition with social sites such as Facebook and Google, rather than local sites such as Citysearch and Yelp, who may be more directory oriented, says Stock. Other events oriented companies include Eventful, and “new city guide” players such as Center’d and American Towns.

In hindsight, the company’s initial focus on teaming with newspapers “look like a very smart choice,” adds Stock. While newspapers are commonly disparaged in today’s climate for their declining circulation and advertising, “they have high repeat traffic. Much more than national partners.” Top Zvents newspaper partners include SFGate, the Denver Post, Seattle PI, Boston.com, the Dallas Morning News, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, New York Daily News, and the Orange County Register.

Stock also sees a major boost coming from renewed efforts in local from national partners such as AT&T’s Yellowpages.com, which has been an investor in the company ; and from MSN, where Zvents listings will be showing up in Bing, and trigger Instant Answers via Silverlight search.

Restaurants currently make up 29 percent of reviews, while shopping currently makes up 23 percent. Other major categories include beauty and fitness (9 percent); arts & entertainment (8 percent); home and local services (7 percent); entertainment (5 percent); and nightlife (4 percent).

Apartments are certainly a good place for Yelp to concentrate on, especially given the youthful target sought by apartment managers. Almost half of Yelp’s users (46 percent) are between 18-34 years old, while 36 percent are between 35-49.

So it was no surprise that Yelp COO Geoff Donaker was out evangelizing the cause this morning on a Webinar conducted by NCI’s Apartment Finder, a leading publication for managers of mega-apartment complexes.

The evangelism effort’s a good idea. In a survey before the call, just 35 percent of the Webinar audience said they were already familiar with Yelp, and just five percent said they were already engaged with Yelp as a business owner. Sixty-one percent, however, said they had never heard of it.

Donaker told the Webinar attendees that while he hoped they eventually advertised on Yelp, he was mostly interested in getting them tuned into Yelp as a marketing resource and to get them to access their business owner accounts and improve their pages. He noted that most reviews on Yelp were actually positive ones and they shouldn’t be afraid of the community feedback.

Many apartment managers, however, have cold feet vis a vis reviews due to what Apartment Finder VP of Operations Judy Bellack suggested was “extremely negative” experience with one site in particular: Internet Brands’ apartmentratings.com.

But as directories, search and user generated content have become more commingled, Gannett has gone a step further with the launch of FindItNow.com, a new directory product from its Planet Discover division.

Finditnow.com is national, but has been localized for specific markets. It is currently live in three markets: Rochester, Nashville and Burlington,VT. Only local information and content is featured. Key categories include Auto, Dining & Entertainment, Health & Medicine, Pets & Animals and Shopping.

The site is integrated with Facebook Connect, and users can add reviews, photos and business details if they register. In Rochester, 883 people have registered to contribute information; in Nashville, 828 people have registered; and in Burlington, 218 people have registered.

The site, in fact, is a lot like other search-driven directories, such as MerchantCircle, ShopCity, SMBLive’s Cloud Profile, and others. As with other sites, local businesses have the option of free or paid tiers. The paid tiers are set at $49 or $99 per month. Depending on which tier they choose, businesses can have preferred search result placement, company logo and dominant photo, extended business description, additional photos and unlimited coupons.

The event is totally dedicated to the higher value/conversion/engagement ethos of vertical media. For sure, this isn’t one size fits all of newspapers and Yellow Pages anymore (but then again, these traditional media are rapidly verticalizing too).

Featured sessions include 5 big keynotes; Mike Boland’s Mobile Vertical Superforum; a preconference session on the Tools of Marketplaces, including experts on search, video, enhanced calls, online scheduling, promotion and classifieds.

We also have cutting edge panels on new directories and city guides; small business marketplaces; vertical ad networks; vertical search; content aggregators (a great session with Examiner.com CEO Rick Blair); and local retailers and marketplaces. To top it all off, there is a special “making money” session with Classifieds Master Tony Lee, Chief Alliance Officer of Adicio.

Our keynoters include:
* Jon Brod, EVP, AOL Ventures
* Jay Herratti, CEO, Citysearch
* Andrew Mason, Founder and CEO, Groupon
* Sam Sebastian, Director, Local & B2B Markets, Google
* Craig Smith, CEO, ServiceMagic

The Mobile Vertical SuperForum has eight great speakers:
* Sam Altman, Cofounder and CEO, Loopt
* Alec Andronikov, CEO, MoVoxx
* Craig Hagopian, President, LocalAdXchange
* Scott Jampol, Senior Director of Consumer Marketing, OpenTable
* Steve Larsen, CEO, CallSpark
* Alexander Muse, Cofounder, Big in Japan (ShopSavvy)
* Eric Singley, Mobile Product Manager, Yelp
* David Sturtz, Cofounder and CEO, RepairPal

Other featured speakers include:
* Ethan Anderson, Cofounder, RedBeacon
* Jeff Beard, President and GM, Localeze
* Rick Blair, CEO, Examiner.com
* Reed Brown, President and CEO, Matchbin
* Jim Delli Santi, Cofounder and CEO, AlikeList
* Craig Donato, CEO, Oodle
* Todd Dubner, SVP, Development, NCI
* Jennifer Dulski, CEO, Center’d
* Sean Fox, COO, Reply.com
* Jordan Glazier, CEO, Eventful
* Krista Glotzbach, VP, Marketing, Vast.com
* Martin Herbst, GM, Kijiji U.S., eBay
* Greg Isaacs, Exec Director and GM, AT&T Interactive
* Jaan Janes, CEO, Pulse 360
* Joelle Kaufman, SVP, Marketing, Adify
* Warren Kay, VP, Local, Fox Audience Network
* David Kidder, Cofounder and CEO, Clickable
* Tony Lee, Chief Alliance Officer, Adicio
* Colin Pape, CEO, ShopCity.com
* Ben Saren, Cofounder and CEO, CitySquares
* Julie Smith, Group Product Manager, SuperMedia
* Mat Stover, CEO, Local Matters
* David Vazdauskas, President, Local Thunder

Do you think it will be a great conference? Do you think you can do major business? Please get more info here; or sign up to register here. Rates are better in advance than at the door.

HotJobs has been on the market since Carol Bartz took over as CEO of Yahoo early last year (or even before). It hasn’t been clear if anyone would buy it for more than a fire-sale price. The deal’s price of $225 million does represent a significant discount from the $439 million that Yahoo paid in 2002, but it is more than some handicappers had been predicting.

The deal likely propels Monster well past Gannett’s CareerBuilder as the online recruitment leaders (by revenue). Lately, CareerBuilder’s lagging profits have become a drain on Gannett’s profits. Likewise, Monster today reported during an earnings call that 4Q revs were down 27 percent, and that it suffered a net loss of $2.1 million on 4Q revenues of $213 million.

For Yahoo, the deal is the latest in a series of selloffs. Notably, it sold its search business to Microsoft last year, and de-emphasized other areas such as shopping and small business. It has also been rumored to put some of its other verticals in play as well.

HotJobs, of course, had been the original glue that brought Yahoo and the newspapers together. But the consortium has lately been focused more on using Yahoo’s APT behavioral targeting advertising platform. Some members of the consortium already use Monster.

Recruitment remains a huge category. But in recent years, it has been challenged by the recession. It has also become a major battlezone driven by technologies, such as semantic search-and-match job listings, mapping and communities of interest. Indeed, a growing part of the market has moved to niche specialties, such as trade associations etc. At the same time, ancillary verticals such as vocational education, relocation and job fairs have proved to be less important than once thought.

CEO Bill Lange says that his two-year-old online scheduling company may look like a simple utility, but it plays a much larger role. “We’re a revenue generation and business growth tool for the SMBs, resellers and partners we work with,” he says. “Consumers want to complete the deal online, and this gets you closer to the revenue.

“In the short term, it is a huge differentiator,” adds Lange. “In a couple of years, it will be a ‘must have’ feature.”

Top categories for FullSlate have been alternative health care, message therapists, fitness centers, hair and beauty salons, pet groomers, and mental health therapists and counselors. “These people live and die by their schedules,” says Lange.

FullSlate is pursuing its customers via a number of channels, including companies that create and promote online presence; general website builders; vertical website builders; vertical directory/trade associations; city guides; Internet Yellow Pages; and SMB resellers. The site has also been surprised by the high degree of organic growth it has achieved, in part by being listed by SMB sites such as GoDaddy and Web.com.

One thing it won’t try to be is a destination site. “ We are not doing that,” says Lange. “We provide the conversion element.”

The company’s business model relies on offering free trials of 10 appointments, and then converting to monthly subscription fees that typically range from $29.95 to $49.95. Pricing is generally based on the number of employee schedules are maintained.

One of the company’s newest customers is Goodtherapy.org, the #2 therapist site (after Psychology Today) with 3,000 mental health therapists. It sees its business doubling or tripling in 2010 and eventually working its way up towards the 600,000 practicing therapists in the U.S.

CEO Noah Rubenstein tells us that the addition of online scheduling “is something we’ve been wanting to do for a long time. Therapy is a unique service in which relationships are very important.”

Rubenstein sees the feature giving a boost to his conversion numbers, and adding value in terms of retention. “It will help lock-in members for the long term,” he says. He especially appreciates that members can access their schedule via FullSlate, GoodTherapy.org or their own site.

FullSlate CEO Bill Lange is speaking on the Tools of Marketplaces precon at Marketplaces 2010 March 22-24 in San Diego.

As recounted in Ken Doctor’s valuable new book, Newsonomics, “the institution of American journalism owes more to the institution of the department store than the First Amendment “– a 1988 comment attributed to Knight Ridder exec Jim Batten.

But what’s happened? The department stores have consolidated and shifted much of their marketing; big chunks of paid classifieds have been Craig’s Listed; and the circulation (audience) has increasingly moved down the slippery slope to a potpourri of “continuous partial attention” news channels. Indeed, the details found in newsprint aren’t always especially sought after. As Doctor notes, just 44 percent can be bothered to click past the headlines in news aggregators like Google News to get to the original source.

Dead. Dead. Dead. Nobody in their right mind would plan a future at a newspaper or TV news broadcast anymore, right? But then there is this inconvenient statistic: applications to journalism schools have more than doubled in the past several years – even with tuition bills exceeding $50,000 at the elite institutions.

For the journalist who will pursue his or her avocation, plentiful options exist, notes Doctor, a former Knight Ridder Digital exec and publisher at newspapers and alternative weeklies who currently does analysis for Outsell, inc. and writes the Content Bridges blog. The solutions are structured in the book as “twelve new trends that will shape the news you get.”

The trends are right on and more than familiar to our Local Onliner audience (“Itch the Niche!”). But happily, Doctor avoids the blue sky and covers the bases with the aplomb of an all star. His comprehensive review, interesting detail and demand that the relationships between business and journalism be creatively re-explored makes this a valuable book for those who care about the future of journalism, and its critical role in democratic societies.

“My vision is (that it will become) the leading content and ad network for local,” says Citysearch CEO Jay Herratti. It is no longer just about Citysearch.com as a destination site. “This is Citysearch,” he adds. “It isn’t distributed in one place. It is part of many places, all around the Web.”

The result also provides an alternative to Google. “We look at what Google is doing with local as a major competitive threat,” says Herratti. “It controls access to the Internet.

“Last year, we were building and rebuilding,” Herratti notes. “This year, we are very, very focused on execution.” Still, the current product is relatively primitive and will be rapidly evolving. “Right now, we are talking about version 1.0,” he says. “Twelve months from now, there will be new geotargeting solutions; new ways of creating content. We’re taking all of these pieces and putting them together. The next thing is to optimize, and optimize.”

Analysis of CityGrid’s impact by my colleague Matt Booth can be found on the BIA Kelsey blog.

That’s what Reply.com is focused on. The two-year- old, 125 person company, backed by $17 million of venture capital, provides vertical advertisers with “enhanced click” packages and validated leads, complete with leads scoring. In addition, advertisers using Reply.com’s auction-based system can filter locations, and puts caps on spending and cost per click rates.

Vertical segments targeted by Reply.com include key leads categories, including home insurance, health insurance, life insurance, education, auto finance, mortgage, used cars and auto insurance. Auto and real estate segments make up the biggest segments, with 60-70 percent of Reply’s customer base. Under Reply’s system, each category is customized for the particular aspects of a vertical.

One key differentiator is that the targeted categories are typically not “inventory based.” They may be new cars, rather than used cars; mortgage, or pure relocation leads, rather than search-based rentals leads.

Reply CEO Payem Zamani suggests that Reply’s clicks and lead offers are more efficiently processed than typical ad exchanges, in part due to narrowing the market base with geo-targeting and a system for discerning consumer intent. The company is processing nine million clicks per month, and 1.58 million leads, with customers for its auctions including auto manufacturers, major media companies such as Hearst Newspapers, and vertical sites such as RealEstate.com and Autobytel. The company also works with several of the search engines, SEO sites and email providers.

The basic idea is to create a “Google-like” platform for acquiring traffic, says Zamani. Reply’s knowledge of user intent and location –driven in part by the installation of a pixel to track users — really streamlines the process, and drives higher conversion rates, he says. Conversion success depends on how deep the advertiser wants to go. Information that goes all the way through to consumer credit cards for purchase will be a small fraction (maybe .1 percent) of more general conversions (30-40 percent) that provide additional information.

Reply.com COO Sean Fox is a featured speaker at Marketplaces 2010 March 22-24 in San Diego.

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette is live, and other newspapers and local media companies are anticipated as partners in coming months. Allmenus.com is the second brand from parent company DotMenu.com. The original brand was campusfood.com, which brings online ordering to college students.

Allmenus’ media partnerships involve co-branding and promotional advertising, potentially including display, direct, email and social media. They also involve contextual integrated content. While they notably don’t involve the papers in sales, the papers receive a minority share of local market revenues. Revenues are derived from online food ordering, advertising and monthly maintenance fees.

AllMenus’ Chief Revenue Officer Tony Wills, a former exec with Quigo, Newsday and RH Donnelley, says the company determined that local markets had to be launched one at a time to be truly successful– even though it has good distribution via Google and Yahoo Local. Newspapers still have the online brand and promotional power to best drive local awareness and sales, he says, despite their drop-offs in penetration and usage. Newspapers also appreciate AllMenus as a “content” service since it strives to have the most comprehensive set of menus in each market – something it handles with local feet on the street, and fly-in teams.

Under terms of the partnerships, AllMenus’ widgets for online ordering will be featured in specific contextual parts of newspaper sites, including sports, local, weather and business. While it would seem to make sense to have newspapers also handle local sales, Wills says that it wouldn’t really work because newspaper sales staffs are paid on commissions.

A primary reason it wouldn’t work is that AllMenus takes no money upfront. Instead, it charges a transaction fee that is a little over ten percent. It takes 11.5 percent, or $5.75, out of a $50 order, for instance. “If there is no revenue, there is no sale,” says Wills.

In any case, newspapers may have trouble committing the resources in today’s environment. “Newspapers are under siege,” says Wills. “They can’t commit the resources. They need it to be turn-key.”

There is a role for newspaper sales reps, however – to build awareness for the AllMenus service. “It makes the print sale” for restaurants more valuable because of added awareness and usage, says Wills. Indeed, online ordering is a big piece of the restaurant landscape. Pizza Hut is getting 30 percent of its sales online. Moreover, online boosts the amount of sales – online orders are ten percent higher than in-person orders because it is so easy to check off additional or more expensive items. Ultimately, however, it is a different ballgame than brand and awareness advertising.