Social Local Search Panel #ILM09

Tim Kendall of Facebook: Manages self-service ad program

Anamitra Banerji of Twitter: Focused on building out revenue products

Greg Isaacs of AT&T Interactive: Manages revenue products

Kara Nortman of CItySearch: BD

Tim Kendall of Facebook:
There are about 700K FB for business pages.  5000 created per day.  They have facilitated over 1 billion merchant-consumer connections via FB Pages.

Anamitra Banerji of Twitter:
Twitter’s geotagging API provides a valuable context for local conversations.  A restaurant will update its menu based on what people are saying.

Greg Isaacs of AT&T Interactive:
Yellowpages.com using Facebook Connect to integrate social connections and local.  Building Buzz.com which should come out next year that melds conversations and lead-gen.

Kara Nortman of CitySearch:
CS implemented Twitter APIs this week and relaunched free claim your profile product.  Users can use Twitter profile to write reviews against biz profile.

Anamitra Banerji of Twitter:
Every tweet should have a bunch of meta data that puts the tweet into context.  This is pretty huge.

Kara Nortman of CitySearch:
Focusing on creating an “introductory” social media marketing product for SMBs.

Tim Kendall of Facebook:
Next year FB will focus on doing more geotargeting with ads.  RIght now it’s all IP address targeting.  From a base of 100 fans, there are 15k one-degree-separation of possible new customers for businesses

Anamitra Banerji of Twitter:
We don’t know if advertising on Twitter will be local at first.  It will be an introductory product that will provide basic engagement metrics and assistance.  This will be the first step towards an advertising program.

Final Thoughts:
FB: Use FB Connect

Twitter: Use the Twitter API and go crazy with it

AT&T: Businesses need to make sure social makes sense for your business before jumping in

CitySearch: Please take our ads and content! Simplicity of implementation is key.

Great panel.