Local Search to Generate $8.2 Billion by 2015

Local search advertising revenues will increase from $5.1 billion in 2010 to $8.2 billion by 2015, according to local media analyst BIA/Kelsey.

That's a compound annual growth rate of 10 percent that's driven by the continuing increase in local search activity. By 2015, the firm expects that 30 percent of all search volume will be local in nature.

"Local search ad revenues hit an all-time high last year, driven primarily by better product integration across search engines, especially Google," says Matt Booth, senior vice president and program director of BIA/Kelsey. "Revenues will continue to grow as better targeting, increased mobile usage and improving integration drive up local search activity."

As smartphone and tablet use picked up in 2010, increasing amounts of consumers took to browsing the Web on their mobile devices, lending to a significant increase in local search. As these devices and mobile search habits embed themselves further into the mainstream, local search will continue to gain momentum - to the benefit of most local and regional brands.

According to comScore's most recent Explicit Core Search Share Report, more than 16 billion such searches were queried in April 2011, with nearly 11 billion of those taking place on Google. Yahoo sites accounted for nearly 3 billion core searches and Microsoft had just over 2 billion.

BIA/Kelsey's Interactive Local Media advisory service provides research, analysis and evaluation of quantitative and qualitative data as it relates to the locally focused digital media and advertising marketplace. Visit BIA/Kelsey to learn more about the Interactive Local Media advisory service or to gain access to the full report.