Microsoft Integrates Calling into Live Local

A new “call for free” click-to-call link has been integrated into every business listing on Windows Live Local.

As I say in my longer Search Engine Watch post on the subject, Microsoft isn’t first to market with this but neither Google nor Yahoo! have this functionality in their local products. (YellowPages.com, which licensed MSFT’s Birds Eye photography, offers click to call for advertisers, supported by Ingenio)

See, e.g., “Wine Stores, San Francisco.” The call for free link appears beside the phone number.

People often confuse “click to call” (call completion/connection) with “pay per phone call” (an ad model). They may overlap, but they’re not synonymous. Microsoft has not introduced pay per phone call. But any click to call infrastructure lays the groundwork for potential pay per phone call advertising scenarios later.

Read more.

One Response to “Microsoft Integrates Calling into Live Local”

  1. The Future of Real Estate Marketing » Windows Live Local Makes the First Move Says:

    [...] Greg Sterling dug up a new feature unique to WLL, one that I find particularly exciting. It now has a ‘Call For Free’ feature on all of its business listings. [...]

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