Tipping Point: What People Missed in the TMP Data

There’s now been a good deal of coverage about the recent TMP local search data. This is the datapoint that has gotten much of the attention:

33% of all consumers still consider print yellow pages as their primary source of local business info, and 90% feel it’s valuable because it gives more information such as accurate phone numbers.

While it’s great to see that print yellow pages is still an important local business resource, here’s the “real” headline: 60% of consumers now use the Internet as their primary information source for local businesses lookups. The claim can be made from the data that print YP is the largest single category because the Internet traffic is fragmented:

• 30% use general search
• 17% use IYP
• 13% use local search sites (e.g., Local.com, Citysearch, Yahoo Local)

But when you add the Internet figures up, they’re approximately double print as a primary source. This is a dramatic, “sea change” from early 2006 when the Kelsey Group found that print yellow pages was the “first choice” for local business information across the board.

So what we have is a much more fragmented world, where print matters but the Internet is now the dominant source of local business information.

This is the “tipping point” everyone has been talking about — it’s been reached.

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