WebProNews

Yahoo has been giving pay-per-call a test drive in Yahoo Local, and using Ingenio's service to provide the ads.

The appeal of telephones to Yahoo goes beyond the branded cellphone it plans to sell through SBC. Loren Baker at Search Engine Journal noted how one user doing searches on Yahoo found that Yahoo Local was serving pay-per-call ads from Ingenio.

Apparently, the user then called Ingenio and learned they were working with Yahoo, and that the ads seen were part of a testing phase. Ingenio does pay-per-call ads for AOL, where they have reportedly been more profitable than other ads.

Pay-per-call looks like the advertising solution that can open up the local search market, and broaden its appeal to advertisers who haven't marketed themselves online. The concept is simpler to understand than the various paid search ad options.

Verizon embarked on a pay-per-call initiative over the summer, announcing it at SES 2005 in San Jose. Google appears to be testing the concept with print ads it has placed in tech magazines, where the ads list contact phone numbers for the advertisers.

David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business. Email him here.