Last week the Kelsey Group’s Mike Boland penned an excellent article about Skype’s new/old plans for local search on Search Engine Watch, and TechCrunch wrote more about the same topic.  Greg Sterling followed it up with a post filled with additional insights and observations.

As readers of this blog know, ContactAtOnce! has particularly relevant experience and technology so we feel compelled to share a bit of insight as well.  As a company our initial “beachhead” has been vertical search, and specifically automotive search, where our customers include many of the industry’s leading search sites including Classified Venture’s Cars.com, Cox Auto Trader’s Automart.com, Rupert Murdoch’s DMRI-owned Motors.co.uk,  and approximately 35 others.  We also work with a small number of local search sites, and in other verticals including apartments, real estate, and law, with aspirations to expand our footprint rapidly.

Based on our experiences, we can confirm that, without a doubt:

• Adding icons to results on a search site improves response rates
• Making it easier for a shopper to contact a business will further improve response rates
• Measuring the shopper-merchant communications is key for search sites seeking to demonstrate/monitize value

Back in 2006 when Ebay-Skype first made their local search plans public we blogged extensively about it.  Those posts are as relevant and insightful today as they were then.  Anyone following Skype’s plans for local search needs to read them, for we have already learned (and already built, in terms of software) what Skype surely will need in order to be successful.   Examples of key lessons learned include the fact that shoppers utilize IM (chat) over click-to-call 20:1 when given a choice, and making the icons “presence-aware” (i.e. the icons only show up if a representative of the merchant is available to answer at that moment) is hugely important to the user experience and thus to response rates.  Read on to learn more…

• Skype Aspires to Be Defacto Solution….
• How ContactAtOnce! Compares to Skype
• How ContactAtOnce! Complements Public VoIP Clients (including Skype)

So is Skype serious this time?  We hope so, from a corporate perspective and as shoppers ourselves.