We were excited to find ourselves shoulder to shoulder with world‑famous applications such as Facebook, Skype and Twitter.  To us, this means that Canadian consumers find value with YellowPages.ca, helping them make better shopping decisions. Business benefit too, with geo-localized comments and reviews, brand filters, placement products and advertising banners. So you will understand why I lost no time in sharing the news over social networks.

So, what makes the YellowPages.ca app so popular? Downloaded 3.3 million times (our new official record!), the YellowPages.ca mobile app is free and enables users to:

-       Make better shopping decisions thanks to rich content that helps them save time and money
-       Maximize of their local searches through results that include photos, videos, other users’ comments on the business and more
-       Map out their route from their own physical location to that of a desired business location
-       Contact the business they are looking for with the touch of a button from within the application

We have also recently added new features to the app, improving user experience. Since the end of 2011, we have enabled users to view businesses’ current deals or promotional offerings as part of the local search process, helping consumers make more enlightened shopping decisions and providing advertisers with greater visibility and more leads.

In addition, YellowPages.ca was recently recognized by Digi Awards as the best mobile application, winning the prestigious “Best in Mobile” award. All told, our mobile applications generate 30% of local business searches across our network, a proportion that keeps rising.

Naturally, we will continue to innovate and will carry our digital lead even further. Research shows that if current trends continue, in 2015 the majority of Web surfing on mobile devices will surpass Web surfing on desktop computers (according to Morgan Stanley), and we will certainly be taking that new reality into account.

So keep an eye out, because more major additions are planned for our mobile applications in 2012!

The YellowPages.ca App is available for free from the App Store on iPhone or iPod touch, or at www.itunes.ca/appstore/. It is also possible to download it via http://mobile.pj.ca/applications/.

Mobile shopping is accelerating at a fast pace. Of the 6.6 million Canadians who own a smartphone *1 63 percent use it to search for businesses at least once a week *2 while 53 percent use it to make a purchase *3. These numbers are likely to increase dramatically in 2012 as smartphone sales continue to go through the roof, and telecommunication companies offer increasingly attractive deals.

For small businesses, the question is: how can you get mobile shoppers to find—and choose—your company?

Get noticed
Firstly, you need to make sure your business appears in the search results of business directories typically used on smartphones. This means updating your business information on YellowPages.ca, Google Places and Facebook. All of these services provide free basic online profiles for businesses.

Be mobile-friendly
Secondly, your company website must be optimized for mobile browsers. A mobile website should feel like a mobile app: minimalistic design, simple functions, key information, and nothing more. Using a special script that recognizes mobile browsers when they visit your website, you can offer these browsers a minimalist, mobile-friendly design while continuing to offer your regular website design and content for desktop computers. Note that YellowPages.ca offers this script as part of its Website Solution.

Stand out from the competition
How can you set yourself apart if your competitors also embrace the mobile shopping revolution (which they may very well be doing right now)? One way is to invest in a preferred placement on the Yellow Pages mobile app. With three million downloads and counting, you will be reaching about half of Canadian smartphone users. And people shopping just a few blocks away will be able to see your business on their smartphone screens.

Boost your mobile leads
Another crucial element in attracting mobile shoppers is advertising, whether it be search or display advertising. You can generate leads by buying keywords in search engines, or boost awareness by creating a rich brand experience with an interactive mobile app, for example. For more details on mobile advertising, you can read the brand new study from my colleagues at Mediative: “A Realistic View on Mobile Advertising in Canada”. Available as a free download, this report compares the performance of various mobile campaigns using search and display ads.

Offer mobile deals
Last but not least, offer mobile deals. If someone is searching and finds three or four similar businesses in the same area, they are sure to pick the one offering some kind of a deal or discount on their product(s). You can promote such offers on mobile devices through services like Shopwise, a newly-released app by Yellow Pages aimed at shopping-savvy consumers. With other apps like Foursquare, you can even reward your mobile customers when they “check in” at your place of business. Now if a free reward doesn’t keep them coming back, I don’t know what will!

*1 ComScore via eMarketer, May 2011
*2 Ipsos Reid, May 2011
*3 Google/IPSOS OTX MediaCT, April 2011

Since mid-2009, we’ve invested significantly in our mobile portfolio.  Our YellowPages.ca mobile app is now available across all major platforms, namely iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry,  Android, and Windows Phone 7 (check it out at yellowpages.ca/mobile).  We’ve also optimized the mobile version of the YellowPages.ca website (m.yp.ca).

And we’ve seen rapid success with mobile. Our app topped the iTunes App Store’s rankings, named #1 Productivity app by Apple in its 2010 Rewind ranking.

Our apps have been downloaded approximately 2.5 million times so far but more importantly, they aren’t just sitting in smart phones after download. People are using them…a lot. In fact, currently 30% of YellowPages.ca searches in Canada are coming from mobile devices.

Mobile is rapidly becoming the new mass media. It’s no longer just a phenomenon limited to the young, urban crowd. Consider this:

• The number of mobile Internet users will surpass desktop Internet users by 2014*.
• More than half of mobile devices sold are smartphones.
• According to ComScore**, smart phone penetration in Canada represents 32.8% of mobile subscribers.
• For YellowPages.ca, 1 in 3 searches are conducted on a mobile device.

Not only that, but mobile is home to an extremely primed audience, who often look to their phones as their new navigators and advisors for everyday situations such as directions or finding goods and services. Think about it. Chances are you’ve probably gone to your phone to quickly jump on the Internet while standing in the aisle of the local electronics store for some peer advice before buying that new camera.

At the end of the day, at YPG, we aim to address two very clear needs for the smartphone audience: access to information about a given place of business and getting them the info they need to make the crucial decision about what product or service they’re going to buy.

I’ve always said Yellow Pages was built for mobile, and boy have we grown this platform in a relatively short period of time. We’re still that same gateway to finding local goods and services. Except now, we go where you go.

Stay tuned. More apps and features from YPG coming to a phone near you.

*Mary Meeker – Morgan Stanley
**ComScore MobileLens