Yandex Offers Geo-targeted Ads to Businesses

Internet, January 26, 2011. Yandex offers businesses a premium placement opportunity in Yandex’s Business directory http://sprav.yandex.ru/pr). This is a new advertising solution designed to give companies a chance to stand out both on Yandex.Maps and in Yandex’s search results and to attract more customers.

Online business directories have become increasingly popular with users looking for company contact details. In response to such search queries, Yandex displays companies’ locations on a map, both in the search results on yandex.ru and in its mapping service on maps.yandex.ru. Business owners opting for the premium placement product will have their company’s location highlighted on a map and their contact details displayed at a click. The potential audience of this product includes the over 25 million users of Yandex’s search engine and over 11.5 million users of the Yandex.Maps service, exceeding the audience of any printed business directory (according to TNS Russia, December 2010).

While premium placement (or geo-targeted advertising) is suitable for all types of businesses it is especially advantageous to small companies. In contrast to contextual advertising, the key feature of this product allows businesses to advertise locally, on a district scale rather than on a city or a regional scale. This makes geo-targeted advertising an ideal promotional solution for businesses like small bakeries, hairdressing salons, repair shops etc., who may not have an online presence and whose rivals are entirely local. This new advertising product gives small businesses an opportunity to distinguish themselves from the competition.

“Geo-targeted ads have one important feature that they share with the ads served via Yandex.Direct: they are triggered by users’ search queries; that is why they meet users’ needs,” says Eugene Lomize, head of the advertising technologies group at Yandex. “However, while contextual ads first and foremost inform clients about the product, geo-targeted ads tell users where they can get it. Our expectation is that advertising in our Business directory will prove as effective as using contextual advertising.”

To order premium placement in Yandex’s Business directory, advertisers can contact one of the company’s partners, directory and database publishers, including MGTS, the information portal Allinform.ru in Saint Petersburg, Twin Media Group in Samara Index.su) and about 20 other companies across Russia. Advertisers can also place an order through our online interface at sprav.yandex.ru/pr (in Russian).

Geo-targeted ads are served at a fixed price for a fixed period of time. Accordingly, advertisers from Moscow would pay 9,450 rubles (approximately $317) for having their company’s location and product information, displayed on a Yandex map for three months, while advertisers from Samara would have to pay 3,150 rubles (approximately $106) for the same package.

Yandex.Maps is one of the most popular Yandex’s services with a monthly audience of over 11.5 million, according to TNS. Currently, Yandex.Maps offers 212 detailed maps for cities in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

Yandex is Russia’s largest search engine and a leading Russian internet and technology company. Yandex’s mission is to provide easy access to the wealth of information available online to answer any questions web users may have. The company also offers a portal providing dozens of free online services and extensive local, national and international information. Yandex’s websites attract a monthly audience of more than 56 million users from all over the world (comScore, December 2010). Yandex ranks 8th in the Top 10 search properties worldwide (comScore, November 2010).

Contact:
Media Relations
Vladimir Isaev, Ochir Mandzhikov
Phone: +7 495 739-7000
E-mail: pr@yandex-team.com