Yodle, a New York based company that helps local businesses advertise online, announced it has landed round four financing of $10 million, bringing its funding total to $38 million. An alternative to Yellow Pages, the company aims to turn click-throughs into direct-response phone calls and new customers for small, local businesses like salons and mechanics. According to a company spoke person, the new round will be used to double the company's sales team and invest in several new products to increase internal efficiency and provide better marketing tools to clients.
Yodle actually purchases the keyword-linked ads called up on search engines like Yahoo, Ask.com and Google (it's an authorized Google Adwords reseller), among other sites. These ads redirect traffic to the business in question's web site - unless it doesn't have one, in which case Yodle builds what it calls "adverSite" for the company. Operating on a direct response model, Yodle says it only charges for clicks or ads that result in calls to businesses. It charges an initial fee of $447 and allows clients to budget anywhere between $900 and $5000.
Yodle claims a triple digit growth with a 135% year over year revenue increase in 2009. An impressive number as the total U.S. Internet advertising revenues declined by 5.3% from the same period in 2008, according to the recent IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report. The company claims over 7,000 customers and targets 25 cities, including Boston, New York and San Francisco.
The recent investment round was led by JAFCO Ventures, and included previous investors Draper Fisher Jurvetson Growth and Bessemer Venture Partners.
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