Bidding on your competitors keywords, in our case – Sean Hakes is a tactic that many companies do. Take Orange Soda, ReachLocal and Yodle for an example – three companies who aggressively target web traffic for each companies respective names.

AdzZoo (a company that I’ve never heard of until today) decided to target my name and my business as a part of their online marketing strategy.

I don’t know whether I should be flattered or a bit offended that they didn’t take time to get to know me. Instead a “Adzzoo Affilate” (smallbizonlinesolutions.com) which is a website owned by Robert Varie decided to write this not so clever ad.

Considering Sean Hakes?
We already reviewed them for you.
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smallbizonlinesolutions.com/AdzZoo

Smart? Nah.

New York, NY – November 30, 2010 - AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) today announced that Mike DeLuca has been named Head of Sales, AOL Local. In conjunction with AOL Advertising, which primarily focuses on national advertisers, DeLuca will build and oversee a regional and local sales team for Patch, City’s Best, MapQuest, and Wow! Deal of the Day properties. Additionally, his team will sell geo-targeted AOL.com, which has 14 million daily U.S. visitors*, and AOL Mail.

“We are thrilled to have Mike on board to build and lead our regional and local sales efforts across our local offerings. Mike and his group will partner with the AOL Advertising sales team – which already has relationships with the top advertisers and agencies in the world – to offer everyone from the smallest businesses on Main Street to the largest global marketers a comprehensive suite of local properties and marketing solutions,” said Jon Brod, President of AOL Ventures, Local and Mapping. “Patch, City’s Best, MapQuest and Wow! Deal of the Day have been focused on building and refining their consumer experiences in 2010. Now we are aligning that goal with an amplified effort to increase sales on the local, regional and national level in 2011.”

DeLuca will be responsible for driving revenue growth at the regional and local level across all AOL Local properties, building and overseeing a sales team and working with AOL Advertising to create and deliver ad products that will benefit businesses of all sizes which are interested in reaching consumers at the local level.

DeLuca joins AOL from Yodle, where he was the SVP of Sales and Marketing. Under Mike’s leadership, the Yodle sales team grew from 25 to over 150 sales people nationwide, and he led both the creation of Yodle’s National Account strategy as well as their Strategic Partner Program that has joined forces with some of the largest brands in local media. Prior to Yodle, Mike served as Vice President of Sales for Yahoo!’s HotJobs division, where he managed a team of more than 200 people in Direct Sales and Client Services for North America.

“I am thrilled to have the opportunity to help drive revenue growth on these incredible properties,” commented DeLuca. “In addition to helping people to stay connected within their local communities, these properties present endless potential benefits for local and regional businesses.”

AOL’s current local offerings include:

• Patch: a platform of sites, currently serving 427 communities across the country, featuring local news and information. Patch is making an important investment in local journalism by placing a professional journalist in each town it serves to encourage community participation and provide original, trusted coverage for each community.
• City’s Best: a guide to the best local food, entertainment and lifestyle options in 25 major U.S. cities, providing the highest quality and most relevant information at the local level.
• MapQuest: one of the leading mapping brands online, offering maps and directions, reaching 47 million users in the U.S. in October 2010, according to comScore Media Metrix.
• Wow! Deal of the Day: local discounts on dining, shopping, weekend getaways and more. Currently offering deals in Washington, DC, Boston and Philadelphia, Wow! Deal of the Day will soon offer deals in other cities as well as national offerings.

About AOL

AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) is a leading global Web services company with an extensive suite of brands and offerings and a substantial worldwide audience. AOL’s business spans online content, products and services that the company offers to consumers, publishers and advertisers. AOL is focused on attracting and engaging consumers and providing valuable online advertising services on both AOL’s owned and operated properties and third-party websites. In addition, AOL operates one of the largest Internet subscription access services in the United States, which serves as a valuable distribution channel for AOL’s consumer offerings.

*October 2010 comScore Media Metrix

Brandon Smith and myself had  a lot of fun opening up our small regional Scottsdale, AZ office which is designed to serve the Tucson and Phoenix Seo markets, we also did mind getting away from the cold in Colorado for some fresh, just right – Phoenix sun.

During our ventures we had the opportunity to meet some of the Yodler’s at the Yodle Scottsdale office. Good people with good services!

Back view of the space.

Front Entrance. Pretty isn’t it?

Back side of office .

We’re excited to have another office once again in Scottsdale which will also serve our local Phoenix and Tucson SEO clients in a much larger capacity.