Battle for Auckland begins with Localist launch

The service consists of a website that combines online listings and user-generated content - just gone live - plus five hard copy directories for four sections of Auckland (the central city is divided in two), each of which will be re-printed twice a year. The East Auckland Localist directory was recently distributed. The remaining four are promised by the end of the year.

The initial launch is Auckland-only. 

Yellow pre-empted Localist on May 23 by launching Yellow Local, a heavily promoted series of 205 Auckland sub-sites broken down by suburb.

The battle will be personal: Localist chief executive Blair Glubb and most of his top managers are one-time Yellow staff.

Five parts
Localist divides its online universe in similar fashion to print, with sections for Central & Islands, East Auckland, North Auckland, South Auckland, West Auckland.

If you register, then you can set one of the regions as your default. The site also breaks down into 30 "super suburbs".

Localist's points of difference include the fact it has hired a professional editor-in-chief, Nigel Horrocks (recently in charge of the Herald's community content) plus a team of paid writers (Yellow Local is relying on amateur community content, with a 50 iPad giveaway to help goose things along). 

The new directory also includes community rankings for each listed business - with a business's social rating determining its position on the site. A group of super-users called The 100 have also been recruited to help push along community content and generate reviews. Frequent posters will also be able to move up a trusted-user rankings.

As with Yellow Local, people are also encouraged to use the site a a community message board.

Both Yellow Local and Localist offer basic listings free.

Blown a million
Yellow said late last year that it would spend around $8 million hiring extra staff and launching new services to counteract new competition (Localist hasn't volunteered any spending figures, but has confirmed that it's hired just over 100 staff, who occupy a standalone office in Upper Queen Street).

Localist's boss helpfully offers another financial stat, telling NBR that Yellow has spend a million dollars on its Yellow Local campaign - a spend he thinks was premature, given that Yellow Local sites are still thinly populated.

In Localist's world view, Yellow Local sites will always be struggling to generate much user content; 205 sub-sites is just slicing the city too thin. Product and marketing manager Sheryl Nichols said she lived and shopped around several suburbs; information for just one neighbourhood would be too narrow.

Soft launch
Localist's Mr Glubb says his site is having a "soft launch" (it went live last night).

His sales team has so far only been selling Localist's print editions. It will start pushing paid listings, which include full web pages within Localist, in a couple of weeks.

For now, there's a showpony premium paid listing on the site, for Auckland Zoo (check it out here).

Templates, and making it easy to cross-post updates to Facebook and Twitter, are central to  Localist's approach. 

For businesses that aren't social media savvy, Localist will update their content once a week, for a fee.

As long as nothing R18's involved, a business can post whatever material it likes, without moderation, on its Localist business page.

GrabOne, local offers
GrabOne, the most successful of the small army of daily deal sites, has a spot on Localist's home page.

Mr Glubb said this was a straight commercial arrangement; Localist would take a cut on sales. The deal is drawn from GrabOne's site and Auckland-specific rather than for any given neighbourhood.

For more targeted deals, Localist has its own Offers section, where neighbourhood businesses (for a fee) or locals can post information about a promotion. 

Along with community ratings for local businesses, the local Offers give people a reason to visit Localist rather than the standard method of looking for a good or service these days - hitting Google (Google has begun to trial a a local Offers service in Oregon, tied to another beta service, Google Wallet. Here, Google Places delivers ratings for businesses, some drawn from Yellow-owned sites like Finda. There's some interesting points made by the portentously-named "Teacher" in Comments below; Sat. 11.13am ).

Mobile ... on the way
A Localist iPhone app has been approved by Apple, and should appear in a few weeks, along with an Android app, Mr Glubb said.

A key feature of Localist is that once a user registers, they can opt to follow a company (or another user) and have updates pushed to their personalised home page.

Once the mobile apps go live, updates could be pushed to a phone as well, and be location-specific.

Those thorny star ratings
Social ratings determine where a business appears in Localist search results - an arrangement that Mr Glubb says should appeal to businesses who can't compete with larger players who pay for higher rankings elsewhere (Ms Nichols qualified that Localist is interested in business from larger companies, too, especially those who want to promote a local branch).

Registered users can duly award a local business a star rating from one to five, and leave a comment.

But what's to stop a malicious competitor from leaving one-star ratings on a rival's listing, or negative comments. And, for that matter, how will Localist handle a company upset by what might be completely valid negative ratings.

Ms Nichols' solution is that any rating below 2.5 stars - and any associated comment (or "Rave" in Localist parlance") won't display on the site, but it will still count towards a business's overall star rating (and the negative comment is forwarded to the business).

This could lead to the incongruous situation of a business having six four-star ratings publically but, say, an overall rating of 3.5 stars.

Mr Glubb said things would equalise over time - as they have on Yelp, a US local review and directory site frequently name-checked by the Localist boss. 

Who'll win?
Will Localist or Yellow Local suceed?

Of course, neither site is guaranteed to win advertisers' or punters' ongoing affection.

But you can say that Localist staff are at least fully invested in the service. 

True, Localist is part of NZ Post - and not shy of trading on the trust factor that comes with that.

But by the same token, it operates as an independent start-up, with specifically hired staff.

For most onboard with Localist, it's Auckland or bust.

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