Bing Local is a new face in local search, at least in the US. Given that Microsoft and Yahoo are now in a partnership deal, this will give increasing competition to Google over the next 2 years of integration.
It is now possible to set up a Local Business Listing in Bing Local in 30 minutes or so, which is effort very well spent. You can verify your ownership of the listing by phone or by snail mail.
For local search, Bing has some cool features, mostly shown within the entertainment and hospitality niches at the moment. Ratings and reviews appear in a scorecard with most of them from Citysearch, Yelp, and Judy’s Book at present.
Overall this local listing process seems much more promising than the continuing problems seen with Google Local Search.
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