The Kelsey Group announced the initial speaker lineup for its annual local search advertising conference, “Marketplaces 2009” (www.kelseygroup.com/marketplaces2009), which takes place March 16-18, 2009, at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza in Los Angeles. The agenda features more than 40 influential executives from across the industry, including keynoters Jeff Berman, president of sales and marketing, MySpace; Jay Herratti, chief executive officer, Citysearch; and Chris LaSala, director of local markets, Google, as well as featured speakers Chip Perry, president and CEO, AutoTrader.com, and Chris Spanos, general manager, AOL local and search verticals.

Marketplaces 2009 (formerly Drilling Down on Local) focuses on high-value vertical marketplaces such as health, finance, real estate, autos, entertainment and participatory sports. These categories, long-underserved by traditional local media, are using the Internet and mobile marketing to effectively target their customers and bring them beyond classifieds, coupons, direct marketing and Yellow Pages.

“Even with the difficult economy, promising signs abound for vertical marketplaces,” said Peter Krasilovsky, vice president and program director for The Kelsey Group’s Marketplaces practice, and Marketplaces 2009 conference chairman. “We can plainly see that leading vertical sites and services are better positioned to engage users with social media and guide consumers to sales and support. What is emerging is an increasingly seamless media offering across many channels, including the Internet, mobile and out of home.”

Highlights from the Marketplaces 2009 program include:

·       “Leads Summit,” covering such key issues as how to get leads, convert them, extend them and generate revenue from them

·       “Mobile Verticals SuperForum,” a fast-paced interactive session exploring the new growth opportunity for local verticals

·       “Parade of Verticals,” featuring vertical leaders Angie’s List, Belo Interactive, Allmenus.com and G5 Search Marketing

·       “Verticals Approach in Las Vegas” case study

·       “Investing in Vertical Opportunities” session

Conference sponsors include Acxiom, AgendiZe and WebsPlanet. Association partners include Association of Directory Marketing (ADM), Association of Directory Publishers (ADP), International Classified Media Association (ICMA), Society for New Communications Research (SNCR) and Yellow Pages Association (YPA). For more information about the conference, visit http://www.kelseygroup.com/marketplaces2009.