There is an interesting review on Search Engine Land about a recent Yahoo study on consumer behavior in choosing local services and providers. The Yahoo study covered 5 vertical categories: legal, real estate, home improvement, health care and vocational education.

One of the interesteing treands that is very noticeable from this study is how important the Internet is becoming for find local businesses and services.

• Vocational Education – 67 percent of respondents used a major search engine compared to 41 percent who used local search
• Healthcare – 53 percent used insurance provider directories while 44 percent relied on a search engine
• Real Estate – 51 percent used a real estate vertical search engine versus 44 percent who used a major search engine
• Legal – 36 percent of respondents referred to a search engine while 25 percent used the internet yellow pages
• Home Contracting – 36 percent used a search engine while 26 percent used the internet yellow pages

 You can read the complete article on Search Engine Land - CLICK HERE for the complete review of the Yahoo Consumer Study.

What does this for local businesses?

The basic message for local businesses and service providers is to make sure you have a professional website and make sure that it’s properly optimized for the search engines and can be found by consumers using the search engines to find their local businesses and service providers.