Backfence Local Information Only
Ever think that Yellowpages.com or Yahoo’s Local Search just aren’t good enough? Me either, but apparently Backfence.com thinks so. This brand new startup still hasn’t even gotten their software together, but they’ve put up their database on the Web and sent out press releases anyway.
The site is so far simplistic like Google, but lacks the search algorithm (or any search, for that matter), so it’s impossible to really find anything useful very quickly here. In fact, it took me four clicks to find “veterinarians” in the Cheyenne, WY area. It came up with hits from a fairly broad area too, but given that no actual search (only clicking on the nearest, listed city) is available, I guess it’s at least good enough to see that their database is well populated. The same search, by the way, on Yahoo’s Local search came up with narrower matches (20m radius) and took only two clicks.
The list of related items that might interest you, which pops up with every “search,” isn’t very useful, though some might find it to be. It’s reminiscent of Google’s related sponsored (AdWords) links included with every search return.
I guess this kind of site would be popular amongst the “anywhere but Wal-Mart” crowd, but until they’ve actually implemented their search engine, I can’t see that it’s of any use right now.
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