CHARLOTTE, N.C., July 8 /PRNewswire/ -- Bizjournals, the online division of American City Business Journals Inc., announces the launch of its new Local Business Directory, a tool for helping users find and connect to services, vendors, prospects and business leaders.

The Local Business Directory, which goes live July 1, contains more than 600,000 companies, public and private, operating in the 40 U.S. markets served by ACBJ publications.

The data, based on proprietary bizjournals research, can be sorted by 14 industry categories, as well as location, business name or keyword.

The directory is prominently accessible through a display module on all bizjournals market home pages and also via top-level navigation anywhere on the site. To see it in action, visit www.bizjournals.com.

Through the online interface, users may rate businesses found in the directory, based on their interactions with the appropriate companies, helping users not only find businesses, but zero in on the ones that are generating positive feedback in the community.

The interface also allows users to submit their own companies for inclusion in the directory, or to submit changes to existing listing information.

In addition to bringing this powerful new tool to users, bizjournals also is creating high-profile premium listings for select customers who want a bigger exposure with the millions of readers who count on bizjournals for news.

Premium directory listings provide clients with:

• Exclusivity - only two available per industry, per market
• Premium placement on market home pages.
• A page devoted to the client's company, on which a business can provide contact information, products and services, map of location, testimonials, website and more.
• Contextual listings on news articles within industry category (i.e. Banking and Finance article displays Community Bank ABC's contextual ad on the page).
• A directory listing badge to use for marketing and promotional purposes.

"With the new Local Business Directory, we're giving businesses a new way to connect and succeed," said Tim Bradbury, president of ACBJ New Media, which oversees bizjournals. "It ratchets up the value of our local business journal sites, which millions of people already regard as critical to their competitiveness."

About bizjournals

Bizjournals is the online media division of American City Business Journals, the nation's largest publisher of metropolitan business newspapers. It operates the Web sites for each of the company's 40 print business journals and operates a web-only site with local business news and information for Los Angeles.

The national bizjournals site features local business news from around the nation, updated throughout the day, top business stories from American City's print editions, industry-specific news from more than 40 industries, advice columns, and a full menu of tools to help business owners and operators manage their businesses more successfully.

Bizjournals' open-access archives contain 1.25 million business news articles and features published since 1996. Bizjournals' sites have more than 8 million unique monthly visitors.

About American City Business Journals

American City metropolitan business newspapers reach 4 million readers each week with exclusive, in-depth coverage of their business communities. The loyalty of these readers testifies to American City's commitment to top-quality journalism, unexcelled service for advertisers and readers, and active business community involvement.

American City is a unit of Advance Publications Inc., which also operates Conde Nast Magazines, Parade magazine, Fairchild Publications, the Golf Digest companies, Newhouse Newspapers and cable television interests.

For more information, contact Joe Lesniak, vice president of sales and marketing for ACBJ New Media, at 704-973-1852 or jlesniak@bizjournals.com

SOURCE bizjournals