The Yellow Pages Association has released a new edition of the Local Search Guide.

The Guide strives to keep people informed of the changes in local search. Changes in local search are so rapid that every day you can log on to the World Wide Web and see something a little different than you did the day before. The players could be different and the strategies could be different as well. That’s why it’s important to stay on top of what is happening so that you can be effective in advertising your local business to the right market. That’s why I recommend the Local Search Guide.

The Guide is sponsored by some of my favorite organizations, including Superpages, comScore, The Kelsey Group, and SEMPO. Here’s what you get when you pay attention to the Guide:

• Profiles of Internet Yellow Pages
• Search Engine Profiles and Support Advice
• Great Search Tools
• Mobile Marketing Tools
• Information on Vertical Directories
• A Useful Glossary
• Insightful Columns and Viewpoints From Industry Leaders
• Other Great Resources

When it comes to definitive information about local search, there’s no resource like the Local Search Guide.

Today, the Google Webmaster Central Blog featured Matt Cutts giving a presentation via YouTube video on how a company can influence the snippet that appears on Google SERPs for their listing. It’s a useful video that offers some great insights into the description meta tag and its importance. Matt also discusses how a snippet can be formed from the content on your website. This has some excellent application for local businesses, which I’ll cover briefly after you’ve watched the video:

• Write a killer meta description tag
• Include your address on every page of your website
• Try to think about the content on your site and what would make a good snippet, then write each sentence as if it could be that snippet
• List your site on DMOZ
• Only include the most important information about your company on each web page