About ReachLocal:

ReachLocal brings order to the fragmented local Internet by connecting advertisers, publishers, and creative solutions providers together on one platform. Wherever customers are online, ReachLocal helps businesses find them with the broadest reach of local digital media, a dedicated force of local Internet Marketing Consultants, and technology that continually optimizes results.

ReachLocal recently filed the forms required by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that aligns it for its IPO which is most likely to happen sometime in 2010.

Here is the latestest:

ReachLocal, Inc., a local online marketing company, announced today that it has filed a registration statement on Form S-1 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) relating to a proposed initial public offering of shares of its common stock. The shares of common stock to be sold in this offering are proposed to be sold by ReachLocal and certain stockholders. The number of shares to be offered and the price range for the offering have not yet been determined. J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and BofA Merrill Lynch are acting as joint book-running managers. Citi is acting as lead manager, and Piper Jaffray & Co., Needham & Company, LLC and Broadpoint.Gleacher are acting as co-managers.

The offering will be made only by means of a prospectus. When available, copies of the preliminary prospectus relating to the offering may be obtained from J.P. Morgan Securities Inc., Attention: Broadridge Financial Solutions, 1155 Long Island Avenue, Edgewood, New York 11717; or BofA Merrill Lynch, 4 World Financial Center, New York, NY 10080, Attn: Preliminary Prospectus Department.

You can read the rest of this story and release here.

About ReachLocal, Inc.

ReachLocal, Inc.’s mission is to help small and medium-sized businesses acquire, maintain and retain customers via the Internet. ReachLocal offers a comprehensive suite of online marketing and reporting solutions, including search engine marketing, display advertising, remarketing and online marketing analytics, each targeted to the small and medium-sized business market. ReachLocal delivers these solutions to SMBs through a combination of its proprietary platform and its direct, “feet-on-the-street” sales force of Internet Marketing Consultants and select third party agencies and resellers. ReachLocal is headquartered in Woodland Hills, CA, with offices throughout North America and in Australia and the United Kingdom.

This is a topic that perks my interest just because of the lack of education in the SEM industry. Bloggers like David Pirek make statements like , “I can live with the fact that somebody manages my traffic portfolio and takes a cut out of the budget, but tell me that you will run a camping for me and then put me in your directory for thousands of dollars in fees, this my friend I have to call a scam. Especially, if you are selling this to people who have no clue what they are buying.”

Though I respect David’s claim I don’t think it holds any ground and isn’t backed by any facts. I have had the opportunity to talk to Yodle’s executives as well as current customers and am convinced through personal research and SEM Reviews aka SEM Showdown and believe it or not Yodle actually cares about the success of their advertisers – something that’s hard to find with companies of that caliper.

Yodle isn’t for everyone. Small business owners should be the first to know that you have to keep trying things until something work and if it doesn’t work for you – that doesn’t mean its a scam, it just means keep pushing forward until you find something that does work for you.