Speaking at a press conference yesterday, David Assouline, NAVTEQ’s director of Global Content Products, said NAVTEQ operates in 44 countries around the world and has made major investments in Turkey starting in 2007. The Chicago-based company currently has three offices in Turkey, one each in İstanbul, Ankara and Adana. There is a massive project that is continuing which plans to map the entire country, he said, adding that they hope to conclude the project within the year.
Assouline stated that the partnership with Turkey Yellow Pages will enable NAVTEQ to access the best information concerning points of interest (POI). “In order to get the most accurate and freshest data, we needed an agent that has a relationship with local businesses to provide the most comprehensive and up-to-date index of content and locations. This is why we became a partner with Yellow Pages in Turkey,” he said.
The strategic partnership is a first for a Yellow Pages company to make its database available to a map provider.
Currently, Turkey Yellow Pages has a database of more than 500,000 companies and plans to increase this figure to 2 million in the near future. The content of Turkey Yellow Pages should be available in NAVTEQ maps starting in April this year. The number of NAVTEQ map users in Turkey is estimated to be in the tens of millions.
The partnership will also pave the way for location-based advertising as a new form of communication, Assouline said, explaining that “it will be tracked by Turkey Yellow Pages whether one successfully arrives at the place he or she has searched for. [Global positioning systems] GPS will emerge as a new advertising media thanks to this perfect feedback.”
Turkey Yellow Pages will be the sole seller of advertising packages for NAVTEQ maps. Göktuğ Oğuz, the marketing director of Turkey Yellow Pages, stated that the packages will be offered at affordable prices and will create a favorable platform for small and medium-sized establishments to purchase ads. “The future lies in [the fields of] maps, navigation and proximity searching. Location-based advertising will enable firms to enjoy scores of customers in the very near future,” he said.
