Seattle-based Marchex, the company best known for its local search and ‘performance’ ad services, has now entered the reputation management space with the introduction of a SME-focused solution.

There are hundred of providers trying to make the most of this fast-growing sector at the moment, but what sets this apart from the crowd is that it triangulates online reputation with offline location. Using local metadata, the company pinpoints references within a particular area, as opposed to general discussions across the web.

Built on top of the company’s proprietary index (also used for its other services), the dashboard allows a business to organise mentions into charts and graphs, as many of its competitors do. It then ranks each mention according to positive, negative and neutral commentary (though this is probably computer-based, so can’t be 100% accurate), also comparing a user’s reputation to other local businesses.

This allows an SME to answer questions like; ‘is the coffee shop down the street selling a large cappuccino at a lower price?’ or ‘are my competitors open longer than I am?’’

The tool can also be used to track whether one shop is doing better than another by collating external feedback and associating it with a particular shop or outlet. Plus it can place ‘buzz’ on a timeline, allowing users to associate coverage with specific marketing campaigns or advertising – as well as point out keywords and phrases customers have repeatedly used to describe a business.

Marchex’s entrance into the reputation management market makes a lot of sense. It capitalises on the recent trend for integrating ‘location’ into everything possible, which many online advertisers (the company’s core audience) are catching on to fast.

However, there’s still a need for some kind of response mechanism to be integrated into a system like this. If someone were to combine the location features Marchex brings to the table with a reputation tool that uses human sentiment analysis, they could have a seriously impressive tool on their hands.