WhitePages – the people search market leader

Next up is John Lusk of WhitePages – the leading people search company with $66M revenue in 2008 and over 2 Billion people and biz searches performed on our site yearly. The company’s network of sites include WhitePages.com, WhitePages.ca, 411.com, Address.com, PhoneNumber.com and 1,300 partner sites including AOL and MSN.

WhitePages vision is to evolve from a traditional free online directory to a “Connectory” – a service that makes it simple for everyone to connect with confidence.

According to Lusk, “a Connectory allows people to list their information in a private, secure and confidential manner (so that others can connect with them w/o the person giving up their private info), it gives people control of their information (that is, it allows people to add, edit and even delete their information) and it provides opportunities for people to connect immediately (i.e. email, sms, voice mail).”

WhitePages is working hard to reposition their brand to better align with their Connectory vision and away from the stodgy offline paper version that comes to mind immediately. They’ve also launched a slew of new mobile products that leverage their data and services including apps for the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry markets.

WhitePages raised a private equity round of financing in 2006 from Technology Crossover Ventures (TCV) and Providence Equity.