Integrent announced the launch of Centro, a local advertising buying service.

The company says Centro is designed to do for local advertising what eBay did for consumers and Overture did for search engine marketing. Centro's system includes over 1,300 local sites encompassing online newspapers, TV and radio sites, alternative weeklies and business publications.

"For all intents and purposes, agencies have not purchased online local media they way they do in traditional media, even though the local publishing industry represents one of the largest quality audiences online. The value proposition for local publishers to agencies has never been established and, unfortunately, the portals have made it much easier to geo-target through them," says Shawn Riegsecker, president, Centro.