The Spokesman-Review has won the International Newspaper Marketing Association's first prize for innovation, a new contest that pays tribute to supporting continuing news investment, Poynter Online reported Thursday.

The Spokane, Washington newspaper's local business directory, BizFinderNW.com, offers listings including, the address, store hours, map and photo for free. Business can buy display ads or add to their listing.

The directory also includes space for user comments, is informative, simple and includes lots of opportunities for upsells, according to Poynter Online.

Using a template from vendor Edirectory, Kathleen Coleman, The Spokesman-Review's director of digital business operations, told Poynter Online that the newspaper produced the directory as a “low-cost, build-it-ourselves” design, has 25,000 listings and now “owns the rights to tweak the software.”

The directory launched in January, and 3,000 businesses already have a photo to go along with their listings. So far, the site has 4,000 unique visitors and 30,000 to 50,000 page views for month.

For a previous article on this topic, visit our partner site, Editorsweblog.org.