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  • Making Yellow Page Advertising Work!

      Local Business Can Benefit From Yellow Page Ads

  • Secrets to Buying Yellow Page Ads

      It is Possible to Save $$

Successful Yellow Page Advertising

  How to Boost Local Business

   Yellow page ads can bring you great results… if done correctly. It’s often the first place that local buyers go before they decide from whom to buy. Eighty-four percent of the people who go to yellow pages contact a business listed there and 49% of them actually go on to purchase something from that business. That is why yellow pages are so important!

    People go to the yellow pages with intent to buy. You don’t have to create demand for your product; it’s already there. All you have to do is convince the buyer that you should be the business that they call first.

    The only downside to yellow page advertising is the cost of the ad placement. It’s not a one-shot deal. It is a commitment for a full 12-month ad run. It is essentially the same as going down to your local paper and making a deal to run an ad every day for the next year without the opportunity to stop or change the ad throughout the year. That’s a huge risk. I don’t know any businesses that do that except for car dealerships, but they get to change their newspaper ads as often as they like.

95% of All Yellow Page Ads Are Weak!

    As you can see, yellow pages have a potentially big payoff but also have a big risk factor. That’s why you need to be very careful about the ad that you place. It needs to be a winner. If it isn’t, you’ll be flushing your money right down the tube every month and there’s nothing you’ll be able to do about it. If you’re going to advertise in the yellow pages, make it pay off. So most ads are weak. Why?

    Usually, because small businesses worry more about how much they are going to spend rather than the ad itself. Far too many businesses let the yellow page company do the ad design and layout. Big mistake!

    This is the advice you’ll typically get from a yellow page rep:

 · Use a big ad

 · Use a heavy border around your ad

 · Add color to it

 · Use a bigger ad

 · Make your name and logo really big, and have a lot of “white space” in your ad

 · Give your hours of operation, phone number, address, as well as the MasterCard and Visa logos

 · Use more than one really, really big ad under multiple listings!

   The yellow page companies have no incentive to make your ad work. They only care about how much they will make from the sale. Therefore, I recommend having a professional marketer do the design or at least do an assessment on the ad. It costs about the same to run an ineffective small business yellow page ad, as it does to run a super-responsive one. Why not make it responsive and get your money's worth?

Your Primary Yellow Page Objective

   It’s critical to know what your primary yellow page objective is before you begin to design your ad. I’ll cut to the chase right now. Your primary objective is to get your prospect to call you. Not to sell them on your product, not to get them to come into your store, but to call you. Besides, that’s why they grabbed the yellow pages anyway, to make a phone call.

   Knowing this, you should design everything in your ad to get them to not only give you a phone call, but to be the first and only one they call. That is the first step. Once you get the phone call, your primary objective is to get them to visit your store.

Before Designing Your Ad, Answer this One Question

    What is your prospect looking for when they look in the Yellow Pages? The answer is slightly different for businesses selling products versus businesses selling services.

    People looking in the yellow pages for a small business selling products are looking for:

  ·  Something that differentiates you from your competitors and matches their wants

  ·  An indication of price affordability and high quality

  ·  Specific brands of products or services

  ·   Location of store and store hours

  ·   Contact information

  ·   A warm, fun feeling

    People looking in the yellow pages for a business selling services are looking for:

  ·  Something that differentiates you from your competitors that match their wants

  ·   An indication of price affordability

  ·   Quality of your service

  ·   Experience and credibility

  ·   An indication of trust and honesty

  ·   Location of office and office hours

  ·   Contact information

  ·   A warm, fun feeling

     Notice the slight differences between consumers who are looking for businesses selling products versus businesses selling services. The consumers looking for services want to know about the quality of their work, their experience and credibility, and an indication that they can be trusted. This information makes a BIG impact on how you will develop your yellow page advertisement.

   See the "Secrets to Buying Ads" in the next column.  

Secrets to Buying Ads

  You can Save $

    Perhaps one of the most common complaints from small business owners is that there are too many yellow page directories, which drive up their marketing costs. There are basically three types of business phone directories, the phone company’s directory (i.e. AT&T or SWB), regional directories, and local neighborhood directories. The one thing to remember is that all of these directories get used!

Your customers are picking up each and every one of the books on the market.

     Now, to what extent they get used will vary from market-to-market depending on the quality of the directory and the size of the market you live in.

    Do your homework. Don’t rely on the sales reps from each of these companies to give you non-biased information on their usage. Ask your customers, neighbors, friends, relatives to determine which books they use.

    Don’t ask them to give you a name. Take the cover of each of the books and show them. Most consumers are not aware that a different company puts out each book.  You may be surprised as to which books really are being used in your area.

How to Allocate Your $

    Once you have a general idea of how much each directory is used then break up your yellow page budget accordingly. If you have three different phone books in your area, as I do in mine, and you determine that the phone company book gets used 60%, the regional type book gets used 30%, and the neighborhood book gets used 10%, then spend your dollars accordingly.

    Don’t dump all your dollars in one book; remember your potential customers don’t care who is advertising. When people go to the yellow pages they already know that they need the product or service you provide they are just reading “resumes” as to who they are going to give their money to. If you aren’t in the book, guess what chance you have of getting that customer. That’s right, Zero!

How To Negotiate Fees

    Now that you have determined amounts to invest in each directory, it is time to learn how to negotiate with your sales rep. Each directory company has a discount policy.

    Most of the independent phone book companies will discount more. In fact, the discount is usually the best sales tool they have. Phone company phone books will typically have smaller  discounts and are harder to negotiate with.

    If you follow the guidelines below, you should be able to either reduce your yellow page cost or significantly increase your program for little or no extra money.

    When your sales rep comes knocking and says that it is time to renew your ad, or they would like to show you why you should advertise with them, welcome them in and be friendly.

Negotiate As An Existing Client

    Let your sales rep do his full presentation. Give him/her friendly nods and buying signs. The when your sales rep is done with their presentation tell them that you have been giving a lot of thought to your marketing program and that you have decided to invest your marketing dollars in other areas. You would like to order only a bold listing.

    This will immediately put your rep on the defensive. Be extremely vague as to where your dollars are being “re- allocated”. The sales rep will typically try to find out and then explain why this is a mistake. (Since you aren’t planning on spending your money elsewhere, this should be easy. Just don’t make anything up otherwise you will find yourself on the defensive trying to justify this. It is hard to overcome an objection that they don’t know what it is.)

   At this point tell your sales rep that you may be willing to reconsider, but to contact you towards the end of the campaign, for your final decision. Do Not Sign Your Contract Yet! The longer you wait to sign your contract, the more negotiating power you will have. At the end of the campaign, make sure that you contact your rep back if they don’t call you, (you don’t want to risk being left out). Sit down with your rep and tell them that it has come to your attention that other businesses are getting discounts on their advertising and that you would like to know what type of discount they are willing to offer you.

    Sit back and listen and wait for them to start offering deals. They most likely will offer you a discount on a bigger ad program. You can take it from there.

How to Negotiate As a New Client

    When you are looking at becoming a new client and a sales rep comes knocking, again let your sales rep do his dog and pony show. Give him/her friendly nods and buying signs. Then, when your sales rep is done with their presentation, tell the sales rep that you are interested but not ready to make a decision, and to contact you when the book is closing.

    Typically your rep will not be working your account at that time and will want to close the sale now. Be very straightforward with your rep and tell them that it is common knowledge in the business community that they give discounts as incentives, and that if they want you to sign up now, what sort of discount would they be willing to give you. If it is not 50%, tell them that you will think about it and to contact you later.

    Keep asking for a bigger discount until they give it to you. If the sales rep you are dealing with will not give a discount, wait until the last two weeks of the campaign, and contact the sales office to talk with another sales rep. Patience will gain the best price!

    But also remember, have your yellow page ad designed by a professional. It can make the difference between a successful campaign and a mediocre one!

 Happy Marketing,

   Greg Schipper

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