Online Yellow Pages

Effective? Some of the most boring advertising can be found in the Yellow Pages! And yet, 40% of your clients buy based on the research they do in the Yellow Pages - 40%!

Online yellow pages and offline print directories - it makes no difference. Flip through your section of the Yellow pages - notice that they all look the same?

What possibly gives them a reason to call you over the other 15 companies advertising the same products or services in the exact same style of advertising?

If you are placing Yellow Page Ads this year - give some serious thought on headlines you can use (remember - 80 - 90% of your success is in the headline), make it look like an advertorial, and give them an incentive to pick up that phone and call YOU, not the guy in the ad next to you.

Notice that "advertorial" was mentioned?

The reason - if you use news-style advertising you will get up to 500% better response. This is proven and documented throughout the years. Make your advertising look like some interesting news, or an article - do not make it look like advertising (that is what your competitors are doing).

If it looks like advertising - most people won't read it. Think about it - do you read the articles, or the ads, in the newspapers and magazines you buy?

Make it look like an advertorial and see your response go through the roof.

To your success,

Troy White

Here are some stats I've seen recently. I see them repeatedly but I am unable to locate the source. They illustrate two trends that you can verify for yourself by paying attention to the online searching behaviors of your family and friends.

"One out of every five searches on Google pertains to a specific location.

Smart phones are increasing taking searches mobile and will account for half of all internet traffic this year."

To be found, your small business needs to appear in these local searches. And your listing needs to be viewable on mobile devices such as smart phones.

Do this now: Go to Google.com and search for your business or product in your area. For example: If I want to buy a bike in Clovis, New Mexico, I might search for bikes clovis nm (I'm in a hurry so I don't spell out New Mexico).

Notice the listings that appear at the top of the search engine results, the most valuable location: the Google Places listings (local businesses that have been registered).

Now look to the the right. The same listings also take the top spot in the sidebar, ahead of the paid advertisements, with their location plotted on a Google map.

By just creating a local search directory listing for your business, you will leapfrog your competitors who don't have a website or have websites that are not set up for mobile users.

It only takes a few minutes to create a local search listing for your business. Why not do it now?

But don't stop there. Google Places is just the first step in your Small Business Website plan.

4,000 Call Tracking Numbers Deactivated Without Warning

On the week of September 10th 2010, United Yellow Pages went out of business causing 4,000 call tracking numbers to deactivate without warning.