Many Buyers Never Consult Yellow Pages Before They Buy

Customers purchase most goods and services from local merchants. In past, they relied on Yellow Page directory to research their choices when they were ready to buy.

The Yellow Pages connected them to providers at perfect moment in sales process. They were referred to as "now" buyers, because they were motivated to buy right away. Although most people still spend their money close to home, more and more of them ignore Yellow Pages. They acquire desired information elsewhere.

Computer-savvy customers go online to find what they need to know about where to do business. A large percentage of young adults or business buyers never consult directory at all. And they control an expanding chunk of dollars spent.

The Internet Changed Way People Locate Products and Services

Many buyers find it faster and easier to enter a query into a search engine than to dig through out-of-date phone books. If your primary or sole exposure to buyers is through your Yellow Page ad, you won't even be in running when online searchers decide where to buy. It's time to get your Yellow Page directory exposure to mesh with your Internet visibility. Places Where Customers Look for Online Information 1. Websites, Portals and Directories Even a simple site can provide information that customers want to find about you: location (including maps or directions to find it), hours, products and brands carried, specialties, payment methods, staff, services, prices, credentials, or special sales. Add to it to suit your customer's desires.

But if you're not inclined to take plunge to its own site, your business can still be found through listings in a local portal (a site maintained to showcase community businesses) or in professional membership directories. The search engines can still locate you when queried.

People have talked forever, it seems, about how consumers are searching online for local products and services, and how this will siphon millions in advertising dollars away from print Yellow Pages, newspapers, and other local media. If story of one caterer, who axed his $12,000 per year Yellow Pages advertising budget in favor of local internet marketing, is anything to go by, worm may finally have turned.

As recently as 2004, clients of SmallBusinessOnline.net, located in Norwalk, CT, were leery of spending anything in online sphere. Small Business Online's clients are, for most part, local businesses serving a local customer base: lawyers, realtors, caterers, small retailers, sailing schools, chiropractors, lumber yards, to give a sample. In 2004, most were happy to get a search engine-optimized website online, and leave it at that. By 2005, a marked change had occurred. Success in online sphere, for these local businesses, led to more investment in Internet marketing, which led in turn to more success. Examples: caterer who received so much new business from Internet that he needed to hire a new employee. A furniture retailer, with a bricks and mortar store, who now gets about 90% of his new business via Internet. A lumber supplier who is selling $20,000 flooring jobs spurred by his website.

The siphon effect? Two out of these three businesses have already eliminated virtually all of their print Yellow Pages spending – in one case, representing a $12,000 a year loss to Yellow Pages industry. Their new Internet marketing campaigns are costing these businesses less than their old Yellow Pages or newspaper advertising. The caterer who added a new employee is now spending about $500-600 a month on Internet marketing – equivalent of a modest Yellow Pages ad or a single newspaper ad. For this, he is getting a steady stream of visitors to his website, with a successful conversion rate into paying customers. For these small businesses, local Internet marketing is proving both cheaper, and more successful, than traditional local advertising.