November 17, 2008 | Rick Nashleanas
I have been approached by all types of small business people who just didn't think their advertising in the Yellow Pages was a must do anymore. It's hard to break up with an advertising medium that has worked so well in the past, but these folks just didn't see the ROI anymore and their online directories just didn't seem that valuable. Interestingly enough, they talk to me, a web guy, to tell them that they are right.
I knew they were right, but now the Wall Street Journal has affirmed their intuition in their article Extinction Threatens Yellow Pages Publishers.
When people want to find something, they don't pick up the Yellow Pages, they don't go to the Yellow Pages online... Instead, they primarily go to "Professor Google" who will just tell them what they need to know.
I like my weekends as much as the other guy, but I recently gave up a weekend to study and recertify as a Google Advertising Professional. To target your prospects requires a constant tuning effort to spend your money wisely.
Many business people say that they would rather not pay for ads, but have a web site that will generate organic (unpaid) search results. The best way to generate organic traffic requires a great deal of work: continue to add valuable content to your site, actively participate in relevant blogs, etc. Although our development platform, Drupal, gives our customers tremendous capabilities to create and publish content, most business people can't or won't make creating new content a priority.
There is definitely a generation gap here. "Older" business people don't make the time to update their site as much as "younger" professionals. I'm not defining what I consider to be "older" as I might have to define myself as "older".
The best way to be found by your customers has changed and, unfortunately for the Yellow Pages, the web has become the primary go-to source for most folks these days.
