Should I bother with Yell.com?

[Sibs2]

We are a family run garage (9 staff including owners) specialising in german cars but also work on other makes.
I pay £1,100 each year to Yell.com for a listing
If I google Volkwagen Garage for our area, the results vary slightly but we usually come up 3 times in the top 5 or 6 (excluding the paid ads). The first of these links is from an an OFT approved motor industry regulator of which we are a member, which I imagine carries some weight with google. The second is from "allinlondon" where we have a free listing and the third is our own website.
A Yell link obviously comes up in the top 5 but when you click the yell link you get their listings page which they allegedly rotate - the highest I've seen us on there is Page 1 - number 16, but we are usually lost on page 2 or lower.
Should I bother with Yell. I really don't think we get anything from it but I wondered if having a yell link helped with google rankings.
Thanks in advance

 

[Bruvver]

Simple answer No !!

 

[Sibs2]

Very helpful Bruvver! I was aware I was answering my main question as I typed but seriously - does Yell have any impact on google rankings?
Will losing the link from Yell drop my own website down the google page?

 

[eventdomain]

hmmm, trouble with Yell is their taken as a good option for tradespeople, but in reality their just a 'platform' that charges for wacking on a few links - ok, ok, I suppose any website can be labelled as doing that, but the whole point is that the Yell.com website cannot target effectively.

I suspect (having used Yell myself) that only certain, select biz types get anything out of a listing. Its not for everyone.... and wont work for everyone, now question is why!

 

[Esk247]

you could probably spend your £1100 more wisely elsewhere on such things as AdWords (PPC advertising) or advertising in a specialist car magazine etc.

 

[Sibs2]

Agreed - Yell certainly doesn't target effectively.
I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and take my little budget to PPC. Thanks people

 

[seDUKEx]

A free Yell link carries just as much weight with Google in my experience. Does your Google Places listing show up in your results? Maybe invest in getting that optimised if not.

 

[davek17]

Yell is only good for local businesses where people still look in the yellow book or perhaps online for a plumber etc etc.

In terms of SEO or online I cannot for the life of me think why you would waste your money.

 

[Sibs2]

Thanks again, waiting for my "postcard" from google places to activate our listing. We stopped the yellow pages listing a couple of years back.

 

[seDUKEx]

Thanks again, waiting for my "postcard" from google places to activate our listing. We stopped the yellow pages listing a couple of years back.

Good job. You'll get much more business from a high ranking GP listing than Yell and it's free!

 

[thebusinesscookbook]

From past experience, having a paid listing on Yell does not seem to have an effect on your "natural" Google listing.

Having said that, you may be getting better quality leads from Yell than Google so it may be worth doing some analysis first before you commit to moving all of your budget to Google PPC. This can be done by checking where your website visitors are coming from (or by even asking them where they heard from you).

Google Ads does allow you to refine your target market so that you just spend money on the more targeted leads - for example "VW Garages in Huddersfield" or where-ever you're based or advertise specialist services E.g. "VW Engine Tuning".

Interestingly, Yell are now actually offering a Google Ad's management service (paid for of course) so I guess that shows you which direction they're heading....

Its excellent that you're appearing well on the first page though - it'd be interesting to see how much "free" business you're getting from this vs PPC.

Hope this helps a bit!
Mike

 

[Sibs2]

Its excellent that you're appearing well on the first page though - it'd be interesting to see how much "free" business you're getting from this vs PPC.

Thanks Mike - I am doing quite a specific search though - as you say Volkswagen Garages in Clapham

I do have to get into monitoring where my clicks are coming from. I'm about to get my website revamped/rebuilt and hopefully my website designer or developer will be able to guide me on that. I've started an interesting debate in the IT/Internet subforum about whether to use a web designer or developer

Thanks everyone for your helpful replies
Best wishes

 

[RevaxMedia]

We are a family run garage (9 staff including owners) specialising in german cars but also work on other makes.
I pay £1,100 each year to Yell.com for a listing
If I google Volkwagen Garage for our area, the results vary slightly but we usually come up 3 times in the top 5 or 6 (excluding the paid ads). The first of these links is from an an OFT approved motor industry regulator of which we are a member, which I imagine carries some weight with google. The second is from "allinlondon" where we have a free listing and the third is our own website.
A Yell link obviously comes up in the top 5 but when you click the yell link you get their listings page which they allegedly rotate - the highest I've seen us on there is Page 1 - number 16, but we are usually lost on page 2 or lower.
Should I bother with Yell. I really don't think we get anything from it but I wondered if having a yell link helped with google rankings.
Thanks in advance

Yell knows that their industry (yellow pages) is dieng and going online so they are grabbing onto everything they can from seo to PPC - avoid like the plague, it won't be long until Yell go out of business if I am honest, not one good review. They target small business owners who know no better than to think they are good at what they do.

 

[jezsez]

Yell knows that their industry (yellow pages) is dieng and going online so they are grabbing onto everything they can from seo to PPC - avoid like the plague, it won't be long until Yell go out of business if I am honest, not one good review. They target small business owners who know no better than to think they are good at what they do.

I agree, Yellow pages is a dinosaur that is clinging on to life. I told the last phone-rep that too and he sounded shocked! Waste of money IMO (for most people though probably not all).

 

[HFE Signs]

We dropped yell years ago, its ok if your a local trader doing local work..

 

[thebusinesscookbook]

possibly a bit OT, but make sure the designer/developer you use understands the products and services you are trying to sell, along with your target market... this way they'll be able to advise on the structure and content of your website to attract the most relevant (and profitable!!) visitors.

Analysing historical visitor trends would be useful and going forwards make sure your web guy implements Google Analytics or similar - it's very powerful and allows you to tweak your site and content appropriately.

Happy to help!

 

[BoobieMilk]

I just had a call from yell.com giving me the hard sell. The thing that made me back away after a long tedious conversation was that they were unwilling to tell me how many people type in a particular search term on yell.com. If they could have given me specifics on how many times a person typed in "nursing bras" then I could have made an educated decision. Am I supposed to believe that yell.com does not capture this data? I was told that they couldn't sell advertising if that search term was not used. I think they offered £450 for a year as a priority #2 for one area. At least Google gives me some statisitics and I can follow all that's going on and change things when I need to. Yell.com also wanted to tie me down for a year.

 

[Andrew Baker]

I've dealt with so many disgruntled business owners who bemoan the hard sell tactics, the vague (to put it politely) analytics and the high costs.

I once provided a client (with 6 city centre locations) with detailed Analytics reports for all Yell referral traffic ahead of a meeting with their Yell rep who wouldn't take no for an answer. I think he lasted 2 minutes...

My advice, if you have a budget for Yell, use it elsewhere.

 

[SEO Lady]

My advice, if you have a budget for Yell, use it elsewhere.

I totally agree with Andrew. Yell are a prime example of the new class of SEO agencies who blind people with jargon who are desperate for their business to work and make profit. These highwaymen are more than happy to ride off the back of an nationally known brand in an attempt to dupe hard working business owners to hand over a 4 figure sum with promises of the Golden Land.

*shakes head sadly and rolls eyes*

 

[Sibs2]

I'm definately finished with Yell. On reflection I can't believe I've stuck with them this long. Lesson learned.

 

[bizwebman]

Yep I reckon yell have just about had it. They are way to expensive now when compared to the competition plus who uses them, when you can find businesses with a quick google search.

One that all you guys should check out and is really excellent for getting and promoting business is http://www.freeindex.co.uk/

Grahame

 

[eventdomain]

One that all you guys should check out and is really excellent for getting and promoting business is http://www.freeindex.co.uk/

Its a nice looking website, okayish but personally, I never got any business from it. There are far better lead-generating sites out there, and 100% targeted traffic senders too.

The sites that never delivered my company business - ever, are:

Yell.com - just a ton of unwelcome telesales callers, bother Yell and others.

Thomson Directories - a waste of time.

Hotfrog, again a nice directory (truly very nice!), but zero ROI.

CityLocal - maybe too young a website to deliver anything yet

some very nicely designed sites out there, no question - BUT doesnt matter how big a company is or how nice the sites look if they cannot perform.

There are independant site/owners where their sites are doing amazing things on the web these days - all heavily documented and better than Yell, Thomson etc and far better value.

 

[bdw]

If I were you I would drop Yell and spend the next year's budget on SEO. Don't go for PPC just yet unless you are desperate for a quick return.

Incidentally I did a website for a local Volkswagen/Audi garage owner and he features at #1 in Google and Bing for many searches like "volkswagen garage histown". To be successful on local searches like this quite often all it takes is some careful onsite optimisation and a couple of inbound links.

.

 

[sitandstay]

Nope......

 

[bizwebman]

Its a nice looking website, okayish but personally, I never got any business from it. There are far better lead-generating sites out there, and 100% targeted traffic senders too.

There are independant site/owners where their sites are doing amazing things on the web these days - all heavily documented and better than Yell, Thomson etc and far better value.

We have had a couple of quite good bites with freeindex, but I fully understand what you are saying.

Do you care to mention the sites that do you well?

Grahame

 

[GBoffices]

Hi, I concur with the above. Yell is best suited to people who don't want, can't be bothered or don't want to be bothered about creating half decent site and learn for yourself.
I suggest you continue to invest some time to keep optimising your site with local metatags including suburbs, areas - the places where your customers live. Google Place and free local listings and Thompson, etc also helps. But it sounds like you're nearly there though!

 

[lockhome12]

You can also do a free Yell listing.

 

[Stationery-Direct]

We advertised with the yellow pages a few years back and set up an 0845 number to monitor enquiries, no joke that number rang just 3 times that year!!