yell in administration

[Christine Hough]

Yellow pages have been declining for several years
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25129629

A victim of the internet age.

 

[Billmccallum]

not so much a victim, more of a suicide....

 

[vvaannmmaann]

"has been struggling with £2.3bn of debts."
How did they get into that position?

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

They charge between 400 and 1000 pounds to be top of their site in citys and towns their site might be at the top of google in that area / city
Maybe it will maybe it wont

The world has moved on a good college kid would get you to the top of google in that area above everybody else for a box of stella and some big bottles of scrumpy jack . So why would anybody pay them

 

[ThePublisher]

Well we'll all miss the name Hibu won't we....... (wonder how much consultants got paid to come up with that!)

 

[mconridge]

The least surprising news I've heard in a long time!

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Well we'll all miss the name Hibu won't we....... (wonder how much consultants got paid to come up with that!)

The same company that came up with the Tesco tablet name they had a difficult afternoon that day !!

 

[rubyspenshop]

"has been struggling with £2.3bn of debts."
How did they get into that position?

I wonder that myself.

 

[The Byre]

That's what happens when you think the Internet is something you can add onto your business.

It IS your business!

 

[zigojacko]

At last businesses have realised the uselessness of 'priority listings in your locations' from directories such as these and Scoot (and the other million out there) with all their made up traffic projections and lead generation figures.

Good to have a listing in Yell for some businesses granted, I'm sure it's even worth the fees to be more visible for some businesses too. But for many, this is just another waste of space on the internet and only worthwhile for the citation.

 

[deniser]

It wasn't that long ago that someone was arguing with me on here saying that Yellow Pages was a good business....

 

[zigojacko]

It wasn't that long ago that someone was arguing with me on here saying that Yellow Pages was a good business....

The story
The web evolved. Yell didn't, Hibu was ****.

The end.

 

[Vectis]

It was only back in August that Thomson Local went into administration. That was bought out straight away though.

I think people would probably still use the directories for local plumbers and services such as that, but little else.

 

[andygambles]

This will just be a restructuring excercise. Yell/Hibu is split in to so many subsiduries/holding companies it can be difficult to know whis you are actually dealing with.

This will probably allow them to spin off the subsidiaries as part of the debt settlement.

 

[fisicx]

I think people would probably still use the directories for local plumbers and services such as that, but little else.

Would they? Can't remember the last time I used them for anything.

Even my dad who is a old fashioned as you can get uses google for everything these days.

 

[ThePublisher]

I've actually got a 2006/7 Yellow Pages on my desk. I use it to bring a screen up to the right height for comfortable use (see, YP does still have its use).

As a matter of interest, I've just looked at the page count. It is 1492 pages. Compare that with the 2013/14 edition with its much smaller pages, of which there are 480. That's a 67% drop in page count in 7 years.

 

[14Steve14]

I have found that as I have got older, and the books have got smaller, I cant read them even if I wanted to, so I revert back to the internet. Our yellow pages only gets moved to dust and when a new one comes.

 

[SkoshBusiness]

I worked at Yell until 2005 and to be honest I am surprised they lasted this long!!! I got out as I could see the ship was sinking. The J.R Hartley days are long gone.

 

[Amazin]

That explains nicely why I was getting no where after I paid £135 annual fee for an advert. £2.6billion in debt? Thats crazy

 

[vvaannmmaann]

I had a lovely email from them this morning,telling me how well my advert is doing on their website.
Thing is I've never had an advert with them.

 

[CAEDAN]

Doesn't surprise me!

The website, like the pages are mostly wrong numbers. If you want a number, you google to company and their are hundreds of directories out there.

Pricing was a major issue - the wanted the usual amount, plus extra few hundred to every area of a town - whereas it used to be one price for the county years ago!

I had a salesman from Hibu come round - he tried to sell me advertising, seo and all sorts. It sounded very desperate. The SEO was basic, and could mostly be done yourself. The only 'benefit' they had to offer was linking the advert to peoples searches/websites they visited through google. I don't like hounding people that way for one, and also - just go through google - why use a middleman?

Been dying for years!

 

[ThePublisher]

My OH had a number he didn't recognise come up on his phone yesterday so he ignored it. Googled the number...... it was Yell cold calling.

 

[Amazin]

My OH had a number he didn't recognise come up on his phone yesterday so he ignored it. Googled the number...... it was Yell cold calling.

Theyre still cold calling? What?

 

[Amazin]

know any other god directories to advertise?

 

[vvaannmmaann]

Try the Bishops' Palace in Lambeth they might help.

 

[exceedmedia]

Try the Bishops' Palace in Lambeth they might help.

Hahaaaaa, yes, Yell managers could probably do with some divine inspiration at this point too!

 

[Fred_the_frog]

With Google on most people's phones now, all you have to do to find a number is type 'Plumber in [town]' or even just 'Plumber' and Google will list some plumbers near your location. The only person I know who uses the Yellow Pages is my Nan, who doesn't understand Google, or 'Goggles' as she prefers to say.

Maybe Yell would do better to list every single number in their directory then ask people to pay to have their number removed! (Not that people would )

 

[Amazin]

Hahaaaaa, yes, Yell managers could probably do with some divine inspiration at this point too!

lol, that was a typo. So people just google everything now days? lol at using Yellow pages for height adjusting

 

[10032012]

This is another blockbuster and woolworths.

They rebranded which was a failure. Hibu... why? Sounds like a 'bebo' competitor. A social web 2.0 like name isn't the way to go for a parent company name!

They assumed they could out last the internet as a new avenue of competition. No idea why so many reputable firms invested so much cash in the dying business.

I used to run a directory website, back when Google loved them, when directory websites were out, I moved away from it. Didn't make much money... (was hundreds of competitors and a side line project - autopilot pretty much) could have made more if I sold adverts directly rather than through adsense. Before that you could buy websites specifically with certain content intended to get the best performing adverts... you just needed a good domain, some good SEO and to drive traffic to it... another autopilot... did quite well. Especially when buying adword adverts to make more back from adsense!

When Google decided to either penalise or ban these type of sites or techniques - I moved away. When Yell was struggling they should have invested into different avenues. In 2005 they kept purchasing out phone directories when the industry was dying... They even did an alliance with Google not realising Google were planning of destroying them... this was after streetview was launched, well after Google Maps...

Slimming the book down was a big mistake... no one wants to read with a magnifying glass and thick yellow pages always had other uses!

I hate facebook, but they used their popularity to generate capital, then they bought up companies to prevent dying out. If they didn't they would be gone now. All the large companies do this, Microsoft, Google, Apple etc. This is why I can tell you a list of 50 times more discontinued or failed products of Google than they have active and ongoing. Microsoft is equally as well known of developing something and shelving it really soon... I still like the MSN and the butterfly branding, didn't stop them moving to Windows Live, Bing...

I think Google destroyed them with the integration, which love Google or not is anti-competitive, but what would I have invested billions in? Google Inc!!!

Google was taking over their turf but via online services, they thought it was a phase. They were too proud to understand what was happening. Yell spent too much marketing efforts on sales teams trying to sell advert space... a grass roots campaign, perhaps hosting a network of local business networking events each month at an ultimate cost of no more than £10 million a year could have saved their bacon. Wouldn't have stopped Google being popular, but could have developed more into something like "ratedpeople.com" etc. reinforcing promoting local businesses.

Why would you buy moonfruit an untrusted freebie (with upgrades) cheap-looking website provider when you could have purchased something like ratedpeople.com or developed your own technology to achieve something similar?

They paid the price. They will get their way out of it... I am sure.

 

[HarveyIT]

It's actually Hibu, the company that owns Yellow pages that has gone into admin, and if you read the article:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25129629

The 5th and 6th paragraphs, it appears to be stating that it's business as usual for people who actually advertise on there (unless I'm reading it wrong?)