Yellow Pages Yell

[APC Nexday Overnite Ltd]

Has anybody here ever negotiated with Yell?

We have three adverts with them in two books Bolton & wigan, Manchester North

It's going to cost us approximately £6k

We've never had a reduction in prices, I've never asked for one.


Has anybody here ever done so and if so how much did you knock them down by?

Any comments appreciated.

Thank You

 

[S-Marketing]

With 6K for marketing, the worst possible thing to do with it would be to spend it with Yellow pages, IMO.

Has anybody here ever negotiated with Yell?

We have three adverts with them in two books Bolton & wigan, Manchester North

It's going to cost us approximately £6k

We've never had a reduction in prices, I've never asked for one.


Has anybody here ever done so and if so how much did you knock them down by?

Any comments appreciated.

Thank You

 

[ScottBaxter]

I agree with Stretchy!!

Spend it on SEO / PPC you see much better return!!

 

[Esk247]

Yellow pages is a waste of time. We just got a new one through the door for the first time in 2 years and its for the wrong flippin area, everyones been given the book for a place 30 odd miles away, no good to us.

It works for take aways and taxis but not much else. 6k is a lot to spend with them, i'd drop it and look in to other advertising options that are more direct. Most of the Yell books get binned.

 

[simbathedog]

Not used a yellow pages or yell.com in last 3 years!
You need to be found on Google!

 

[ADS-MARKETING]

I would keep a very basic advert in the yellow pages and spend the 6k elsewhere.

SEO
Email Marketing
Other local advertising depending on what type of business and services you offer?

Good Luck!

 

[Partnership Telecom]

My brother has a carpentry business that listed on yell.com last year for the first time. The advert on the online directory paid for itself many times over. When he tried to negotiate a better deal on renewal they wouldn't move on the price. They used 0845 numbers to track the success of his advert and said that the number of calls he had received from the advert represented a good return on his investment.

 

[Esk247]

My brother has a carpentry business that listed on yell.com last year for the first time. The advert on the online directory paid for itself many times over. When he tried to negotiate a better deal on renewal they wouldn't move on the price. They used 0845 numbers to track the success of his advert and said that the number of calls he had received from the advert represented a good return on his investment.

THEY told him if he had a good return on his investment? :|

 

[Mike W]

Has anybody here ever negotiated with Yell?
We have three adverts with them in two books Bolton & wigan, Manchester North
It's going to cost us approximately £6k
We've never had a reduction in prices, I've never asked for one.

Has anybody here ever done so and if so how much did you knock them down by?

A serious waste of money in my opinion.

But, if you're intent on going ahead (you really shouldn't), then I'd have thought they would definitely deal. Just tell them you've decided not to renew, stick hard to it, and they'll cave on something.

I'm a good buyer. If you want some help, happy to deal with it for you for a percentage of the reduction I achieve. If of any interest, let me know.

 

[popunder]

Your problem is despite having paid them for the ads for (I'm assuming) quite a few years you don't know if it's been worth it for you, ie: you've never tracked the business that's come via Yellow Pages. I'm no fan of YP and haven't used them for 10+ years but you may just be in a business sector that could profit from it. The point is you should know by now. If you do decide to continue paying you must know by this time next year what return you've got for your £6k. Buy some local trackable phone numbers (they're cheap as chips, I use Citynumbers but there are dozens of suppliers) and use a different one on each ad in each book. After a year you'll be able to see how many calls each ad delivered, and you'll get an idea of their value. You might find one ad works really well for some reason, and others don't, in which case bin the others and keep the good one.

But you have to stop guessing when spending that kind of money, and with trackable phone numbers is easy and cheap to do these days. As others have said already, re-invest any savings in online activity (SEO and PPC) and maybe telemarketing.

ps: Don't let YP do it for you - they have their own trackable number system - just do it yourself so you can trust the results and take advantage of the trackable numbers' other features. PM me if you'd like examples of tracked call reports.

 

[VLAHAKISA]

I bin my Yellow Pages. I don't need it, I have Google. Having said that, I believe that there are possibly a lot of people still using it, and for SOME industries it can be excellent. Trades for instance.

I refer to the actual Yellow Pages hardcopy. Haven't seen it for a while though, do they still do it?

I wouldn't blow an entire marketing budget on it though. I'd spend 50% on YP and 50% on online marketing. I wouldn't touch YELL.COM with a bargepole for any business.

Amanda

 

[APC Nexday Overnite Ltd]

But you have to stop guessing when spending that kind of money, and with trackable phone numbers is easy and cheap to do these days. As others have said already, re-invest any savings in online activity (SEO and PPC) and maybe telemarketing.

ps: Don't let YP do it for you - they have their own trackable number system - just do it yourself so you can trust the results and take advantage of the trackable numbers' other features. PM me if you'd like examples of tracked call reports.

You hit the nail on the head there was just about to say " but we have trackable numbers" but i suppose they mean zilch. I'll post the result info on here when i find them.

Can I just say thanks to everyone for their replys. You've been a great help.

I focus on sales at my company and me and the MD have been debating over this for some time.

I personally reckon we should invest a sizeable chunk of that 6k into building our own website just so we have a online presence. It wouldnt neccessarly be a complicated website just to start with but eventually I want a website where customers can order samedays, pickups, actually be able to track the sameday vehicle and see it real time as it's moving from A to B- but that's a long way off as of yet. At the moment I think it's neccessary just to have an online website advertising our services.

 

[S-Marketing]

With businesses such as yours your marketing plan should be concentrating on building relationships, and developing a strong and long term, strategic alliance marketing plan.

 

[APC Nexday Overnite Ltd]

Well........ it all went wrong!

Just an update!

Told everyone we had the yell sales rep in I stressed we didn't want google adwords or one of their crappy websites building for us.

Sales rep came back in sat with the MD (WHILST I WAS OUT) and got told again what we didn't want. Our MD then signed up for the package we wanted and in it they had included the adwords and website

WHAT WE DIDNT WANT

So go on the phone to them and basically said I refuse to pay for it, I want it taking off, this isn't on, how dare they set up a website with our name on it which is a shambles etc etc

I got told "we'll do the best we can do and try and get it took off".

One of the sales rep's minions then rings back and tells us unfortunately we have to be part of the minimum 4 month adword advertising campaign costing £160.

So I've now dropped two of my Yell book adverts with them for next year both costing £900 each near enough.

SO WELL DONE YELL YOU'VE CHARGED ME £160 MORE THAN USUAL AND LOST ALMOST £1600 IN DOING SO...THIS REALLY IS THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH YELL

 

[Mattlock]

There customer service is a pile of crap too, my add came back with my company name spelt wrong!

 

[Mattlock]

Yes okay so my spellings not great either lol