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If you're a service business,
then most likely you're a local business. That probably
means you do most of your business with customers within a
50-mile radius of your physical location. That also means,
perhaps unexpectedly, that you need to be online.
Consumer research conducted earlier this year by The Kelsey
Group indicates that the Internet's reach is now equal to or
greater than any other local medium. Other consumer research
has confirmed these findings.
As more and more consumers get broadband Internet
connections (now more than 50 percent of online U.S.
households), more of them are turning to the Internet, as
they once turned to local phone books, to find local
business information.
That brings us to the question above: Where's the best place
for service businesses to advertise?
The immediate answer is Internet Yellow Pages (IYP). That's
because, according to empirical data, for every lookup on an
IYP site, 50 percent of those references turn into phone
calls to local businesses.
Here's what 2003 research from the Yellow Pages Association
revealed about consumer behaviors and response rates
following reference to an IYP site:
67 percent made a contact (73 percent of those contacts are
by phone)
64 percent made or intended to make a purchase (40 percent
actually make a purchase)
65 percent of purchasers were new customers
While that data seems self-serving, it's accurate. IYP users
are closer in time to buying decisions than search engine
users, for example. Search engines are used much more
broadly and more frequently than IYP sites. So in
advertising on search engines you don't necessarily catch
consumers when they're "ready to buy."
The following are the major IYP sites:
- AOL Yellow Pages
(distributes SBC BellSouth listings)
- BestRedYP.com
- DexOnline.com
- InfoSpace.com
(distributes SuperPages listings)
- Switchboard.com
- SuperPages.com (Verizon)
- Yahoo Yellow Pages
- YellowBook.com
- YellowPages.com
(jointly operated by SBC and BellSouth)
There are many other online
yellow pages sites, and increasingly, newspapers are
offering yellow pages on their sites. Access to many, if not
most, of these can be purchased directly through local
yellow pages sales representatives or indirectly through
local online marketing agencies:
- Leads.com
- LocalLaunch
- LocalLead
- Pinpoint Local
- ReachLocal
Most print yellow pages
providers are also now selling search-engine traffic and
simplified online marketing packages in addition to IYP
advertising. In this way you can purchase both IYP inclusion
and search distribution from a yellow pages sales rep. Many
of the local marketing agencies mentioned above also sell
simplified search-engine packages.
Search engine marketing should not be ignored. Even though
it's less qualified than IYP traffic, search has much more
traffic volume than IYP sites. Google, Yahoo and others sell
advertising on their search engines and offer free inclusion
in their directories:
- Google Local Business
Center
- Google AdWords
- Yahoo Local Listings
- Yahoo Search Marketing
In addition, Google, Yahoo,
AskJeeves, MSN and AOL have "local search" on their sites.
As consumers become more familiar with these local search
products and usage increase, they will become another
important marketing vehicle for local service businesses.
There's also another, very new form of performance-based
online marketing called "pay per call." This form of
advertising offers phone numbers in search-engine ads and
drives calls to local businesses rather than clicks to Web
sites. Right now, you can buy pay per call from two primary
sources (although there will be more over time):
Ingenio
MIVA (formerly FindWhat)
Furthermore, you don't need a Web site with pay per call;
and you only pay when you receive a phone lead. This should
be considered for businesses that want and are used to
receiving phone calls.
Depending on what type of business you operate, there may
also be specialized vertical directories that cater to your
industry. Most of these directories have advertising
programs. Here are a few examples:
Lawyers.com
ServiceMagic (for contractors)
1800Dentist
Last, consider placing ads on Craigslist. Unless you're an
employer, listings are free and traffic (if you're located
in a major metro area) is considerable.
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