| Yellow Pages Ad | Web Site |
| Content | There's very little you can say in a tiny little rectangle. And don't even try to update your content during the year due to rigid publication dates! | Show off your local business to its best advantage. No Size, color or media limitations. Update anytime - make special offers, let visitors know about new products or services, etc. |
| Visitor Attention | Relatively low. Eyes scan listings. | Total - once your prospective customer is on your site, you have 100% of his/her attention. |
| Visitor Mindset | Dubious, careful. Yellow Pages is advertising. We've all had experiences with services that were downright dismal. Low credibility. | Interested, open to buy, PREsold - found you through Google, feel smart and read your excellent content, becoming PREsold upon you as an expert who shares. A web site that provides as much business information as your prospect needs, along with friendly/useful content, allows the prospective client to know and trust you. High credibility. |
| Exposure, Traffic | Near zero. It may generate a few calls per week (per month)? | Substantial. Attract hundreds, even thousands, of targeted visitors per day, on an ongoing, ever-building basis. And if you do it right (and you will!) they will return to your site. Your ezine also gives you the opportunity to reacfh your customers on a repeat basis. |
| Measurable | No. Do you have any idea how many exposures you get, or how many people call or visit due to your ad? How can you measure ROI (return on investment)? | Yes. You will know exactly how many visitors arrive every day. You know the Lifetime Value of a new customers (i.e. the amount of profit that a new customer will bring to your business over his/her lifetime of dealing with you). It makes ROI so easy to calculate. |
| Build Customer Loyalty | Not applicable. | Your own ezine. Develop an increasing sense of loyalty with existing customers, as well as repeat business. You can reach them, free, whenever you want to. |
| Competitive Advantage | Low. Everyone takes a Yellow Pages ad. That's why you did. Who gets the attention? The companies with the expensive BIG ads. Everywhere. | High. Your web site, properly done, can both build new local business and pull your competition's customers to you. |
| New Revenue Streams | No. Yellow Pages just advertises that you have a business. It does not build new revenues. | Yes. A web site builds content, which builds targeted visitors and establishes you as an authority in your field. This establishes the potential for multiple streams of income that can even surpass total income from your current local business! |
| Open New Markets | No. Yellow Pages is a local medium. | Yes. The internet is a global medium. More and more, it will replace large paper-bound directories as THE way to find local businesses with local clientele. It also opens up global potential. |
| Expandable Search - Geography | No. Yellow Pages is a geographically restricted directory. And it's totally non-interactive. Users either find you...or not. If you didn't buy a listing for a particular locale, they won't. | Yes. Suppose the local curling club is looking for a bag-piper in its local town. None? Look in the adjacent town(s). Still none? Look in the nearest mid-size city. Ah...there you are! Better still, our favorite web site builder, SBI!, shows you how to get found for that first town, even if you're not located there. |
| Expandable Search - Keywords | No. You buy a listing for a single category. If a user searches in a different-but-related category, s/he won't find you. For example, you sell and service sprinkler systems in your town? Your prospect is looking up "landscapers," who then recommend a competitor. | Yes. Your prospect searches for "+landscapers +your-town" and finds your sprinkler business (because you created some content about landscaping) is PREsold by your site's excellent information and calls YOU. |
| Cost | Expensive. Hundreds of dollars per year, per listing, per geographic area, per category, for each 4" x 2". | Inexpensive. A web site costs less than a single 4" x 2" ad, no limit on keywords (i.e. how prospects find you). geography, size, etc. No complicated packages, just one single yearly fee. |
