Yellow pages book Vs Google
Posted by Administrator (boyd) on Nov 22 2010
Website design and development blog >> Newsletters

One of the most common dilemmas facing our clients this year is whether or not to finally give up on the Yellow pages. I decided to do some homework so I could answer this question with a little more authority...

Nowadays the overwhelming opinion amongst people that I encounter is that Yellow Pages is no longer a good investment for your advertising dollar.

But what are the statistics that back up this popular opinion?

There is no doubt that many people will go straight to the internet rather than pick up a phone book, especially if they are at work in front of a computer, but there are examples of the Yellow Pages still being used:

• Elderly people
• People who don't have internet at home or are on dial up (e.g. rural areas)
• People in hotel rooms
• People in service stations or on the road

Based on the information from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, these groups of people roughly account for 40% of Australia's buying market. (I am making some rough assumptions about minimum age of potential customers for most businesses).

So if we look only at the Yellow pages book, our market is potentially 40% of Australians, which is still quite of people.

The big question for you is; are the people listed above your target market?

The next thing to consider is that these figures are changing.

Many surveys have shown that older Australians are statistically the group with the highest increase in internet usage, so more and more will start using Google or other online search systems.

People who are traveling, on the road or in hotel rooms are using iPhones, or smart phones to surf the web on the go.

And Australia's internet coverage is improving. More and more rural areas are now enjoying reasonable internet coverage.

But what about Yellow pages online?

There is no doubt that Yellow Pages Online get some traffic and deliver business via their search engine, but the Yellow Pages Online is just one of many directories on the Internet. Our statistics, and those that we track for our customers usually show less than 3% of traffic comes from the Yellow Pages Online.

In most cases we believe that users will only resort to the Yellow Pages online if they can't find a good result in Google.

So what's my conclusion?

The Yellow pages book is still useful to reach the elderly, reach some rural areas and some other small niche markets, but this market is shrinking rapidly.

For your average business, your money is going to be better spend on online advertising. SEO or Adwords are the most reliable options.

For more information email us at design@boyddesign.com.au

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