Small businesses face many challenges when choosing how to invest in advertising that will attract new customers. The biggest issue, of course, is to spend money on advertising that will bring direct measurable results. While many ad salespeople will use phrase like “building a brand” or “having tip of the tongue recognition,” most business owners want one thing: sales and a direct return on investment.
Yellow Page Advertising is not cutting it an I feel there are several problems. First, most markets are covered by several directories, which, in effect, lessons the chances that potential customers will find your ad if you do not advertise in all the directories. Second, the yellow pages are a slowly dying medium. In 2008, Internet searches for local information (i.e, a local restaurant or plumber) exceeded that of yellow pages directories. Most Internet users would confirm this; they seldom use the phone book these days. A small business owner, though, has to balance the costs and reduced coverage with the possibility of not reaching a segment of the population. Older, less tech savvy people are likely to be using the yellow pages in greater frequency than younger, more connected people.
although i think that mobile devices will be the wave of the future. they are only at about 20% saturation of the market. when it gerts to 80%, and everyone has a smart phone, then skype and social networking will overtake traditional media.