![]() |
Marketing Resource Center |
|
|
Beware of Magazine Style Yellow Pages Ad Design.
I have been designing Yellow Page ads for the past 15 years. I have been fully submerged in the medium. Even as I sit here writing this article I have various Yellow Page directories from all over the US stacked on my desk. It's an art form, I tell you. Few comprehend its power. Few understand the subtle blend of art and science that combines to create the successful Yellow Page ad design. It takes a true connoisseur to understand the underlying psychology of a masterfully crafted Yellow Pages ad design. Now I know what your thinking. This guy is off his rocker. Oh, but I disagree. I intend to plainly illustrate a very disheartening trend developing in our local neighborhood Yellow Pages. I call this trend-the rise of the dreaded 'magazine style' Yellow Pages ad. Now I love magazines too. I like to leaf through my Forbes Magazine as I leisurely sit by the pool. I occasionally glance at the pages of Elle when my wife leaves it lying around. I've even been known to flip through the pages of Wired when I'm ready for the latest rant on how Star Wars has changed the world. But when I turn to my local Yellow Pages the last thing I'm ready to face is the pages of Cosmopolitan. With the recent rise of readily available, cheaply commissionable, Yellow Page ad design services it would seem our Yellow Pages are turning into a 'magazine style' nightmare. Now I'm not saying your ad should be as ugly as your Yellow Pages advertising sales rep wants to make it, but if your Yellow Page ad is turning into an Ansel Adams exhibition, and your selling air conditioners there is something wrong here. I know, I said Yellow Page ad design is an art, but what I meant by art was the kind of Yellow Page ad that ultimately leads to someone buying something from you. It's like Trump calls it-the art of the deal. That's the kind of art you are looking for in your Yellow Pages advertising. It's the art of getting peoples attention, and not loosing it a half second later when they can't figure out what it is your selling. I mean, the heading says 'Plumbing' but with all these baby pictures it looks more like a Daycare heading. Which one of these guys is a plumber? These clever ads may be all the rage as I'm sipping my cocktail by the swimming pool, but when I'm looking for a reason I should buy from you instead of your competitor, trying to baffle me with a clever picture that makes me think some Yellow Page flunky lost his job when he mistakenly pasted a Daycare ad in Plumbing, is not the way to do it. Yeah, you got my attention. Am I calling? Sure. I'm calling your competitor. Nobody has the time to decipher your cute 'magazine style' Yellow Pages ad. Captivating your audience is important, making your Yellow Page ad design distinctive is paramount, but confusing people can make your Yellow Page advertising useless. I have learned over the years to even steer clear of 'magazine style' layout for fear of lack-luster results. Many directories have phone company traps set up with 3 or 4 pages of these 'magazine style' Yellow Page ads for there own products and services. Yellow Page shoppers learn to tune them out quickly. Stumble through 4 full-page full-color 'magazine style' Yellow Pages ads under 'Publishing' while you're on your way to the 'Printing' heading and you quickly learn what not to look for. Phone company traps can be set up under Advertising, Communications, Publishing, Internet, Telecommunications-always just a few pages away from where your Yellow Page ad is going to call home. While magazine ads can be very entertaining, who doesn't like PacBell's cross-eyed dog that is guaranteed to be under seven headings of any given PacBell directory, the important thing to remember is Yellow Page shoppers are not there to be entertained-they are there to buy. Hopefully from you! So be warned, from the desk of a 15 year veteran in the Yellow Page ad design field, if you are expecting great results with that clever, not so clever, magazine style Yellow Page ad design you are running this year, you might find yourself sadly disappointed. There are better ways to grab people's attention with your Yellow Page advertising, AND get them to buy from you. Never sacrifice your company's sales for magazine style Yellow Page advertising. Adam Strange
MORE RESOURCES:
Marketing - Google News |
RELATED ARTICLES
Calling All Carbon-Based Lifeforms Many businesses want to market to all carbon-based life forms. They won't take the time to really understand their audiences from geographic, demographic and psychographic perspectives. Corporate Gift Tips To Wow Clients & Associates 1) Know the company and their culture. Are they trendy and artistic or conservative and elegant? Your gift giving should reflect this. Marketing Operations Elevates Public Relations and Communications Professionals Is your marketing department taking advantage of MOM and MRM? Do you have BAM and DAM systems in place? Do you know how to measure NPV? Do you even know what I'm talking about?If so, you may not be a "Quant" (a marketing scientist or specialist in marketing analytics) but you're certainly ready to seize a leadership role and spur your company into the new world of Marketing Operations.Marketing Operations (AKA MOM or Marketing Operations Management) seeks to improve performance and measure ROI through sustainable processes, best practices and clearly-defined metrics. Top 10 Dos and Donts for an Effective Business Referral Network! Every business - particularly small, entrepreneurial or professional businesses - must have a powerful referral network. It is very unlikely (and terribly expensive) to "advertise your way to success". Lead Generation: What Is It worth? Our business environment has changed dramatically. Companies must now be disciplined and market-driven if they want to stay alive. Importance of Endorsements And How To Use Them Customer endorsements are an inexpensive and easy sales tool, particularly for someone just starting out. Here are some tips on how to get them and use them: Send follow-up letters. Marketing Brain Trust Rest assured that no matter how smart you are, you do not know everything about marketing. You don't even know anything about marketing your product! You can't figure everything out yourself, or see all the angles, or provide every bit of critical thinking. 10 Packaging Tips That Will Make Consumers Buy Your Product The customer is king/queen. We have all heard this mantra. Small Business Marketing Tip - Get Attention and Be Remembered We live in a world of noise - not just auditory noise but total sensory overload. Everywhere we go marketing messages are shouting at us day and night. Marketing to Hispanics/Latinos A powerful consumer market with annual spending power exceeding $350 billion, Hispanics-or should that be Latinos?-have become the largest minority group in the United States, and a marketplace well-worth looking into and with plenty to see--once you get the labels straight.Is it "Hispanics" or "Latinos"?Hispanics and Latinos have hotly debated that question for years, and apparently, picking one answer over the other means drawing political, social, and generational lines in the sand. Why You Buy Behavioral economics is a new science that sheds light on some of our most important decisions. It is the study of how and why people make money-related choices. An Internet Marketing Strategy that Works You can't put up a beautiful (or any) web site and hope that people will just arrive. You have to let them know, IN EVERY POSSIBLE WAY, that your web site is there. Know Thy Competition BREAK FROM HO-HUM MARKETING ? IT'S TOO BORING!Once you break from ho-hum marketing, and learn to put your deeper beliefs and values into your promotion, a remarkable thing will happen: You will beat your competitors at every turn, attract precisely those clients who really need and appreciate the products or services your company provides, and have a really good time in your business. In other words ? once you know what your clients really value, and how you are different from your competitors then it's an incredibly simple process to promote your company's products or services. The Importance of Business Marketing Business marketing is one of the most important parts that your business needs to be addressed with careful attention and proactive thoughts. In last decade or so, the importance of business marketing has increased volcanically, as the advent of Internet and online business has ushered a whole new era in business. The Advantage and Consequences of New Economy Marketing Some of the research that has been done today gives us alot of information on the values of today's society. WhatI'm referring to is a lifestyle in which there is more todo in generally less time in which to accomplish it. When You Need More Than Magic To Keep Your Marketing Going It is easy to focus on what remains outstanding and not seewhat you have accomplished or how you have grown over thepast year. Even marketing experts have difficulty nailingdown time to market. Catalogs are Selling Machines If you've got a mailbox, you're no doubt aware of the popularity of catalogs. People love to look through catalogs, and more important, they love to buy from catalogs. Why Cutting Prices Is Like Cutting Your Own Throat Why cutting your prices is like cutting your own throat. It's the oldest sales tactic in the world? And one of the worst? Price cutting. Defining Moment Do you know your audiences? I mean really know them. I've just been working on a project for a client to help him position his financial planning business and to determine who his key audiences are. Good News Travels Fast This newsletter is full of opportunities staring you in the face. If you don't believe me, write and tell me so--and by doing that you'd be proving me right. |
| home | site map | Advertising Articles |
| © 2006 |