The phone book came out a month early. I got a copy today and here’s a picture of my first yellow page ad. The large ad is fine, but they should have put that 1 inch ad in pressure washing, and it should have been a pressure washing ad - but for some reason they wrote what they wanted and put it in the window cleaning section. So there’s 3 ad for me in “window cleaning” - the large ad, the 1 inch ad, and the 1 line listing.
Last year there were at least 2 other large ads, one was a quarter page. They’re not there this year, I’m the only one anything else besides a listing. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not…
Looks sharp Micah! There was an article in the AWC a couple issues back on advertising during a recession. They used the example of Kellogg’s and Post. Before the depression they were neck and neck competitors and Kellogg’s actually increased the money they spent on advertising during that period while Post decided to save money and cut back. Today Post is number 2 to Kellogg’s number 1 and hasn’t been able to get back to where they were.
The businesses that will grow thru this time are the ones that will try to increase their presence in the marketplace thru advertising.
Micah,
Any way you can keep us updated on the return on this ad? I have been lead to believe that those ads dont work, well, versus the expense. The ad looks GREAT man. Congradulations man.
I shut down YP as soon as I bought my company and concentrated on the web, best decision I’ve made on marketing so far. To me YP customers are MOSTLY price shoppers, and being in a huge city like Houston it will force me to spread my service area more than what I’d wanted.
I think it’s important to ask your current customers if they use the yellow pages.
I have a fair amount of work in gated very upscale “communities”. The residents are typically from out of town and are retired. Almost all of them said they use the yellow pages, but were not happy with the window cleaners in them.
So that’s why I decided to try it out. I was always against it, but asking my current customers made me think a little differently about it. Besides, I never would have known for sure if it would work or not unless I tried it.
Micah,
We have been running ads similar to the one to the right (My rep calls it a leader ad). Its the one that is located under window tinting “Going Green” at the top. My ads were fairly cheap $220.00 per month each - one in gutter cleaning and of course window cleaning. I can tell you that they work outstanding and pack a great punch for as small as they are. We have been getting on average anywhere between 10-25 calls per week from the yellow pages for quotes depending on what the weather is doing outside that particular week. My competitor isnt in the yellow pages this year for some odd reason and I have been capitalizing on that bigtime :D(some of his current customers can get in touch with him/think he’s out of business).
I think that the ad will do fairly well for you and it has color which makes it even better. Good luck to you. I would like to know how well it did for you as well in the upcoming year.
Micah,
I dont know the actual numbers (its been awhile). I am supposed to sign off on next years contact for advertising in the next week or so. I forgot to mention that we primarily target residential customers and that we get a very low response on getting commercial calls. I might add as well that during the winter months in the east, we dont get hardly any calls from it due to the cold weather. Pretty much 9 months of the year it does a really decent job. Worth it for us.
I will post that # for you when I get it next week.
Yeah, with 3 ads for “window cleaning”! That was their mistake though. The 1 inch ad should have went in “pressure washing” and it should have been directed for pressure washing. I’m still waiting to see what’s going to happen with that mistake…
Last year there were 1 or two ads, one was even a quarter page ad - he was paying for a full color ad but only using 2 … not sure why. So I wanted a good size ad but didn’t want to be the biggest. I figured people may assume that that largest ad would be the most expensive company. Boy that line of thinking back fired. Now I’ve got the only ad besides 1 line listings!
So I’m not sure if those window cleaning business just weren’t getting the response they wanted, went out of business, or what. I do think that my ad is far superior to theirs from last year though, if I do say so myself.
Like you I put my big ad in YP two year ago. I could count on one hand the jobs I got from it.
I spent around $18.000au and put my add in several YP.
Now I have my van sign written and a web page and I still do flyers and the hard sale knock on doors introducing myself to strata’s.
Do you and your wife work together? That would be a asset
But your add is very good
Ottra
