Apr 29, 2008
I didn't need the business, but I was keen to try a listing on the online Yellow Pages. I wanted to know for my clients as much as anything else. I had a Gold Priority listing for $110 per month. I initially signed up on a special 3 month deal.
Low Traffic Compared to Optimising your Own Site Properly
I added all the different categories possible onto the listing, and got 732 views and only 5 people visiting in two months = $220. Compare this to the over 6000 page views, and over 2600 unique visitors that I got direct to my website in that same time. Hmmm. I have now canceled my Online Yellow Pages listing.So why have I got such good traffic compared to Yellow.co.nz?
- one of the categories of my listing was "Content Management Systems". If I do a Google same site search on yellow.co.nz (site:yellow.co.nz content management systems), their specific CMS page is not even cached in Google
- neither does a page come up on same site search for "Search Engines"
- nor "web applications"
Clicking through, I am able to find a page for http://yellow.co.nz/category/Web-Site-Development.html, but this page is not well search engine optimised.
Wow - I appear 3rd on a search for "website development in glen eden". Since its such a non competitive search phrase, they are able to get ranked top 10 for it.
So how about for a competitive search phrase of "website development in auckland" - Yellow does not even get in the top 50, yet they have a page especially for it. http://yellow.co.nz/category/Web-Site-Development/Auckland-1.html
For all the marketing strength and stock market capitalisation of the Yellow Pages group, their online marketing strength is rather weak.
Lets try another one:
Auckland Restaurants
Yellow has decided that it is good enough a search phrase to have Google Adwords for. So how well have they done their own websites optimisation for the phrase?I can't personally find a series of links that will get me through to a page dedicated to Auckland Restaurants. A large number of the menus are javscript that Google is not able to easily read, and then there are text entry search boxes.
Lets give them the benefit of doubt - do they rank in the top 100 on Google for Auckland Restaurants? - No
And a same site search "site:yellow.co.nz restaurants in auckland" does not show any specific dedicated page cached for Yellow - just restaurant pages.
If I look at the Google analytics stats for a restaurant's website that I look after - I see only 32 visits from Yellow.co.nz compared to over 600 in the last month coming in via the search engines.
Yellow - you need to do better, and I won't be recommending you to any clients. Getting good rankings on the search engines generates far more traffic for a lot less cost.
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27 Comments
Friedrich - Apr 30, 2008
If Yellow hasn't worked for your niche industry listing or the (highly competitive) restaurant trade, perhaps a listing with Finda directory is better proposition?
They have added benefit of mapping deals both wises Wises and the Google Maps.
Out of interests, what rankings did you achieve for your restaurant client?
Warmest Regards,
Friedrich
Jai Ivarsson - electronic marketing - Apr 30, 2008
This is something that I have been thinking of canning for a while, but was hesitant to due the links that I get from the site. Since reading you post I started thinking a bit about those links. I have noticed over the course of the last year that the number of links can vary from 1 up to 100 from one google crawl to the next. Secondly they are never that good a link anyway as there is no PR on the linking page and it appears to be randomly generated depending on which way the wind was blowing at the time.
On top of this I have had no traffic from them in over 3 months.
So I have made the call to drop it and see if it hurts my top 10 rankings. Fingers crossed.
RichP - Webhelp SEO Blog - Apr 30, 2008
Michael, you make some excellent points
Regarding the nofollows on finda.
Paid business listings have the nofollow removed, meaning some pagerank is passed. See Freeride'n listing
Although no pagerank is passed, tests have shown that google still follow through "nofollowed" links and can lead to indexing of pages linked to from nofollowed links. So there is still some benefit even if the links are nofollowed.
Keran - Apr 30, 2008
Hi there Michael
First up, I'll go on the record saying I'm the product manager for apnfinda. I think a summary of this article is this. You have to ask "How are you going to measure this?"
Online Listing with Yellow - is it worth it .... for ? customers, for links, for seo? What's your context?
See with AdWords most people measure with traffic to their site - after all, the result of an AdWord is a click through to your site.
If this is how you measure Yellow & finda, Google AdWords will trump anything when you measure this way. While sites like finda & yellow can drive traffic to your business, they allow business to place a lot more information in front of the customer. This means customers don't have to go through to the website, they can instead call, email or walk in to the shop.
The bigger picture of course is conversion rates through to sales. You have to qualify where leads come from (very easy for websites, harder for walk up sales).
You are right about finda listings helping you in Google Maps. We have an exclusive partnership with Google meaning if you list your business with finda, (and you choose to show your location), your business details will be passed through to Google Local - fantastic for getting your business into Google. This gets your business (your restaurant for example), into Google Local, Google Maps & onto mobile devices - I use my mobile to find food places all the time with Google Maps Mobile.
Anyway, if you want you now have my email Michael, shoot me a note if you want to discuss how finda can help your customers businesses grow.
Cheers
K.
Keran - May 1, 2008
@Micheal, talk to me, I'm happy to work out something for you to be able to test finda and report your results. As I mentioned we are keen to work closely with the community, and having folks as yourself offering improvements, we are going to look at these very closely.
@Harvey, you hit the nail on the head. It's about Industry, and we have to admit some industries directories are not the best.
Micheal equates customers with visitors, which for his SEO business is probably true. This is NOT true for most other businesses.
finda can organise 0800 numbers for clients, and we do often use these to track extra contact with businesses.
Anyway, thanks all, some very good discussion here.
Keran - May 1, 2008
Sorry this line:
Micheal equates customers with visitors, which for his SEO business is probably true. This is NOT true for most other businesses.
Should be
"equates customers with website visitors"
Aidan Rogers - InKoDe - May 1, 2008
Wow lots of chatter going on here, awesome stuff. Thought I had better add my comment since i told you i would Michael :)
Yes - yellow pages is expensive, passes no pagerank, low traffic etc etc but I know for a fact it sure passes something....
A whole truck load lot of trustrank.
I believe its actually one of the top10 trusted domains in all of NZ! Same goes with Finda ;) (not quite as authority but definitely high quality) These domains can be found by combing a couple of advanced search queries.
Great to see the community growing here!
Peace.
Aidan Rogers - May 2, 2008
TrustRank
it.
Robert Kramers - New Zealand Web design - May 2, 2008
I thought as much to be honest.. But to have this experiment clarify exactly how well Yellow does for you was great, cheers Michael. Surely different terms like 'car mechanics' or 'auto electricians' would have a different outcome i would think. But things based purely on word of mouth i never thought would. Thanks for the post.
Michael - since you "don't understand trust rank" I thought I'd post this link for you as it is a pretty good explanation :)
click here
Hi Aidan. If you read my post again, you will realise that I do in fact understand "trust rank". But a link from a site means little if Google has not cached that page, or if it is nofollowed, or not ranked in its own right.
Once these things are happening, then the "trust rank" part of the algorithm as you have so rightly pointed out can certainly play its important part.
Finda has many of these aspects working for it. And I now have a paid listing to find out more about it.
Rich - It was not easy to find out about "paid" listings on Finda. I had to first create my free account, then see the paid options.
While I agree with you in part Micheal - I still believe Google sees the yellow pages as a trustyworthy site - regardless of wether it has "good onpage" or anything to do with the inidividual page ranking.
I think Googles algorithm is far more complex than whether a page has "pagerank". You said:
"But a link from a site means little if Google has not cached that page, or if it is nofollowed, or not ranked in its own right."
I disagree completely. Some links pass trust. Also as RichP pointed out , tests have shown that google still follow through nofollowed links and index pages. I have also tested and agree.
Plus if you look in your Google webmaster tools you can see The Goolge knows all about your links in the yellow pages. Therefore your site is being associated with a trustworthy neighbourhood. Look at yellowpages backlinks - lots and lots of trustworthy sites linking to it such as several govt sites.
So what I'm saying Micheal I believe there are different links for different purposes - if all your going after is links that "pass pagerank" I think you are missing the big picture.
Ben Armstrong - Ben at AusMedWeb - Dec 29, 2008
At least in Australia there is now a high correlation between Yellow advertising and Google listing (not just PageRank). Not sure if the same may come to NZ soon but it does create an interesting dynamic.
This article explores it in some detail.
Finally, don't forget about the quality of traffic you are getting from different sources. For sites I monitor the visitors from Yellow stay longer and generally fit the profile of potential purchasers more so than general Google search traffic. Crank up Analytics and have a look at the different performance by Referral Sources to see what I mean (or not)!
Jordan - Feb 17, 2009
www.madefromnewzealand.com is free and easily out performs yellow. It is young and gaining popularity among the webbies.
It is very well created, designed to be Google's friend in everyway. The sites designed for Google!
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Dave - Link building services - Mar 8, 2010
Hey Michael. I believe Yellow Pages holds considerable weight but I guess the complexity of Google's algorithm can only determine this. Am not sure a Yellow Pages listing provides great ROI. Cheers for a great post.
Richard Conway - Jun 2, 2010
A lot of my clients have spent a lot of money on Yellow Pages in the past and have got little or no benefit. They have since stopped advertising in the Yellow Pages and now spend the money on either PPC (Google Adwords) or SEO. Obviously with PPC they get a great deal more clicks (and conversions/sales) for the same money and with SEO (as you pointed out) they get a much better benefit (especially in the short term with long tailed keywords)
Jesse Archer - Emerge Wedding Videos - Jun 7, 2010
A client of mine made a similar move earlier in the year - completed ditched yellow in favor of her own simple site.
Needless to say, the results have spoken for themselves.
Harvey - Apr 29, 2008
Well said Michael.
If a directory is charging a premium, and $110 per month is a premium, then they need to provide value that is competitive with Adwords. $44 per click isn't competitive.
I'll wager your free nzs.com listing (if you have one) brought more traffic over the same period.