This week Yellowbook launched a new ad campaign that pretty well captures the multiproduct sales approach that most of the world’s major publishers are embracing in one form or another. The ads declare how the company has moved “Beyond Yellow” to help small-business advertisers sort out the myriad media choices through a single relationship — with Yellowbook. The company has also unveiled a nice graphic depiction of its suite of products, with each getting its own icon and color (print, IYP, Web sites, direct marketing, SEM and performance metrics). This colors theme is picked up in the TV ads that launched this week.
Yellowbook seems to be making strides toward becoming a real multiproduct company, and it is committing resources to promoting the idea to small businesses through television advertising. Convincing small-business advertisers to single source their local advertising through the Yellow Pages channel is an executional challenge, but it is also a marketing challenge.
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What YB is asking for is a huge leap of faith from Main Street. I doubt that local YB reps have any interest in actually relationship selling or learning a new menu of offerings, either. All due respect, I don’t see how YB has the credibility to make this work, especially with their dubious history of customer service and today’s local ad market being so soft. Value-add is fine but you have to have a foot in the door and YB doesn’t have that kind of cred. Their reps are typically regarded as nuisances, not valued consultants. Also, let’s not lose sight of the fact that there already are other local providers with existing relationships in the same space. In a vacuum this might make sense, but I’d be shorting YELL if I were playing the market.