It’s Called Investing in Your Business

There is a marketing guy who is trying to build his business by telling people that the best way to get more golden eggs is to kill the goose that laid them. Larry Bodine’s LawMarketing Blog recommends that lawyers do just that. He says, “cancel that #*$%! expensive Yellow Pages ad” and brags that he gave that “clear advice” to attendees at two recent conferences. Why? Because, according to Mr. Bodine, “fewer people are reading the Yellow Pages every day.”

Ken Clark gave a very effective response only to be told that his rebuttal was “rantings  someone from the Yellow Pages industry.”

Now I can understand that marketing people want to attract attention, and I believe that one of the great things about blogs is that they give everyone, no matter how little he or she knows about a subject, the opportunity to express an opinion in an open forum. But Larry, your “clear advice” is clearly bad for the majority of attorneys. Here are just a few reasons. Yes, Yellow Pages references have declined from 15.1 billion in 2002 to 14.5 billion in 2005. Every traditional medium has been negatively affected by the Internet, but if you add in Internet Yellow Pages references, the number of people using the Yellow Pages is growing.

So let me provide some clear advice to attorneys who want to see their business grow: Advertise in the Yellow Pages. Why?

1. In 2002, there were 263.6 million references to the print Yellow Pages. In 2005, that number had grown to 311.5 million, according to Knowledge Networks/SRI.

2. Eighty-one percent of people who go to the attorney heading in print Yellow Pages say they have already done business or intend to do business with an attorney. In other words, they are ready to buy.

3. The return on investment for attorneys who advertise in Yellow Pages is 18 to 1. In other words, according to CRM Metered Ad Study, for every $1 invested in print Yellow Pages, attorneys can expect to get back $18 in revenues.

Mr. Bodine, a good marketer should tell his clients the whole story.