Comments on: Guarantee at Center of New Dex Strategy

By: Victor Ortiz

Victor Ortiz — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 21:52:44 +0000

Charles, we’re past Q2 of 2012. How is Dex doing?

By: Brady

Brady — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 21:55:08 +0000

If you look at a true strategy that reaches all buyers don’t you really have to look at a print and digital solution? Come on guys…there are alot of people in the country that aren’t using the internet everyday to search for a local business. I mean really these blogs and posts are such faceless empty pits of comments that are driven to paint False truth. If you look at a complete source of reaching truly local potential ready to buy leads. Your telling me a hyper local print and digital solution isn’t better than your other options? First most of you have never ever bought advertising for a SMB. Try it and then come back and tell me a Dex or other major publishers offering isn’t if not the best one of the best options to reach ready to buy customers. 2nd- Tell me a media company that hasn’t experienced shrinking revenue and declines over the last couple years? Not to mention do some research these things are money machines and throw off alot of cash. Minus the witch hunts and dazzling internet only solution sales pitches these products spell more value than anything else you can find.

By: Charles Laughlin

Charles Laughlin — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 01:06:50 +0000

Dex is saying it will get to 30% online while reducing the rate of decline in print to single digits. Of course, getting to 30% online simply by allowing print revenue to freefall is one way to get there, but it is not a path any company would make the cornerstone of an investor day presentation. Once at something akin to 70-30, 60-40 revenue split, it obviously becomes easier to grow total revenue. I still think a shift to multiproduct + performance guarantees is the best shot for publishers to restore overall growth. That is not the same as predicting success. So much relies on very challenging execution.

By: Matt

Matt — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 19:06:47 +0000

Ed you have a very good point based on simple math of a shrinking print number will of course make the % of digital “grow”. At the end of the day, the only thing that matters is what is happening to total revenue regardless of print, digital or anything else.

By: Ed Tennant

Ed Tennant — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 18:55:00 +0000

If print revenue continues to decline and digital revenue continues to grow it is inevitable that at some point in time the digital portion will reach 30% or more of revenue. So the percentage of revenue that comes from digital can be almost any number you would like if you have enough time to wait. In my opinion the interesting part of this forecast is reversing the decline in revenue by the the 2nd half of 2012.

By: Matt

Matt — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 01:02:47 +0000

“Dex is saying the decline in print will slow to single digits”. What are the facts behind this statement? Many of Dex’s statements seem to be more wishful thinking. All the yellowpages must stablize print first because of the size of that number. Even a 10% decline for Print means hundreds of millions of dollars which will be very hard to make up with digital. I think the best and smartest yellowpages company is the Canadian Yellow pages group. They diversified their business early on and have a strong brand equity.

By: Charles Laughlin

Charles Laughlin — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 20:56:33 +0000

Tony, Dex is saying the decline in print will slow to single digits and overall growth will come back in 2H 2012. Eniro has made a similar assertion about the return of overall growth, but it has the benefit of a strong balance of print to digital revenue. Dex and SuperMedia are playing catch up with regard to digital driving a 30%+ share of revenue, which is really the minimum level for a publisher to have a chance at restoring growth. So it’s no surprise that Dex has laid out an objective of getting to 30% online by 2012. Without that, growth relies not just on stabilizing print, but making it grow again. The former is difficult. The latter is probably close to impossible.

By: Tony

Tony — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 03:38:56 +0000

If you do the math using DEX as an example, their current revenue is around $2B and if you assumed that it will decline by 15% each year. In 4 years time, they will be a $1B company. If the annual 15% decline in revenue holds true, that means every yellowpages companies in the States will be half smaller. The big question is can the yellowpages companies stop or slow the decline.

By: Charles Laughlin

Charles Laughlin — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 02:48:29 +0000

All good questions and comments. I will say that the volume and quality of leads directory publishers deliver tends to be undervalued. Is the trend on publishers’ ability to drive these leads positive? Of course not. But for now publishers are a major supplier of local leads. Offering these leads with guaranteed results is problematic but a potentially powerful tool for publishers to reposition themselves with local advertisers. Dex’s strategy assumes a lot will go right, when much could go wrong. Still, remember that publishers are often counted as dead, while the “corpse” somehow keeps on breathing.

By: Matt

Matt — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 01:07:11 +0000

I do like the question \why Dex makes sense in these current times?\. My bigger question is just what does make sense in local advertising and search in these current times? There seems to be a paradox of choice for both local businesses and users searching for local businesses. Some people thinks Google is the answer for local search, if that is the case, sites like Yelp, Angieslist, and care.com should not exist. On the other hand, how many companies can sell advertising to small businesses at scale. There is a saying that local advertising is sold and not bought. Google and Facebook are mostly offering self service which many small businesses have neither the time nor inclination to do. At the same time, there is still no guaranteed or clear cut of superior performance by using Google or Facebook. Some people like to say yellowpages no longer works but at the same time what does really work for both small businesses and users.