Web pages are replacing telephone books. Craigslist, EBay and other web sites have replace newspaper classified ads. Most consumers now use web sites to find information that they used to find in telephone books. Recently a new Verizon Yellow Pages book was delivered to my office. It is about half the physical size of the previous year and it is gathering dust on the shelf. It has never been used. The sales people for all the various yellow books appear to be selling web site listings rather than the printed book. It seems only a matter of time when the printed telephone books will completely disappear.
Recently I sold a 15 year old racing bike on Craigslist in three hours for my asking price. There was no cost for the ad. My son and his wife now have two successful retail stores in the Atlanta, Georgia area as a direct result of an online business.
On May 18, 2009, the Tampa Tribune quit home delivery in Pinellas County dropping about 11,000 Monday-Saturday subscribers. Newspapers all over the United States are making major cuts in staff and circulation in an effort to stay in business.
The Internet has changed the way people buy products and find information. Newspaper consumers tend to be older and young people have found new ways to find information. The future of printed newspapers looks gloomy at best and newspaper owners and managers have so far been unable to develop a business model that generates the income necessary to survive.
So what does this mean to businesses?
Every business including the smallest retailer must have a web site. Without a web site, consumers who use the Internet as their primary source for information will not find you. Retailers in particular must have basic information on the web – your location, hours and contact information.
Evaluate how you spend your money in telephone books and other printed material. A few consumers, especially older men and women, still use telephone books but you must be on the web too.
Where are you running your employment ads or selling your products? Look to the Internet for free or low costs web sites as additional ways to sell your products or hire employees.
If you are still doing things the same way you did two years ago, than you are missing costumers and probably wasting money on telephone books that few people use.
