Ever since 1883, the Yellow Pages have been a convenient and easy way to find local business in whatever their field of specialty is. Whether it be a repairman, or a certain type of restaurant, the Yellow Pages, with their iconic walking fingers logo, have been the place to turn to for whatever service you want in the local area near you. Very convenient, as everything is alphabetically categorized by field of service. This not only helps people find services they need, but also helps the business gain exposure they otherwise would not have obtained.
This has helped many a new business get the start up help that they need. Hand delivered to the front door of everybody who owned a telephone, the Yellow Pages listed the name of the company, address, phone number, and ads of all local businesses. Many businesses that are now household names would never even have made it past their first year were it not for having the Yellow Pages as an advertising platform to help get their name out.
The Yellow Pages Aren’t Obsolete
Some people may be of the opinion that the Yellow Pages have gone the way of the typewriter, Packard, Polaroid, and rabbit ears on the television, but this is far from being the case. Based on search engine data, the Yellow Pages directory is still one of the most searched for items on the internet today. With over 20 million business listed, they are still delivered door to door in a suburb near you, and their site and app have a combined 80 million monthly view count. They have obtained over a billion dollars from digital profits, and beat google in local data accuracy. That being said, if you want a good source for local data for the U.S., Canada, Britain, or Australia, the Yellow Pages is still the best place to turn. Yellow Pages also has services tailored to help small business reach out to their desired audience through a free mobile optimized website builder that allows business to enhance web visibility and have a stronger presences with a better reputation. This gives yet another platform for public outreach. With over a hundred years of experience, they are still leading the industry.
Invaluable for Startups
The information contained in this platform is crucial for any business decisions especially if you are a startup looking gain a new foothold in a local market. The knowledge contained allows you to do market research, gauge competitors, understand demand for particular services, and understand just what kind of situation you are looking at before you even open your doors. Before you start, you must understand industry trends, without this kind of understanding in advance, you are setting yourself up for failure. The alphabetical listing of related industries allows customers to find what ever service they want from a host of providers. Listing here means that these business have a better visibility to people who fit their buyer persona. This helps both the business and the customer at the same time. This being the case you don’t want to miss out on such a powerful platform for public outreach and market analysis.
How to Utilize All of this Information?
Now that we understand the significance of what the Yellow Pages have to offer, how do we utilize this to our full advantage? Do we spend hours scrolling through list? Do we manually search through tens of thousands of listings and ads, and then copy and paste the data into a database spreadsheet? If your answer is yes, then you are way behind the times! Data scraping, the method of digging through all of this and then putting it into a practical format easily utilized for your purposes is the only way to go. But trying to manually data scraping is unpractical. It would not only take a lifetime, involve hiring a full-time staff of workers (thus adding another business expense) but also runs the risk of inaccuracy.
Data scraping services from a third party specialist is the most effective way to retrieve all of this critical information and then present it in a form that is easily digested. Data scraping can be used to place name, address, city, state, zip code, phone and fax number, email address, and website URL for any listing in not only the U.S., but all countries that use the Yellow Pages. All you have to do is choose the category, keyword, and location, then the services do all of the work for you and then present it in a neatly formatted database ready for you to then use for your decision making. No need to worry about duplicate data causing inaccuracy, that is automatically purged. Meaning that third party data scraping services are the fastest, most accurate, cost effective way to achieve the knowledge you need for your startup.
Third Party Data Scraping Services Give You a Competitive Advantage
Having a third party produce all of this for whatever industry you are looking to startup in means you have the necessary tools you need to run market analysis. Having this conveniently at your fingertips puts you a step ahead of the competition. You will be able to properly estimate the demand for whatever your product or services will be and know the best geographical area to place your facility based on what the market demand is for that locality. You will also be able to survey prospects that fit your buyer persona and figure out what they want and the proper price to ask for these products and services. You will also be able to understand the shortcomings and current foothold your competitors have in the market. Knowledge is power and with this power you are one step ahead in the right direction. In short without data scraping services, you are just spinning your wheels and with you are ahead of the game. Please feel free to contribute in the comments section below.
