Yea - sounds cool..... but keep in mind it's
AT&T / Yellow pages guys.
If they put half the effort into marketing their products to the public to actually make them a cost effective way to advertise - as they did mastering ways to cram bogus charges in this program - it might actually be something worthwhile.
In short - steer clear - very clear.
If you care to know what to really expect if you sign up - read on.
It starts off a shiny new way to advertise....... only paying for actual calls rather than real estate in the book or online. What it ends up is your number spammed on their site in non-pertinent locations, "accidental" recycling of numbers used by last years victims who refused to sign on again, and a very expensive white pages.
We signed on - and immediately started getting calls for weed control, window replacement, siding, and 20 other service needs that are not even remotely close to what we signed on for (restoration exclusively - water damage, fire restoration, and mold abatement). Came to find that the numbers were recycled from previous advertisers in old books and online (that still had been live).
Well you can just immediately hang up and not get charged right?..... Nope - you only have 18 seconds from the first ring, to then answer, greet, hear their hello and what the person on the other line is calling for before the charge hits. It isn't even enough time to get that far and hang up let alone offer a response as to that's not us, or we don't offer that, or we are not hiring before the charge hits.
Next was the endless "are you hiring calls" - folks who got online, searched for companies in our industry, and began calling, same deal as above, not enough time to hang up when they stated the reason for their call.
Then I started digging online (yp.com) - well what I found was it was an expensive white pages. When you typed in a restoration pertinent keyword - we were found on like the 18th page........ However when you typed in All Pro (and anything after that) such as spaceships, or yachts, or diaper service, even space travel - our name not only came up in the top position, but in the upper 3 sponsored results - all three positions.
Keep in mind - all of this is happening on the affiliate sites that pull from YP.com as well.
We also had numerous calls from numbers known to be scammers/phishers, and even auto dialers.
Only 3-4 calls in 5 months were actually pertinent..... and even there they get you. We had 2 of those customers (who were instructed to call our direct line and not the ppc number) still used the ppc number, and so 4-5 times each.
Calls for that category ding you for $88 bucks a pop. One of them called in total 6 times. $528 in costs, for a $1900 job.
And good luck trying to fight the charges in any of the above situations. Our phone systems record all incoming calls - I prepped all of the info in a nice tidy package - undeniable proof that 98% of the calls were not pertinent and the result of their cramming - for our rep, who had no words after seeing the dirt he sold. Promised he'd take care of it - and guess what happened the next day.....
He was no longer our account rep..... new guy.... who returned not one call in 6 months, nor will the manager, nor will the regional manager.
The only ATT people we can get to call us - is the billing dept..... trying to collect money they will never see.
I signed up for yellow book's version at the same time as the YP's scam - some of the same problems, however they will work with you on correcting non-pertinent charges - however it is so time consuming to do - it's almost a wash.
