Goodbye Yellow Pages!

From red telephone boxes to the Yellow Pages – digital and mobile lead to their demise

IT helped JR Harley to find his fly fishing book and gave a step up to the little girl seeking a kiss under the mistletoe.

But the bulky local business directory Yellow Pages as we know it is coming to end – and from next year onwards will no longer be published on paper.

There was a time when no home would want to be without the Yellow Pages, in case of an emergency flooding or that last minute delivery of flowers.

But after more than half a century – the directory will continue only in an online format, with the final print run next January.

I suppose that owners Yell have recognised that this is a sign of the times, and from the view of Safe Local Trades - our business, brand and reputation has largely been built online, born in an age when websites are your shop window.

As a consumer facing business, we – along with many other businesses – realise that making the journey as quick and as easy as possible for the customer will put a tick firmly in your box.

Having a user-friendly website which can be navigated with ease is what people want when looking for a service. Offering transparent feedback and customer reviews also helps to engage the customer and offer confidence.

To have a mobile friendly online service is crucial in today’s busy and fast pace of life; whether you want to book an oven cleaner in your lunch break, make contact with a plumber whilst waiting on the platform for your train or book an appointment with a landscape gardener whilst on the school run.

And of course, along with the website comes the social media element – certainly not around in the days when the young man using Yellow Pages in the TV ad was looking for a French polisher!

While there may be an element of nostalgia associated with Yellow Pages, our mobile lives mean we let our fingers do the tapping and swiping rather than the walking!