As business owners, we all know how important it is to get your name out there, or, in other words, market. But the world is advancing and the old ways of marketing have not only become less relevant to consumers, but they have essentially dropped off their radar completely. There might have been a time in the recent past that your business was spending upwards of $4,000 dollars on yellow page ads, and contributing under $1,000 to online marketing, because that’s what had driven you traffic in the past. But the reality of marketing in 2015, is that the consumer’s eye exists just about nowhere, outside the internet.

The honest truth is that consumers just don’t pull out the phone book anymore, they don’t ask around for recommendations, and they don’t use directories to find service providers. What consumers do, in this day and age, is pull out their cell phones, iPads, or laptops and “ask Siri,” search on Google, or read ratings and reviews online. Sure, this may seem like a far out concept for some of you, and to others it may seem like untouched territory for your business, but the fact of the matter is that businesses who spend money on yellow page advertising aren’t getting the conversations they need to sustain the ads themselves.

To prove this assertion, Yelp conducted a survey of over 3,500 business owners, and asked them to estimate the percentage of customers that found them by using a yellow page phone book ad. 43% of the participants replied that 0% of their customers found them through their yellow page ads, 47% replied between 1-25% of their customers, 5% said between 26-50% of their customers, 3% said between 51-75% of their customers, 1% said between 76-99% of their customers, and 0.1% of the participants said 100% of their customers where driven to their business solely using their yellow page ads. The conclusion of this survey being that 90% of the business owners using yellow page ads didn’t see an estimated drive of traffic over 25% of their total consumer intake.

Now, knowing that yellow page ads just aren’t that effective, it’s important to know why. What studies have found, is that the ineffectiveness of yellow page ads can be found in the disconnect between relevancy and the consumer. For example, you may be advertising your businesses commercial landscaping services in the yellow pages, but the recipient of the yellow pages may not be commercial business owners, and they may not be looking for a landscaping service at all. This consumer could quite possibly be looking for something more along the lines of a hair salons and color services. So, assuming that not every recipient of the yellow page ads are even looking for your business type, service, or product, you are essentially spending money on ads that one, don’t connect with all viewers, and two, don’t reach all the viewers who are looking for your type of business.

Digital marketing, on the other hand, bridges the gap between the consumer and your business. Not only does it allow your ads to be seen more frequently, as it places your ads on platforms that are being used by today’s consumers, but it targets consumers that are in the market for whatever your business supplies. With digital marketing, the money you spend is used to increase your visibility for those who are searching for specific services, products or information relating to your business. This means, that instead of hundreds of people who aren’t searching for, say, commercial landscaping services, seeing your yellow page, commercial landscaping ad, your ad is being viewed by commercial building owners who are looking for landscaping services.

It may seem complicated, and you may not understand exactly how it works, but you know the world is changing. And with that, comes the knowledge that you must make a change too. So, even though you may not understand digital marketing, it’s important to see its value, and weigh it against the marketing strategy you are using now. If you are still spending thousands of dollars on yellow page ads, it’s time to make a change. It’s time to spend your money online, where it counts, for the sake of growing your business.