Phonebook Bulletproofing

If you've ever wondered if Phonebooks could be used to bulletproof your car, I might just have the answer you've been waiting for.

At the recent ADP Annual Convention and Partners Trade Show, we spoke to a lot of Directory Publishers that told us just how many Yellow Pages and Phonebooks their sales reps carry around on a daily basis. Now, we're not sure if they're trying to bulletproof their cars for some or other reason or whether it is purely for business reasons, we just think there must be a better way.

The "MythBusters" team from Discovery.com, famous for "busting myths" of all sorts, did an experiment to see if it is true that you can bulletproof your car by sticking Phonebooks in the doors - http://bit.ly/bOiBtK. In all, it took 400 Phonebooks to completely cover the car & make it virtually impervious to all but the most high-powered rifles.

We're not sure if a lot of reps carry 400 Phonebooks in their car every day, but I've seen the trunks & back seats of a couple of Yellow Pages reps and for some it might not be that far off...

There is a better way though, you might even want to call it a "silver bullet", go take a look at our iPad solution for Yellow Pages, Phonebooks & Sales Reps at http://yellotouch.com and http://bit.ly/dfJCIA .

We cannot guarantee that it will bulletproof your reps' cars, but it's a lot easier to carry around!

YelloTouch Released Today!

YelloTouch utilizes a realistic page-turning display environment in which entire directories can be downloaded, searched, and viewed on an iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad.
Publishers can e-distribute their directories using the Apple Apps Store and users can download the directories for free. Not only does this create a new distribution channel, but maybe more importantly, it gives them an alternative to offer when someone says they would like to opt-out. They could say “If you do not want to receive a printed directory, how would you like to receive one on your iPhone?”.
It provides new sales opportunities and creates a competitive advantage.
It saves money for there are no printing costs, no books to distribute, and no recycling concerns.
Users can see the whole book, including the covers, inside covers, community pages, tabs, all white pages sections, and of course, the yellow pages.
The system is independent of the publishing system used to create the directory. Simply send us your PDF files.
See a video of the Hagadone Directories North Idaho May 2009 - 2010 directory by going to http://www.yellotouch.com where you will find the YouTube video.

Magic Club Has Been Scheduled!

Mark your calendar! We have tentatively scheduled our next Magic Club meeting for October 6-9, 2010 in beautiful San Diego.

As always, we will have a welcome reception on Wednesday evening where all Magic Club members can see old friends and meet new members. The meetings will start the next morning and will continue until mid-afternoon on both Thursday and Friday. Saturday will be a half-day so that everyone will have an opportunity to enjoy San Diego or to catch a plane home.

Yellow Magic Incorporated will host the welcome reception, continental breakfasts on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday as well as lunch on Thursday and Friday. All Magic Club members in good standing can have up to two attendees at no charge, but there will be a small charge for more than two.

Be prepared to learn a lot as we demonstrate all of the new features of Yellow Magic version 2.2 along with a host of exciting companion products. Learn how your customers can view and approve their ads and listings online and how your sales reps can have paperless contracts!


Paula will be confirming the date and venue soon, so watch this blog and your mail for more details.

See you in San Diego!

Is Yellow Pages Publishing An Art Form?

I think anyone that has gone through the process of creating a Yellow Pages Directory or even a regular Phone Book, would agree that there is a degree of art involved.

For some people far more so than for others. For some Yellow Pages Publishers it's all about speed & getting 500 pages paginated in a morning. Some others prefer (and insist) on rather spending an hour on a single page, discussing the layout & tweaking the settings until it is truly a work of art with the signature of the publisher proudly on every page.

Here at Yellow Magic, we understand that, which is why you as the artist & Publisher, are completely in control of what your book is going to look like. We have close to 500 different commands that you can tweak until you have exactly what you had in mind. If you have a change of mind, you can go right back, change it & see the result immediately. You don't have to call us or send any files to us in order to make those changes, it's all in your hands and in your control.

Of course if you just want to get the job done, we'll help you set it all up so that you get a beautiful book without all the fuss. We call it Sleight-of-Hand, you might call it magic.

Although not a Publisher, Alex Queral is a Yellow Pages artist, but he has chosen a very unusual canvas for his art, he carves faces out of old Telephone Directories.
http://www.projectsgallery.com/Queral.htm


Alex looks past the pages & sees the people inside and although we here at Yellow Magic might not all be artists, we also look past the pages and we see you.

Contact us if you need any help with creating your next piece of Yellow Pages art, we'd love to help.

Save Time, Save Money, and Save Trees

You may have received an e-mail from Grace titled “Save Time, Save Money, and Save Trees”. As some of you know, Yellow Magic has been in the process of implementing totally paperless business processes for yellow pages publishers.

It started out with our Document Imaging feature where all contracts, verifications, confirmations, copy sheets, proofs, customer correspondence, invoices, late letters, customer service notes, marketing material, and more could be created, e-mailed, and/or maintained electronically so that paper did not have to flow around the office. Many Yellow Magic users are already using this.

Last year when we introduced Mobile SalesMagic, we went a step further by distributing sales leads to sales reps on their mobile phones and allowing them to report sales call results electronically, thereby eliminating the time-consuming sales call reports. Now, at the upcoming ADP and YPA conventions we will be showing the last two pieces of the puzzle that will complete our quest to offer totally paperless yellow pages business processes.

The first piece is what we call ProofMagic. ProofMagic allows publishers to post their proofs (yellow page listings, white page listings, display ads, white page banners, internet banners, etc.) to a web site and the advertiser receives an e-mail with a link where they can approve (or not) these proofs.

And the grand finale is the ability to write contracts without paper! If you want to learn how this works, plan to come by our booth at ADP or schedule a Strategic Exchange Session at YPA.

Out-of-the-Hat Newsletter

On February 3rd we mailed out the latest edition of Out-of-the-Hat, the Yellow Magic newsletter. If you didn’t get one, you can go here to see it. http://www.yellowmagic.com/newsletter/

If you would like to subscribe, go here: http://www.yellowmagic.com/newsletter/signup.html

And if you have any suggestions for future topics for the newsletter, please let us know.

The Birth of Wolley Segap

The first Telephone Book had no numbers, just names & consisted of only one sheet of paper!

The image to the left shows the first Telephone Directory, printed just two years after Alexander Graham Bell was granted a patent on his telephone in 1876.

From the records available, it would seem that the first Yellow Pages directory was published on May 15, 1886 for the Chicago Telephone Company. There is however another story that says that the first classified listings with ads were produced by the Cheyenne Wyoming Telephone Company, in 1883 on Yellow paper, because the printer had run out of White stock.

Whichever it is, the process of creating Telephone Directories & Yellow Pages have come a long way!

In 1960 the Michigan telephone book featured the cartoon character Wolley Segap ("yelloW pageS") that promoted Yellow Page ads & now Wolley Segap's ads amount to a world wide $30 Billion+ industry.

We're not quite as old as Wolley, but we've been around since 1989 & we love the Yellow Pages. We love to create products that make it easier for you to run your Directory Publishing company and get your slice of that $30 Billion!

Speak to us about anything from print directory and pagination systems, internet directory publishing, mobile directory publishing, CD Rom directory publishing to sales force automation & social media!

Our software has been licensed to more than 150 directory-publishing companies worldwide. In addition to many sites in the United States, Yellow Magic’s software is installed in Canada, Central America, the Caribbean, South America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. It has been used to create directories for 54 countries and in 23 languages. No mean feat!

Images & information from:
http://www.oldtelephonebooks.com