I am looking at getting in contact with a few local companies that have had their website built with the poor efforts of Hibu and get them on board for a proper website tailored to their needs.

My question is this, are there any methods or tools out there to easily find a website like this? I don't really want to be trailing through every website on Yell.com to see if the credit points to Hibu or not.

As an owner of localized SMB's when I get such calls or emails they are rebuked very quickly, trying to market to a business by telling them what they have does not work in a cold call/email is not a good route to take.

 

I would recommend having your own portfolio up to the latest best practices and standards, going social and localizing your social efforts, then making sure you can be found easily on search and map. If a business owner feels their missing out they will find you before you can find them.

 

If you are going to try and target any one companies customers - DON'T ever put that in writing like you have here. You can get into trouble for it if it can be proven.

 

So rather than targeting Hibu's poor standards, which I must agree are as bad as they can be at times, use local searches looking for businesses with poor web sites or no web presents and approach them on a more positive line. Start with an ice breaker such as 'Hows business going for you at the moment', (Make sure you know a little about the company before you call, the name of who you need to talk too is important!), 'Do you see your business as a local or regional success?', 'I can help you find more customers'. You can work out the rest if you have a good sales patter.

Ah really, I didn't know I could get told off for something like this, think I'll forget about that one then. The next plan was exactly this, to target local businesses with poor websites and help them that way. Thanks for your advice.

I'm new to this game, but in my limited experience, people can have the most appalling websites and have no idea that there is anything wrong with them.

As Jane B said, terrible websites are typically owned by people who don't have any idea that they're terrible. I've approached a few businesses with sites like that and the owners were simply old men stuck in their ways. They got their backs up really quick and simply didn't want to know what I could do to help. If you can get an old guy with a crappy website to listen to you, you're a better cold-caller than me for sure.

This is true, I'm looking at trying to target the people who pay on a monthly basis and convert them to a one off payment saving them money. The idea being that an old man would want to save money in the long run, who wouldn't right.

How much does a Hibu cost because that'll be your working budget.

 

Wasting your time chasing the wrong customers is a costly mistake you should avoid making.

How much does a Hibu cost because that'll be your working budget.

 

Wasting your time chasing the wrong customers is a costly mistake you should avoid making.

They offered me a 'custom' 5 page site for £250 a year, and when I asked would that be based on a responsive template the telesales women (Hana I think she said here name was) said "responsive is ok but a 'mobile version' is much better and wont cost much to produce". They clearly don't regard the use of a template as an issue or she would have denied a template was being used LOL.

Do you guys think it would be better to give them a call or put it in writing and show them what I can do?

Have yourself a decent website for your business, search optimize it, advertise it, and make a point of advertising on yell if you want to pick up customers from them. You will be surprised just how many will be thinking 'is my site good enough' but when they get a cold call or spam mailing they will dump it like a dead donkey.

 

Telesales will work, but you will get one hell of a long list of unpleasant knock backs. Many of which will be very rude so be well prepared if you want to go down that route, and also be prepared to take no for an answer. Arguing your point will only send potential customers to a competitor. As to spam, all of mine gets shredded and is NEVER read!

Personally, I don't believe this works. I've spent some money with Yell for sponsored adds, not sure if it will help

That sounds like a pretty poor way of going about business. Despite being a bit sneaky, bare in mind that people who have a live website with hibu will have chosen it to be like that. I used to work there and the customer is involved in the design process and the website is set live once it has received their approval. This might frustrate the designers but ultimately it's down to the customer. Going in saying 'your website is crap' may actually be insulting to them.

 

I'd agree a lot of the older ones look quite dated but they do end up getting updated for free and the newer ones are mostly decent and competitively priced. I often saw one man outfits/small companies going in for customers like this promising something better, more often than not the results were not what they promised and the customer would be back to hibu. Also note they offer a lot of extra support and just being linked to Yell helps SEO compared to an unknown small company.

 

If you offer something better then get a showcase of your best work and advertise in the same places. If people are unhappy with what they've got then they'll come to you. No-one's going to trust a cold caller coming in with that pitch..

11 months old thread, lol

 

In the last year we had 9 clients moving away from Hibu/Yell.

Edited March 19, 201511 yr by newman