118 118 Help/Advice

[Malc]

Hi to all you UK lockies,

Need your advice, thoughts on 118 118. Had the rep round from them this morning and went through the presentation and costs etc etc.

I've been looking into doing this for a while but it seems the Reactfasts of this world seem to get the lions share of the calls ( having done some test calls myself ).

Price i've been given is £1275 plus vat for 1 year for one area.

A) Does that seem pricey or is that about right ?

B) How does it work for you guys who do it ?

C) Is it worth doing. Will I get a return for my investment.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Malc

[horsefeathers]

There are several threads about Uk lockie advertising in the Business section.

However, if you get the £75 of the £1275 back I will eat my hat. It sounds incredibly steep!

I am not in any mobile directories (some lockies of course are, and say that IN THEIR AREA it works). But certainly in my area this form of advertising doesnt work, or rather you will get nowhere near the money you spend on it back. You will lose hundreds! And your number will get lost among the dozens of RF/Absolute Emergencies numbers etc.

What about the customers who dial 118500, or 118247 or some other mobile directory??? You gonna spend £1000+ with all them too???

[NickBristol]

My experience of 118 118 is that it works brilliantly.... for one small district in Bristol and only when the customer has asked specifically for a locksmith in that area. Which isn't often. Last year, jobs paid for the advertising cost and some more but not enough to get rich on, or even get decently drunk, but a profit is a profit at the end of the day.

Most people will be very general when describing their location, or the operator will locate them automatically to a city-wide position and that's where the big names get all the calls.

Oh, and never ever trust a rep. They are without fail only just after your money. I wouldn't be that surprised if company details never even made it onto the databases in some cases. Or you'll get the odd one or two calls per year just so they can say you got calls put thru or whatever therefore they delivered on their side of the contract.

[chip]

Sounds very steep to me.

I've taken out 9 ads with 118247 this year spread over my 3 nearest locations.

On average, so far this is, i've been getting 3-6 jobs per week out of it, which is pretty good.

Last year I had a single add with them and got 1 job all year, it's all about the percentages yur number comes out from the others.

Multiple ads are one way to go, and it doesn't work out too bad eiter with 247, mine was £1690+VAT for the year, for 9 ads

[haribo]

It can and does work but thing to do is get the best price in the first place. Makesure you haggle the price the rep told me £2500 + vat at first I told him to go forth etc. Finally got to £1k + vat it has brought in the work and i have profited. Always the same though depends on your area. It is normally the 25-35 age group i get calls via 118 from the older generations tend to go for the old fashioned books.