Glossary
Yellow Pages Services

Useful Yellow Pages Definitions:
Additional Listing (AL or CLT):  A paid listing that shares the same account telephone number and appears in the same local white pages as the primary listing.  For example, another department under the same listing name, or another listing name associated with the same number.

Ad Sheet:  Customized proof of publication provided on request by Leone Advertising.  Generally consists of a single page indicating the directory name, publisher, pub date, & heading notes and includes all advertising for a particular customer in that particular directory (with headings noted).

Anchor listing:  A listing appearing alphabetically (in column) under a yellow pages heading that refers the user to a larger display ad often under the same heading.  An anchor listing often comes free of charge with the purchase of a display ad and features at least the customer’s name, and sometimes the customer’s address and telephone number.

Binder Copies:  Photocopies, provided to the client upon request, of the directory pages on which the advertising appears.  Binder copies can be provided in large batches or sent (one-at-a time) with our invoice.

Blue Pages:  The front section of any white pages directory that contains all government (city, county, and state) listings.

Bogus Yellow Pages bill:  A misleading and fraudulent yellow pages advertising “bill” that is actually a solicitation

Caption arrangement:  An arrangement of an advertiser’s listing information in the white or yellow pages in which the listed name appears only once, followed by two or more addresses (and/or other descriptors) and telephone numbers; used by customers who have multiple locations, departments, and/or phone numbers.  A note about caption arrangements:  numbers controlled by different utility phone companies (telcos)—Sprint vs. AT&T vs. Verizon—generally will not caption together.  This is one of the consequences of the ongoing trend of deregulation in the industry.

Certified Marketing Representative (CMR):  As opposed to a general advertising agency or a local directory sales representative, an advertising agency that assists regional or national advertisers in the planning, research, design, and administration of white pages, print yellow pages, and internet yellow pages programs.  In doing so, they are authorized by the customer to make listing changes.

Close date:  Deadline upon which new, additional, or different listing information and/or advertising must be submitted for publication in the next issue of a directory.  Note:  the white pages close date (referred to as the service order close date) for a given directory is often several weeks after the yellow pages close date for the same directory.

CLEC (Competitive Local Exchange Carrier):  A business that operates as a reseller of the incumbent (utility) local exchange carrier’s telecommunications services.  CLEC phone service often results in listing errors and omissions, as CLECs generally don’t have specialized listings groups.  Due to regulatory issues and the CLEC’s agency agreements with their clients, listing errors and omissions generated by the CLEC can only be corrected by the CLEC.

Co-op advertising:  Advertising jointly funded by the manufacturer and retailer for their mutual benefit. The national advertiser and the local manufacturer share the cost of the local yellow page advertising.  Co-op dollars are often greatly under-utilized.

Cramming:  Unexplained charges on your phone bill for services you never ordered, authorized, received, or used.  Both one-time charges or monthly recurring charges can be crammed onto your phone bill.

Cross-Reference Heading:  A classified yellow pages heading under which no listings appear but refers the user to another classified heading covering the product or service.  For example, for the category of “Doctors”, see “Physicians”.

Cross-Reference Listing:  Cross-reference listings are used when an advertiser wants to refer directory users from a commonly-used or former name to another listing name. Cross-reference listings are available with or without a phone number.  Appropriate for customers who have recently taken over a business location under a different name.

Extension: Lengthening the life cycle of a directory to more than its normal life of one year (12 months). 

Exchange name:  Also known as “community name.”  The name of a city, town, region, etc. that appears in a directory, just after the street address, often in abbreviated form, as defined by the telephone company.

Foreign Directory:  A directory a customer advertises in other than their primary directory (the directory that covers the area where the customer is physically located).  For example, Santa Barbara would be a foreign directory for a customer located in Los Angeles.

Foreign listing (FAL or CLT):  A paid listing appearing in a directory other than the primary, or “home directory” that covers the area where the customer is physically located.  This term can also apply to phone numbers handled by one phone company appearing in another phone company’s directory.  800 numbers are also always considered foreign listings.

Heading:  A word or group of words—describing a business, product, or service—used in the yellow pages to categorize advertisers in a given line of business.

ILEC (Incumbent Local Exchange Carrier):  As opposed to a CLEC, the only local telephone service provider for a geographic area prior to the 1996 Telecommunications Act (i.e. AT&T in most parts of California, Qwest in most parts of the Pacific Northwest, etc.).

Indents:  Often used in caption arrangements when listing different addresses and/or telephone numbers under a single listing name. The degree of indent identifies the amount of space the indented listing is shifted to the right under the caption heading. For example:

        XYZ Business
                      [Name of City]
                         [Address] …………………… [Phone Number]
                         [Address] …………………… [Phone Number]
                      [Name of City]
                         [Address] …………………… [Phone Number]
                        
In this case, city name is indented at the first level, while addresses are indented at the second level.

Independent publisher:  A company other than the telephone company that publishes yellow pages directories.  (clarify this one since telco and pubco are 2 separate entities).

Independent telephone company:  A telephone company other than Sprint, Qwest, Verizon, or AT&T.  For example, a small, rural utility phone company or a CLEC (see definition).

Internet Yellow Pages (IYP):  An online version of print yellow pages.
  • Regional IYP:  directly associated with regionalized telecommunication organizations that distribute yellow pages directories.  Includes Dex Online (Dex/RH Donnelley), SuperPages (Verizon), and YellowPages.com (AT&T and Bell South).  Despite the fact that these are referred to as regional IYP, you can advertise nationally on these sites.
  • National IYP: not directly associated with regionalized telecommunication organizations.  Includes Switchboard, Yahoo Yellow Pages, AOL Yellow Pages. Despite the fact that these are referred to as national IYP, you can advertise regionally on these sites.

Listed Address/Service Address (LAD/SAD):  A listed address is the address that appears in the printed directory; a service address is the address where a customer is physically located.  While the listed address and service address are usually interchangeable, advertisers occasionally want to have their address appear differently from what the telco (& emergency services!) designates as their service address.  For instance, the customer may request the address to appear as Campbell Av and Thompson Rd (listed address) as opposed to 1234 Campbell Av (the telco-designated service address).  In this case, a LAD/SAD white pages request is submitted to the telco to cause the requested listed address to print in place of the service address.

Listing:  Made up of a customer’s name, address, and telephone number and printed in-column in the white pages, yellow pages, or online yellow pages.
                           
Local Advertising: Advertising purchased directly from a local representative of a publishing company for insertion in printed directories.  Pubcos tend to assign different close dates and pricing to local advertising reps and CMRs.

Main Listing Number (MLN/MNL/BTN for Billing Telephone Number):  The primary number in a business location’s bank of numbers; also the number entitled to a free business listing in both the white and yellow pages of its primary directory.

Marketing the Medium (MTM)Ò:  Developed by the Association of Directory Marketing (ADM), an industry-wide initiative that uses marketplace testing to prove the value of the Yellow Pages to national advertisers.  For example, MTM can help demonstrate that a larger ad, or an ad in a new heading or neighborhood directory, generates additional sales at a very favorable ROI.  The testing can also involve split-run directories that test two ad variations.  Call-tracking technology is used to count calls to telephone numbers in the current ad and a test ad, and after the test, an advertiser assesses the value of an expanded program.

National Advertising:  Advertising purchased through a certified marketing representative (CMR) for insertion in printed directories.  To qualify as a national account, the following criteria must be met:  advertising must be (1) with two different pubcos; (2) in 20 directories; (3) in 3 states; and (4) with 30% of revenue is outside of the primary state.  Note:  pubcos tend to assign different close dates and pricing to local advertising reps and CMRs.

Non-published listing (Non-pub):  A listing that will appear on directory assistance records without the telephone number and will not appear in the printed directory.  Often there is a minimal monthly charge associated with making a number non-published.

Primary Directory:  Also referred to as the “home” directory for a given phone number, the primary directory covers the area where the advertiser is physically located.  Business customers are usually offered a free/courtesy listing (SRL) in both the white and yellow pages of their primary directory.

Projected Print Distribution:  As defined by the publisher (with respect to directory circulation), the anticipated full year distribution for the book on the street.

Publication Date (Pub Date, Issue Date):  The official date (month) a telephone directory is scheduled to be in circulation.

Publishing company (Pubco):  A separate entity from the telephone company (telco), the pubco is responsible for compiling directory information & advertising and printing & distributing the telephone directory.  Note:  while they are separate entities, it is not uncommon for the telco and pubco to share the same name, as is the case with AT&T & Verizon.

Remote Call Forwarding (RCF) Number:  A number provided by a telco or specialized vendor, set up to automatically forward all incoming calls to another telephone number in a same or different exchange.  Obtaining RCF numbers is extremely useful in testing the value of a given yellow pages directory.  By placing an RCF number (which forwards to an advertiser’s real business number) in a single display ad, it is possible to determine the number of telephone calls that the advertiser receives vis-à-vis that particular yellow pages ad.  This, in turn, can help determine the return on investment (ROI) for that directory.

Rescope:  The reconfiguration of a printed directory’s coverage area.  This is when a telco redefines the geographic coverage of a directory as well as the listing content base of a directory according to area code/prefix, zip code, or exchange tables (each company has their own specific scoping criteria).  Such reconfigurations may consist of adding or deleting exchanges, combining two or more directories into one, or separating one directory into smaller directories.  Rescoping occurs purely at the discretion of a given phone company and may explain why a customer’s listing is “no longer entitled to an SRL” in a given directory.

Scoped listing:  A listing not in a given directory’s primary coverage area but appearing in that directory, free of charge, based on its proximity to that directory (determined by area code/prefix, zip code, or exchange tables), as defined by the controlling phone company.  Scoping can also apply to phone numbers controlled by one phone company appearing in another phone company’s directory but, unlike foreign listings, involves no charge.   Scoping occurs purely at the discretion of a given phone company, with certain telcos scoping more numbers than others.  Some of the inconsistencies in scoping policies between various telcos occur due to regulatory issues in certain geographic areas.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM): The marketing of a website via search engines, whether through improving rank in organic listings, purchasing paid listings, or a combination of these and other search engine-related activities.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO): The process of increasing the amount of visitors to a website by ranking high in the search results of a search engine. SEO helps to ensure that a site is accessible to a search engine and improves the chances that the site will be found by the search engine.  Of course, the higher a website ranks in the results of a search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user.

Sectionalized (white pages) directory:  When the white pages of a given directory are sectionalized according to community/town; each town is listed alphabetically, followed by its respective listings grouped in alpha order or when alphabetical listings in the white pages of a given directory are first divided into community sections that appear in alphabetical order by community name. 

Short life:  Shortening the life cycle of a directory to less than its normal life of 12 months.

Slamming:  An unauthorized change in your local, regional toll, and/or long distance carrier.  Can be prevented by requesting a “carrier freeze” through your phone company.

SRL (Service Regular Listing):  Also referred to as a courtesy listing, an SRL is a free regular type listing (as opposed to bold) to which most local utility phone service entitles their business customers.  The free listing includes the business’ name, address, and telephone number and appears in both the white pages and under a yellow pages heading of choice in the business’ primary directory.

Straight line listing:  When a customer’s name, address, and  telephone number appear on one line (sometimes two, when the  length of listing info causes an overrun into the second line).  That is, when a listing does not appear in caption.

Tear pages:  Pages on which directory advertising appears, pulled directly from the printed directory. Tear pages accompany the publisher’s billing invoice as proof of publication, and Leone Advertising is happy to pass these (or color tear page copies) directly onto the customer as proof of publication.

Telco (Telephone Company):  The original seven Regional Bell Operation Companies (RBOCS)—Ameritech (now AT&T), Bell Atlantic (now Verizon), Bell South, Southwestern Bell (now AT&T), US West (now Qwest), Pacific Bell (now AT&T), NYNEX (now Verizon) plus GTE (now Verizon) and Sprint/RH Donnelley—that were formed as a result of the AT&T deregulation.  Each RBOC covers a separate area of the U.S.  Although most RBOCs have a pubco under the same name (for instance, Verizon), the telco and the pubco are two separate entities.  The telco generally controls phone service, or “dial tone,” and listing content and format in their respective 411 (directory assistance) databases and in the printed white pages.  Generally, listing information appearing in the yellow pages must agree with the respective telco databases, although in some cases, paid advertising can override this.

UDAC:  (Industry jargon) Universal Directory Advertising Code; a code that identifies items of advertising (i.e. DHC, 5HS, ABLN)

White Pages (WPs):  A publication which lists alphabetically the name, address and telephone numbers of telephone service subscribers who wish to be listed; better understood as a printed version of the 411 (directory assistance) database as it appears at the time of publication.  The white pages close date for a given directory is often several weeks after the yellow pages close date for the same directory.

Yellow Pages (YPs):  A publication that provides the name, address and telephone number alphabetically listed under types of business or service headings. Generally, listing information appearing in the yellow pages must agree with the respective telco databases, although in some cases, paid advertising can override this.

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