TheBluebook.com

AAPaint

Is anyone here using bluebook for leads or anything else? I have been contacted a few times by them, but it seems they only offer commercial work, and they want me to join (which means pay money monthly, I'm sure) to be part of their network or whatever it is they have. I'm going to go meet their rep on Wed. to see what it's all about.

I'm not too keen on paying for leads, and most definitely not going to pay to be a part of something monthly. I would like to hear if any of you know anything about this company at all.

They have sent a couple of commercial leads to my e-mail....but I'm not too keen on doing commercial work either. If that's all they offer it might as well be nothing in my book.

Opinions please?

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-AAPaint

AA Quality Painting & Pressure Washing LLC
Jacksonville Painters
Jacksonville, FL.

PipeGuy

If I had to guess, only commercial GC's even know what The Blue Book of Building and Constructon is. It costs good money to both buy (it's published by region) and advertise in. The advertising fee is annual and depends on your ad(s). My ads about $3,000 / year.
As an advertiser I get the BB-Bid e-mail announcements (leads). They're useless.

__________________
Fortunately I keep my feathers numbered for...for just such an emergency. -Foghorn Leghorn

eastend

I'll second Pipe Guy's comment. I ran ads in their books for a couple of years- it's not inexpensive. Also got their BB-bid leads. Got very few legit inquiries (most of them were for work we don't do) and the leads were useless- totally off the mark for what we do.

AAPaint

That pretty much puts them off the list for me. I don't mind getting into commercial work in the future, but not at this point. Not only that, but I'm not forking out thousands of $$ to bother with anyone. If I'm gonna spend $$, I'll do my own advertising and build my own brand.

__________________
-AAPaint

AA Quality Painting & Pressure Washing LLC
Jacksonville Painters
Jacksonville, FL.

mdshunk

blue book blue book

tgeb

I have a free listing in the Blue Book.
Just name and number under excavating.

And they send me a free copy annually!

__________________
Tom

www.gebcon.com

mdshunk

Everybody gets a free line ad listing. I've never gotten a free copy, though.

mdshunk

ddddddddddddddddd

tgeb

Well don't anybody tell em I've been getting it, they might send me a bill!

I haven't gotten a project from the book in years but do use it to find suppliers sometimes.

__________________
Tom

www.gebcon.com

Frankawitz

I have had a free listing in that book for a few years, they send me a free copy every year. they deal with commerical work, I told them we only do residential work, Insurance repairs. but I did get a call from a builder looking for a Plaster Contractor so I have to meet with them on Monday to give them a bid. I have found there are allot of these types poping up. that's like the Yellow Book USA, this bunch is a rip off, I set up an advertisment with them gave them a low down payment and set up ads to run in their books(2), under the headings of Plastering, Painting and Drywall, I proof read the ads and when the books came out they had us doing Covice ceilings under Drywall. Then they run three BS checks through our checking account for $150.00 each and never gave us credit on our bill with them, They called me for payment of the ads and I told them I'll see you in court on stealing money out of our Company account. I haven't heard a word from them since I showed them copies of the BS checks they cashed. and on top of that we have a free listing in their books, go figure.

katttfishh

I get free listings. They send me a free book every year. I get requests for bids on new jobs. I just used their email quote setup for a price on some cabinets and I recieved three quotes from subs the next day. All free. Cant find a single reason for complaining. Best thing since sliced bread for GCs.

RubyLou

A bluebook Ad is currently $3300 a year or $6000 for two years, if you want a small visual advertisement about your company to be shown if someone clicks on the link to your company. Otherwise, you can just be listed with a 'company profile' which shows a contact name, address, phone. I'm not sure how much that smaller subscription is, but I know that usually people who subscribe just get sales calls from lead companies, and it is more or less just a fancy, digital phone book. However, I have talked with one contactor and a couple of sub's who have been contacted and landed jobs or been given the opportunity to bid on jobs by getting an ad in bluebook for their company. For alot of smaller companies, though, its an investment that takes an even larger toll on their budgets, because they don't always recover the cost of placing the ad thru jobs the ad brings forth.

Anyways, how is everyone doing? I've talked to alot of people who are getting somewhat slow, but others are doing okay because they are finding developers or companies that are in a rush to get projects done before the full force of winter hits. (I guess that doesn't apply to all of you, but I'm in Michigan, so it does for me.)

Okay, well I am going to get offline now.

Ruby Kowal
Ruby@cnsofmich.com

dirt diggler

You know, some marketing salesman (and this isn't attacking you Ruby --- you just reminded me of this) was telling me the other day how good of an "investment" their lead service/ad was. As if he knew.

It's insulting to my intelligence

btw --- I thought Blue Book was free?? Is it helpful?? actually, I've found a couple suppliers through it

mdshunk

You get your "line ad" for free. If you want anything more special than that, you pay. Sorta like the yellow pages.

RubyLou

Hey Dirt,

I think its free to view, yeah, I'm not sure. Because I know if the phone number isn't working for one of the contractors I work with, I'll go to their site to see if they've changed it. Probably its only the advertisements that cost $$, but its free to find potential suppliers from, etc. I'm not sure why, though, but it seems like lately there are lots of missing links, companies that aren't in BB or in the phone book.

What lead svc salesman told you that? Actually I'm not in marketing, either .. but the message board police switched my "trade" to marketing. I do private project consulting, actually.

Anyway, where are you at? I am Western Michigan / Grand Rapids.

Debookkeeper

My GC I work for just opted not to renew in the Blue Book. They wanted 1600.00 for the year, and it included a 1/4 page ad under GC'S, an ad under Alterations & Additions, and one under millwork. Also have the link to the website. We are going to try direct mailing to Designers and Architects instead.

Peladu

I'm in the book. I didn't purchase an add, I'm just listed. I can tell you this, a lot of my mail to the business is from other companies marketing to GC's. But then again, I get calls for jobs also, and I land about one or two a year, just for being listed. But, in all fairness, my company is also listed on the Internet site, so these days I don't know if they grabbed me from the site or the book. I get the book every year.