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In the early 1980’s it was realized that many businesses dedicated too much of their advertising budget to an area that offered very little possibility of growth or return…something many business describe as a “necessary evil”…the yellow pages (which ironically isn’t even a form of advertising). In an attempt to help educate businesses on more effective ways to advertise, American Consulting Services was founded and began training media properties in the use of this yellow page consulting technique. This consultative selling approach resulted in merchants reducing what they spent in the yellow pages and redirecting the dollars into more effective creative advertising.

In addition to the questioning technique, the media properties were also educated on what the yellow pages really were, how they were sold, prices and on consumer usage. Over 29,000 salespeople at more than 1,000 media properties (including 85 of the top 100 markets) began “Selling Against the Yellow Pages”. By 1990, Yellow Pages revenue growth had whittled down from 18% per year to 2% per year.

In 1988, American Consulting Services produced a videotape version of their training system, “A Closer Look At Yellow Pages Advertising”, to be used as a retraining tool and allow smaller media properties to take advantage of this valuable training. Training was expanded to include seminars designed for merchants and professional associations. Business owners were taught how to evaluate the effectiveness of their yellow pages expenditures and also learned more effective ways to market their business.

In 1990, A.C.S. launched TOMA Research and created a tool for the advertising salesperson unlike any other in the marketplace. The TOMA survey measures who is thought of first in up to 60 categories of business. Most businesses do not score as well as they wish and learn that they need long-term name awareness advertising to succeed. This TOMA concept is now offered in over a thousand markets throughout North America.

American Consulting Services and TOMA Research is committed to excellent service, product innovation, measurable results and helping media properties generate new, unbudgeted revenue from non-traditional sources.

As American Consulting Services and TOMA Research celebrates it’s 20th year, they reaffirm their ongoing commitment to excellent service, product innovation, measurable results and helping media properties generate new, unbudgeted revenue from non-traditional sources.