There must be very few people in life who have never had the misfortune to take the day off work to wait in for the plumber, electrician, TV repair or gas man, only to while it away watching Trisha and Loose Women, with not a workman in sight.
Therefore, the thought of thinking of the aforementioned AWOL tradesman in words longer than four letters is sometimes quite a troublesome task.
So it was rather brave then of Yellow Pages to build an entire campaign around the very notion of "thinking of the people behind the numbers".
The directory itself says the campaign is all about moving away from its image as a traditional brand to "a more human, engaging and modern feeling brand... championing the enterprising people who make up British business - big and small".
In one of the ads, a young woman who works in a cake shop is shown in slow motion preparing a cake; as she does so, she provides the narration about her pride when she sees the results of her endeavours.
Other ads feature a plasterer and a roofer, and are intended to "demonstrate the breadth and depth of skills, trades and services" provided by advertisers in the big yellow book.
All rather heart-warming stuff, but does the creative deliver? The multimillion, fully integrated campaign first hit our screens on 18 March and it seems to have had the desired effect.
BrandIndex shows that Yellow Pages' "buzz" rating has shot up to an all-time high of +10 since the campaign broke, backed up by constant radio ads.
This score is a sure sign that the ads have got people talking - and Yellow Pages' overall index has nudged up two points to +22.
Given the momentum, perhaps some bright spark behind the campaign will be reminding their paymaster to think of the people behind the numbers?
METHODOLOGY
YouGov's BrandIndex is a daily measure of public perception of more than 1,100 consumer brands across 32 sectors, measured on a seven-point profile, with data delivered on the next day.
YouGov interviews 2,000 people each weekday, more than half a million interviews per year.
This means you can spot trends as soon as they happen, not when it's too late. Respondents are drawn from an online panel of more than 130,000.
The score is the net rating: people are asked to identify the brands to which they have a positive response, and then those to which they have a negative response, to whatever is the prompt measure.
The net score is the positive minus the negative.
The seven measures that make the complete profile are below.
Each is taken independently - in any one survey, any individual respondent is asked about only one measure for the sector, not all seven. Therefore, none of the readings influence each other within the survey.
1. Buzz
2. General impression
3. Quality
4. Value
5. Satisfaction
6. Recommend
7. Corporate reputation
In addition, we supply an index score.
by Sundip Chahal
www.brandindex.com