One of our favourite websites for assistance with Search Engine Optimisation is, you guessed it. SEOBook.com.

In particular they provide FREE tools as add-ons for Firefox.

We’ve been using:

A few features of Rank Checker worth mentioning:

• It enables you to check all your keyword rankings within the SERPS of Google, Yahoo and Live Search (MSN).
• You can specify which Google to check. We’ve been using the .co.uk version of Google.
• It performs quicker than a lot of other tools we’ve tried out. (Web CEO for one…painfully slow)
• The top 200 results are checked for a rank, if you aren’t found you’ll see a dash.
• After using it for a month or so we’ve found it to be not always accurate, but its usually within 10 places or so.

A few features of SEO for Firefox worth mentioning:

• Customises your Google results page. Adding useful…& some not so useful information to each result.
• Adds some links underneath the search box, such as the interesting ‘Google Trends‘, and ‘Google Insights‘. CSV is also a useful tool, it enables you to export all data on the page into a spreadsheet.
• The most useful things it adds are ‘PageRank’ for each result, Alexarank, and Age of Website (Domain).

Go check them out.

SEO Book: Link

Roxbourne Search Engine Optimisation Services

Being a Great leader requires a combination of skills, character traits, experience, mental strength, intelligence and principles.

If you are a leader and you lack any one of the following YOU WILL ultimately get found out and crash and burn:

• Can articulate a compelling vision of the future that’s clear and focused
• A good communicator with a simple message
• A charismatic and enthusiastic character
• Able to mobilise people and hold their company/team together
• Can inspire confidence and empower others
• Can bring out the best in others
• Is credible, courageous and proactive
• Has admirable principles which guide decisions
• Makes decisions intelligently, quickly and with commitment
• Has high expectations in self and others
• Can establish a success formula and achieve tasks efficiently
• Searches for new opportunities for their company to consider
• Is flexible and can refocus in light of new opportunities or threats
• Predicts future demand and trends and plans for them
• Embraces technology
• Puts health and family before work (within reason)
• Can take advice and knows the right people to get it from
• Can manage change effectively

Alexander Bullivant
Roxbourne Marketing Consultants

Those who get a lot of referred business are usually good at their job – AND clients know it.

Their clients KNOW, understand and appreciate the service and its benefits, believe they are given good value for money and they also TRUST and LIKE the person that deals with them or provides the service to the extent that they want to help them.

KNOW, TRUST & LIKE are the attributes that need to be improved in order to get lots of quality referrals. more…

Those that don’t get a lot of referred business EITHER have a low level of KNOW, TRUST AND LIKE, unbelievably don’t ask for referrals, or both. If it’s mainly due to not asking; this is relatively easy to fix, but it must be done properly and consistently as a natural procedure and a culture developed and honed within the firm. Management needs to embrace it as a business system.

Client facing staff need to be aware that in order to gain lots of quality referrals they need to be generally liked, valued and trusted by their clients and thus should WORK on these aspects – with SINCERITY. They also need to CARE about their clients again with sincerity, and clients need to FEEL it.

Asking for referrals is NOT begging and should never be done in desperation. Clients need to be made aware of the benefits to THEM that you use Referral Marketing Systems. They should ultimately feel they WANT to refer quite happily, they should want to see you and your firm continue to prosper.

The best time to ask a client for a referral is just after you’ve concluded some work particularly just after they thank you; at this point they’re feeling very happy with their decision and suitably softened for your appeal.

A referral is only a referral if you have permission to quote the referrer’s name to them and giving thanks for referrals is a must; remembering personal details (write them down somewhere) to chat about will help build rapport each time you talk. A quick note on building rapport – it is not something confined to the first 10 minutes of a meeting; it is something you should do continuously. Business discussion can become tedious and dry and it helps to dilute that with normal human banter.

Alexander Bullivant Roxbourne Marketing Strategies

Also see post on about Referrals From External Connections

• Why are you in business and where do you want to take it?
• What is mission critical?
• What barriers to success are in your way?
• What sets you apart from your competition?
• What do your customers really need/want?
• Have you researched it?
• What kind of service do they expect these days?

Endless things to consider.. all you know is turnover and profits must rise and stress levels must fall.

What’s needed are a new Mission Statement and an Action Plan to get passionate about. You need to research, innovate and develop your offering to attract more and better business, boost client/customer satisfaction and reputation.

Re-focus on a new mission and work out a success formula for your business. Once you have a clear Mission Statement you can then start to work out suitable and effective Strategies and Tactics within a practical and tailor-made Company Action Plan. Develop, use and perfect those marketing tactics to attract more clients/customers to your door.

Within the Company Action Plan there can be various subsections like

• Marketing and Sales Tactics,
• Process Efficiency,
• Growth Plan,
• Customer/Client Care Management,
• Service/Product Development Plan,
• Modernisation and Technology,
• Your Internet Strategy,
• Cost Reduction,
• Employee Incentives,
• Competition Beating Tactics,
• Work/Life Balance,
• Your Exit Strategy as a shareholder, etc.

Consider the following:-

• Do you ever consider new marketing methods borrowed from other industries?
• Do you regularly send emails to your clients/customers?
• Have you updated your website’s blog, main content, style or coding recently?
• Have you checked where your website appears in internet search engine results pages?
• Do you develop Centres of Influence in your community?
• Do you ever ask for referrals?

If you have a client base you simply MUST develop a Referral Marketing System – it’s all about KNOW, LIKE and TRUST – see other blog on referral marketing.

You need to make sure your website and marketing materials abide by the old marketing chestnut -

AIDA – Attention, Interest, Desire and Action.

• How about branching out?
• How about working with related but non-competing companies – sharing contacts?
• How about developing your services?
• How about offering new consumer friendly policies rather than “protect the company at all costs policies”?

You can read all about Business Strategy and Marketing from 1,000s of books, the internet, at university, etc but they can’t provide MOTIVATION and ACTION.

Writing a fresh 2009 Mission Statement and Action Plan maybe what’s needed to help get you passionate, rejuvenated and positive about the future again.

A new and exciting Company Action Plan is all very well, but it clearly needs to be embraced and followed by all in your company. As a leader – inspire your teams – let them feel your fresh confidence – give them a reason to work smart and be proud to work with you and in your company. See our recent blog about the traits of a great leader.

Good luck for 2009 – be positive – recessions come and go (although this is a mother) - like evolution and the survival of the fittest - it may just help you out by eliminating a few competitors.

If you need some external Strategy and Marketing assistance – consider us. By delegating some or all of your marketing strategy to Roxbourne you will not only have our wealth of experience and abilities but also our hands-on assistance in turning your objectives into plans, into action, into results.

We will take time in understanding your business and your objectives, help you write a mission statement, conduct the consumer and market analysis, decide suitable marketing strategies and tactics AND help you deliver those plans and create results. Sometimes it helps to have an outsider’s view, entrenched employees are very often scared to make the necessary changes.

I have learnt a fair amount of things about marketing, the kind of stuff you won’t even read about in books like “What they can’t teach you at business school”. I have nearly 25 years of experience in Services Marketing Strategy, I read a lot, I keep up-to-date as much as anyone can, I try to predict the future (try it) and I think a lot. I don’t profess to be an expert – they don’t exist – just a helping hand with some passion, empirical recommendations and a fascination for assisting owner managers build their businesses.

Give Roxbourne a call and find out how much we could help you build your business.

Alexander Bullivant

Ask about our FREE  initial marketing consultation.

A COI is ideally a client who knows your firm and at least one person in it very well and trusts and respects what you do and is confident enough to recommend you often and without hesitation.

The reason they are like this is a combination of their character – “they are just naturally like that”, and their social status or power status at work. COIs need to be identified within your client-base and treated very well for obvious reasons. More…

Other COI in the local area that are not yet clients need to be identified, researched and carefully approached. These could be heads of Chambers of Commerce, managers of large clubs, the Major, local MPs, council executives and other public sector leaders, managers of the biggest firms in the area, newspaper and magazine editors, heads of influential business groups or associations, etc. A brain storming session is needed to build a list then ascertain why a person would be useful to develop a relationship with, and how you go about it.

Ideally you want these COI as clients and to get regular referrals from them – at the very least they need to know all about your firm and services and see you in a favourable light.

If in the course of conversations with a client, it transpires that they need help with something or they need a contact, e.g. to help get planning permission, raise funds, gain support for a new venture or influence authority, etc – then it clearly comes in handy if you can whip out your black book of COI contacts and other connections that you can introduce. You will be highly appreciated and remembered for when it comes to asking for referrals or recommendations in return.

Alexander Bullivant www.roxbourne.com

See our other blogs on Referral Marketing

Getting leads from Colleagues, Internal Business Referrals,  Inter-departmental Referring or Cross-selling, whatever you call it – either way you’re maximising the value of your clients. Here’s some simple tips – but be aware of the common problems.

This post is for any firm or individual that has clients,  rather than customers. It follows on from our other blogs on Referral Marketing and from info on our main website. Referral Marketing is the best business development strategy there is for Service Providers…

Some firms are good at inter-departmental referring others are not; either way your strategy for dealing with this should be included in your overall Marketing Plan.

Human nature needs to be used to your advantage rather than disadvantage.

There will be…

• “What’s in it for me?”
• “I don’t rate them”
• “I wouldn’t feel comfortable letting anyone else deal with my client”
• “I’ve heard bad things about their department…”

All these barriers need to be recognised, suitably torn down and replaced with a nice combination of warm loyal camaraderie and hard company policy.

Strong leadership and management is needed here to ensure colleagues share their clients where necessary and always look for opportunities for cross-selling. Regular Internal networking meetings, building closer internal relationships and integrating a suitable remuneration policy is crucial. How about social occasions for staff and selected clients mixed in?

KNOW, TRUST and LIKE also comes into play with regard to internal referrals too. (See previous referral marketing posts.) That’s why work colleagues need to socialise and network more.

Give Roxbourne a call and find out how much we could help you build your firm.

Alexander Bullivant Roxbourne Marketing Designers

Ask about our free initial marketing consultation

Referral Marketing is the best business development strategy there is for Service Providers…

…Accountants, Financial Advisers, Solicitors, Dentists, Designers, Architects, Plastic Surgeons, Builders, Vets, IT Services, Website Designers, Stylists, Trainers, Consultants, Printers, Landscape Gardeners, Brokers, etc.

Other service providers and professions other than your own have clients that may also need your services; your clients might also need their services. So it makes perfect sense to be proactive about it. Working more holistically and referring your clients to other carefully selected providers and professionals will compliment your own offering, bringing ‘added value services’ that your clients will appreciate and remember you for. In return the service providers and professionals are also more inclined to refer their clients to you, which is the main objective.

Whatever service you provide, the backbone of building your business is client acquisition and retention, one way to do this is to understand that there is a growing need to be more holistic. This requires knowledge of some other local service providers and professionals and their respective complimentary expertise. Building relationships and respectful trust with local firms and their individuals, getting to know how they operate and exactly what they can do – will help you spot opportunities for them. In the spirit of reciprocity they will want to refer back in order to keep you referring to them and to stay in ‘the reciprocal team of complimentary services’, with all its benefits.

EXAMPLE :- As an Accountant it makes perfect sense to build up good connections within Law, Financial Services and Risk Management, Banking, etc. And those fellow professionals should clearly seek out Accountants and Tax Advisers to compliment their own services too.

When the relationship with your external complimentary connections is managed properly it will bring new clients your way – either as direct referrals back again or via your clients recommending your more encompassing services. Joint effort projects bring added value services to each profession – building greater client satisfaction and thus greater loyalty, both of which need to be in place for your existing clients to recommend your services to others.

How you find other complimentary service providers depends on where you are now, you may know them and work with them already but maybe you both need to be more proactive. You may wish to be more analytical about it and research all the relevant local firms and their services.

Using a service level agreement (SLA) shows professionalism as it will state how you promise to look after their clients and what they can expect in regard to duty of care, procedures and service, etc. This builds trust also. Keeping a regularly updated database of referred clients and progress is a must. This is used to keep all parties informed and as a discussion document at regular review meetings. Approaching and building relationships with other service providers and professionals must be done carefully, with research, patience, determination and a Win/Win attitude. You have a lot to offer the right firms and in return you have a lot to gain from them, get it wrong and the doors will shut for a long time.

Alexander Bullivant www.roxbourne.com

See our other blogs on Referral Marketing

This blog is for any firm or individual that has clients and a client base, rather than customers. It follows on from our other blogs on Referral Marketing and from info on our main website. Referral Marketing is the best business development strategy there is for Service Providers…

Simple is best – it’s easier to ask with just one sentence, it’s clearly faster and efficient and less likely to be left out of a meeting than a long rehearsed speech on why you want referrals and how the system benefits the client, etc. However, you need to memorise a longer set of effective phrases when you come up against resistance to referral giving.

I have a 300 word speech from years ago written by an American referral marketing guru – it’s over the top but the core principles contained within it can hardly be argued with. When resistance occurs a better set of phrases is needed based on the core principles, just asking is NOT  insufficient.

Clients need to know why you work a referral system and how it benefits them in many ways, and why you would like them to refer people they know to you. Learning stock phrases and how to handle objections in a non-confrontational way is the key. This needs to be learnt, it should be embedded, tested and analysed on an on-going basis. The benefits will soon be realised. Those that become good at it will inspire and coach others eventually.

Thanking Clients for Every Referral

Remember a nice bottle of something as a thank you for each referral. How about posting some of your branded merchandise to the client’s place of work too. A great idea is a coffee mug with your company name, what you do well, your web address and phone number on it and importantly the words THANK YOU written on the other side – just an idea. Point is, their work colleagues will see it and it will not be thrown away.

Remember the attributes discussed in previous posts – KNOW, TRUST AND LIKE – if these are in place objections and hesitations will rarely happen.

Alexander Bullivant Roxbourne Referral Marketing Strategies

Call us about the FREE initial marketing consultation no obligation. 01543415423

The key to successful copy-writing -  for blogs, press releases, marketing literature, web pages, sales letters, tele-sales scripts, leaflets, posters, brochures, adverts, book titles, articles, white papers, etc.

……is having a High-Impact HEADLINE or TITLE

Draw people’s attention to reading the body text using a strong attention grabbing headline.

Grab them from the start. It’s about the HEADLINE TEST; if the title makes people read further – you have succeeded.

The headline should make sense, get ATTENTION and ATTRACT enough INTEREST for the reader to have the DESIRE to ACT by reading more.

If not, your copy headline is not strong enough.

To labour the point here’s a video of Dan Kennedy…

Make sure you’re barking up the right tree!

Aimed at business managers and entrepreneurs – this post is just to start you thinking about ways to improve your marketing efforts in 2009 and beyond.

New Economic Era – New Marketing Plan, The Customer Experience, Pain Points, Behavioural Data, Online-Shopping, Marketing in a Recession, Generation X, Y, Baby Boomers and Traditionalists. Predicting the Future.

How has the recession affected your target market?

What tactics within your marketing strategy do you NOW need to change, if you haven’t already?

Is it your prices or your target market? Do you work on efficiency, cheaper suppliers, etc ?

In today’s dynamic environment, where the consumer has a wealth of choice  and loves brands – you need to focus more on the customer’s ‘experience’ of your service, products, outlets, staff, website, etc.

What do they think? Ask them what they want. Collect email address to find out what they want, and then offer it… and stay in touch.

What is it that you are actually solving for people? The need to wear something nice that makes them feel better? The need for a cold beer? A hassle free way to sort out their tax or legal affairs?

Do they mainly want  the feeling of comfort or pride? Or mainly avoid hassle and pain?

Does what you provide as a business alleviate their fear, or increase their happiness?

You need to be aware of their pain points and explain in your marketing literature and website how you can solve their problems or increase their happiness.

Collect and analyse your customers/clients behavioural data and be aware of how consumers have changed in the digital information age – online shopping is is getting more and more popular for example. Should you go online if you’re not already? Does your website need an over-haul?

Be aware of how different generations think and react.

• Generation-Y (born 1978-2001 or so – aged below 30),
• Generation-X (1966-1977 31-42),
• Baby Boomers (1947-1965 age 43-61) and
• Traditionalists (pre 1947 age 61+)

They all have different buying decision processes. For example Generation Y are used to getting things quickly and probably don’t have mortgages or spouses yet.  Generation X – young families, overspending, disposables and materialism.  Traditionalists need a fair amount of trust, will take time in their decisions and prefer to buy things of quality that last. Baby Boomers – have half inherited their traditionalist parents principles but are loaded with Generation X aspirations and family responsibilities.

Which are your target market?   Approach and communicate with them appropriately.

The current economic downturn presents some very challenging issues and decisions for businesses.

More than ever it’s about the survival of the fittest. You cannot run your business like you did in 2007 or 2008. Flexible workforces – freelance can work for all roles – why not? Rather than cut prices – how about selling the benefits a bit better, or add some more. If it’s your business – get the family involved even more – an 8 year old can stuff envelopes!

There is much to be made from predicting the future – trends in consumer needs, behaviours and attitudes, enforced conditions. As a business manager or entrepreneur – your empirical skills and knowledge are made very much more powerful when you also use PREDICTION. Try it when you lie awake at night.

Surviving or even thriving in the recession starts with some great ideas and some well researched and applied business and marketing strategies.

Thinking positive isn’t enough – you need to work smart, be pro-active and get things done too.

It doesn’t matter how hard you bark – if the cat’s in a different tree you better stop and find the right one.

If you need some help with marketing – give us a call – see what we can do for you.

Alexander Bullivant, Roxbourne Ltd  Marketing Consultants