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“Hi Angela,

Sorry to hear that things are slow for you.  Where are you advertising?  What are the adverts like?  Who are you targeting?

I'm not a marketing guru but I am certainly beginning to enjoy the practice management part of my work more than the bookkeeping now.  Marketing, advertising, selling my services, meeting new clients etc.

I am happy to have a look at your advertising materials, letters, marketing plan, or whatever you have an offer some advice. 

If you want to send anything to me you can at kris@kmbookkeeping.co.uk

Regards

Kris ”

“Hi Angela,

Sorry to hear that things are slow for you.  Where are you advertising?  What are the adverts like?  Who are you targeting?

I'm not a marketing guru but I am certainly beginning to enjoy the practice management part of my work more than the bookkeeping now.  Marketing, advertising, selling my services, meeting new clients etc.

I am happy to have a look at your advertising materials, letters, marketing plan, or whatever you have an offer some advice. 

If you want to send anything to me you can at kris@kmbookkeeping.co.uk

Regards

Kris ”

“kjmccullochsaid:

“Hi Angela,

Sorry to hear that things are slow for you.  Where are you advertising?  What are the adverts like?  Who are you targeting?

I'm not a marketing guru but I am certainly beginning to enjoy the practice management part of my work more than the bookkeeping now.  Marketing, advertising, selling my services, meeting new clients etc.

I am happy to have a look at your advertising materials, letters, marketing plan, or whatever you have an offer some advice. 

If you want to send anything to me you can at kris@kmbookkeeping.co.uk

Regards

Kris ”

---

To Kris,

Should the mentoring scheme get implemented, I think you should apply for the position regardless of how long you have been practising. You have skills and patience to mentor in my opinion. You have been so active in sharing vital information and helping a lot of us here and I truly appreciate it. Thanks for posting a thread regarding VoIP. This is a facility i am definetely opting for.


Kind Regards,

Nathaliexxx”

“Hi Angela,

I had a quick look at your site.  It's very clean and tidy.  I think it would be worth looking at who the website it aimed at and the type of information they want or need to make a decision to pick up the phone.

This isn't just your site, I've looked at loads of bookkeepers websites where the only information on offer is the services they can deliver.  Although this is required, I don't beleive it's the most important information.  More important is why choose you?  What do you offer that no one else does?  Are you the friendly bookkeeper?  Do you speak in language I'll understand?  Do you know about businesses like mine?  In short, what makes you special?

I think for a client to buy our services we need to recognise the issues they face, and show them that we not only understand, but have a solution.

If we're not special, we're the same.  If we're all the same, then logically the only thing that sets us apart is price, thats not good.  Then its just a race to the bottom.

If I were you I'd try to pretend you are a potential client and think what would you want to see from your website.

Have you spoken to local businesses?  I found a great thing to do was pop into small, local shops and speak to the owner if I could, or the staff if the owner wasn't there.  Just to introduce myself and leave a card, but mainly to get the owners name so that later I could send a personal letter at a later date.  You may sell your services when you're there, but I find that quite daunting.  I tried to speak to 10 local businesses a week.

I was in a similar position to you, I had no money to advertise so had to put a bit more thought into the cheap or free forms.  Have you tried writing to your local papers with a press release, just saying who you are, what you do and how you got there?

Hope these help.

Kris


”

“Sounds good Paula,

Can we have a look at your leaflets, it may give others ideas.  Also, you'll need to let us all see the press release when it's done.

Great stuff.

Kris ”

“Paula,

Just had a look at your flyers, I think they're quite impressive.  I especially like the right hand side word bubble that looks a bit like the map of Scotland.

I'm sure you'll do will with them.

Kris ”

“Hello Angela,

Can I convince you to attend the Kent Branch meeting in March?  It's in Rainham so I know it's a bit of an epic journey but it would be a great chance to meet your fellow members and some of them are even as helpful as Kris (who I hope to meet at the Scottish Conference on 28th March).


Hi Angela,

I am setting up the Kent branch meeting. it would be lovely to see you there. I used to work not too far away from you at the Pfizer site in Sandwich, and I know a few other people who are looking at training to be bookkeepers (although not through the ICB), and I know a few people who have set up businesses as sole traders in east Kent after the pfizer site shutdown who I could possibly introduce to you/ask them to look at your website (although I don't know whether they would already have bookkeepers/accountants of their own yet, but it is worth a try).

Thanks Ami for pointing out Angela was from Kent, I hadn't picked up on that!

Cheryl 



 

Hi

I am in a similar position with regard to clients but am having to look at the potential market differently as my job is raising and collecting business rate and sundry debt for a local authority - i am therefore ensuring that there is no conflict with my job, so am restricted in what i can do.

My approach is to try to attract a niche market - i am concentrating on home based and mobile businesses (businesses that have no premises subject to business rates) and am starting to put together as much information as possible on these businesses - the idea is that the more knowledge that you have of a business type eg common terms , the more confident you will be when speaking to these potential clients - i suppose it is the same as when you go for an interview, you would be expected to have background knowledge of the firm that you are applying to.

I am trying direct marketing to potential customers.

Other things i am trying:-

Lamppost advertising
T shirt advertising

Like Angela i am trying to add services as well - which has got to be good.

On a positive note, i come into contact with businesses every day and there is definitely a market for bookkeepers, it is just a matter of reaching them - and despite the recession, there is new business out there.

It is great to see all the support on the forum and the advice is great

Can i add that if there is anybody that needs any assistance with any business rates queries, claiming reliefs etc  i am only too happy to help - my phone number is 07531703240

Regards

Acorn

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