Customer Street Improvements

At Customer Street I often talk about how much I love passion for what you do and people that are passionate about what they are doing. Benny is passionate about helping people learn Mandarin his website AskBenny.cn is full of mini language lessons, insights into Chinese culture and some very fun videos. In the micro class below he gets to meet Miss Shanghai 2006 and tell her he thinks she is very beautiful!

Benny’s passion is infectious. I think his site is very clean and he has spent time investing in a product that is informative, educational and fun. What’s hidden behind this is a person establishing a language learning brand that may become as popular as “Where’s Wally?”.

At Customer Street our passion is for getting our customers exposure on the internet because more exposure equals more business.

We have been working on a tool at CustomerStreet.com to track where how the web sites we build for our customers, our directories; UFindUs, SmileLocal, MoreUK and trade specific directories get found on the major search engines.

Sharon Odom-Fling is a Local Internet Marketing Expert and has written an interesting article on Internet Based Moms about how the web works for local business.

For any business to be found on the web it needs a a presence. A Customer Street Package offers excellent value by giving the business a basic website that is designed to be found by the search engines, listings on UFindUs, SmileLocal, MoreUK and a trade specific directory which also get found by the search engines and a tool so that they can edit their website and add to it. Stuart Forrest my boss wrote about how much traffic we get our customers in his posting “Traffic Aggregation is what Customer Street is about”.

We have all been reading about the credit crunch and impending recession in the media. The stories of doom and gloom talk of an impending financial meltdown. So, what does it really mean to small businesses and how can Customer Street help?

Those of us that have been around to see the previous financial crisis of recent years know that whilst there is a general belt tightening, job losses for some and real personal tragedy for others the reality is that life goes on and people still need services and products. If your toilet gets blocked and it’s a recession you still need a plumber. If your car breaks down despite the credit crunch you will still need to get it fixed.

At CustomerStreet.com the vast majority of our customers are all micro, small and medium sized businesses. We are used to working with new starts and more more established business to get them exposure on the internet at affordable rates. The exposure we get them ensures that when someone is searching for the service or product they offer in their area we get them found. We get them found on the directories UFindUs, SmileLocal, MoreUK and Customer Street Trades.

To be honest I always knew it would happen. I knew that the Huddersfield office would open. What I really couldn’t be sure of was whether the Customer Street Huddersfield office would open on time!

The main cause for concern was the extremely tight deadline. We needed to get a leased line installed for our data. NTL won the business on the promise that they would deliver on time. Despite delays in site surveys, the need to dig up 75 meters of path and problems getting into the building they delivered on time. Congratulations to the team at NTL Virgin Media from everyone here at Customer Street, we wouldn’t be open without you!

On the whole all of our contractors and suppliers have been extremely professional and helpful. If you are looking for suppliers for your business you should try using one of our excellent directories; UFindUs, Smile Local or More UK failing that just use a search engine and you will find us all over the search results.

It’s been a very busy year here at Customer Street. New product launches, major system changes and continuous improvement mean it is never a good time to go away. Last week I managed to get the week off to see family before Christmas.

Our directories have all been busy in the run up to the festivities with people searching for lots of different services and products in their local area. As we list every UK business on our directories we know that businesses get found through our products. The businesses that have the edge are the one with enhanced listings. I recently heard from our sales people a customer who had signed with us was already getting business in a competitive area just from their directory listing. We also build our customers a basic web site if they want one.

The year for me is finishing on a high note as I am project managing the opening of our new sales office in Huddersfield. We are just getting everything fitted out ready to open in mid January, creating up to 50 new jobs for Huddersfield. This new office will provide excellent facilities for our sales people.