Joe welcomes some new "Business Joes"

We would like to say a friendly hello to three new companies who have registered with http://www.iusejoe.com/.
First up is Ellie Montgomery Fireplaces based in Mollinsburn near Cumbernauld. Ellie has an excellent and welcoming showroom in Mollinsburn where you can see many different types of fireplace in a room setting. She takes care of all the details and will see the installation of your new fireplace through from start to finish coordinating the work of all the necessary tradespeople. You can get a better idea of the service offered by visiting Ellie's own website at http://www.elliemontgomery.com/.
Next is Watterson Exteriors based in Cumbernauld. Watterson Exteriors specialise in roofing and gutter work. They are members of the Guild of Master Craftsmen and I can personnaly vouch for the excellent quality of work they provide at very reasonable rates.
Our most recent new company is Ambersyde Design based in Hamilton. They specialise in the production of personalised albums and desk calendars using your own photographs. Judging from their website at http://www.ambersydedesign.co.uk/ they have many customers who have been delighted with their purchases.

Introducing the "Business Service Area"

One of the bits of feedback (thanks!) that we've received is that different businesses have different requirements with respect to the area which they serve. For example, some businesses have a very local focus preferring to serve only the surrounding area whilst others may provide services regionally or even nationally. Until now, Business Joes adverts would only be listed if the customer searched on a postcode within 15 miles of the Business Joe's address. Now, thanks to the "Business Service Area" (see left) Business Joes can select the area they cover helping to ensure searches reach more potential customers.

The Business Service Area can be set during the signup process and can be altered at any time after signup by visiting My Account -> Update My Business Service Area.

It's worth also noting that setting your Business Service Area appropriately can help also with getting Google to notice your Joe advert. This is because the City / Town links at the bottom of the home page are populated automatically using the Business Service Area to match up what towns a business serves.

That's it for now. We have other new features in the pipeline designed to further optimize the site for Google. We'll keep you posted via this blog.

Scotcomputers joins Joe

We'd been having a lot of bother with one of our PCs and decided it was time to replace it rather than spending any more time trying to track down the problem that had been causing the dreaded "blue screens of death". We spoke to Sam Walker of Scotcomputers at Glenboig (http://www.scotcomputers.co.uk/). Sam came up with a package of an attactively priced PC coupled to a small network area storage device which means that our data is now stored over three hard disks - much more secure for all our documents, e-mails, etc. Scotcomputers offer a very friendly and personal service and whilst he was installing our equipment asked to have a look at http://www.iusejoe.com/. Sam was impressed with the customer focused concept behind IUJ and also the fact that some of our busieness joes' listing are now starting to appear at the top of the first page of Google. So Sam, we are delighted to say, signed up there and then!

Did you get yours?

Just a wee post to let all our business joes know that we have now sent out their customer response postcards. If you haven't received yours yet please let us know at http://www.iusejoe.com.

.... a postcard from Joe

Just to let you know that we have taken delivery of our customer feedback postcards. The idea is that after completing a piece of work for a client business joes can leave a postcard thanking the customer for their business and encouraging them to visit http://www.iusejoe.com to leave a rating and a comment to help other consumers who are looking for a quality job. The layout of the cards was designed by Karen at Connal Mac Design. Connal Mac provide a rapid and customer focused service and you can find them on IUJ or at http://www.connalmac.com.
We'll be distributing the postcards to all business joes over the next few days.

Dic, dic-tation……

….. how many buses are in the station? Actually, quite a lot! There’s a bus depot just across the road from Nick French’s Data Supplies & Accessories (http://www.dictationsupplies.com/) office in Cumbernauld.
I met Nick yesterday. His firm has been in the business of supplying quality dictation equipment to companies throughout the UK since 1982. Data Supplies works closely with all of their clients, many of whom have been with them from the start, so they understand just how this sort of equipment is actually used in all different sorts of industries and organisations. Data Supplies also works very closely with the equipment manufacturers and have regular training sessions to learn the latest products. All this allows Nick’s company to provide a solution tailored to the client’s particular needs and also to support them with customised training if necessary. And, if a client does run into difficulties, they can fall back upon Data Supplies’ support desk which is available 24 hours a day. Talking to Nick it was quite evident the importance that he places upon understanding and then satisfying customer needs and also the value to his business of word of mouth recommendations – which is why Nick can appreciate the potential of http://www.iusejoe.com/ to help reach new customers and further grow his business.

Dial I for internet

Just a quick post while I remember about a fairly recent article in the Economist magazine (http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11413206&fsrc=RSS) about traditional yellow pages type operations. Apparently, fewer and fewer people are using them as more and more people turn to the internet to find the services they need. To quote, "people now want more than a book full of advertisers—they want word of mouth and a sense of community". And that, is exactly what http://www.iusejoe.com/ is designed to provide!

A "live wire" from Stirlingshire, Scotland

This evening I thought I'd give new Business Joe, Annette Kerr, a ring just to welcome her to http://www.iusejoe.com. Annette is bursting with ideas about web marketing. A mother of young twin girls she's also an experienced party planner and has found time, amongst other things, to start http://www.partyplanconsultant.co.uk. This is a resource site for party plan consultants, direct selling distributors and work-at-home mums. On Annette's site you will find resources to help grow your home based business, links to other useful sites and a forum to share and discuss ideas with fellow consultants, distributors and marketers. I'm sure with Annette's enthusiasm and commitment to helping others her business will flourish and I'm sure Joe will help her on her way. Good luck Annette and welcome to IUJ!

Meeting local businesses in Marlow

Things behind the scenes at www.iusejoe.com are as busy as ever so please accept my apologises for not posting to the blog for a wee while. Last week I was out and about meeting local businesses at a BRX business breakfast networking meeting in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. I attended the meeting as a guest having been invited by a local video production firm www.takeonetv.com. Whilst it is early days in terms of meeting new people and making new contacts, the general feedback I received from a number of people at the meeting was that the concept of I Use Joe - that your customers are your greatest sales force and that word of mouth marketing can help power a business - struck a chord. Hopefully in the next few weeks and months ahead we'll build on that message and demonstrate that managing your customer feedback on I Use Joe helps build your business. Off to bed now as I have another breakfast meeting tomorrow morning in Gerrard's Cross. More on that one in another post.

At Fairways BNI chapter (Scotland)

Early Friday mornings are the usual time for our weekly BNI business networking meetings at Dullatur Golf Club in Cumbernauld, just north of Glasgow. The meetings are an opportunity for like-minded business people to get together and do some business. BNI's philosophy is "givers gain". It's about building trust and sound business relationships over time rather than a fast sprint for a quick win. Iain Whyte is BNI's Executive Director for Scotland South and East and he's also our current chapter director. Which is good for our group as he's passionate about the BNI concept and very convincing on that theme. In fact Iain is a renowned inspirational speaker and has recently set up as http://www.bigmantalking.com/. Iain is also a big hearted sort of guy and last month he and BNI co-director, Colin Read, rode across America in kilts (2,913 miles in 10 days!), on Harley Davidsons to raise money for the http://www.moebiusresearchtrust.org/. On the way they had some great experiences and encountered a lot of kindness and support. You can follow their exploits on their blog at http://kiltsacrossamerica.co.uk/.
Ian is a firm believer in the power of business networking and sees http://www.iusejoe.com/ as a valuable tool to extend his networking reach.

Joe in Bonnie Scotland

This is the first post from the Scottish end of I Use Joe. I'll be keeping you up to date on how Joe is developing north of the border.



This morning I attended the Enterprise chapter of BNI (http://www.bniscotland.co.uk/) at Dullatur Golf Club in Cumbernauld as a substitute for Colin Watterson (of Watterson Exteriors). The meeting was really well attended and conducted at a brisk but friendly pace by chapter director, Brain Hamilton. After the formal business was finished one of the several people I chatted to was Graham Mackay of Graham's Digital Productions (http;//www.dvdwed.com). Graham's firm specialises in the production of high quality videos to capture the happy event that is a wedding. I know from personal experience that Graham's company does indeed delight its customers and we agreed that http://iusejoe.com/ would be an ideal medium to spread the word about his company.



So if you aim to provide excellent customer service and want to tap into the power of customer feedback to help you attract new customers visit http://isuejoe.com/ to sign up now for a three month, no obligation trial.

First thoughts - putting Joe to work for you

Well folks this is my first post on the official I Use Joe blog. Joe (for short) is a website I have been working on for some time now but only recently has been "put out there". As I'm beginning to go out and spread the word (I was at Maidenhead Chamber of Commerce, Summer BBQ on July 17th and tomorrow I'll be up bright and early at Marlow BRX Breakfast meeting) I thought it would be appropriate to take a few moments to explain why I got into Joe in the first place.

I guess the answer to what Joe is and the motivation behind it lies in the name "I Use Joe". Essentially Joe is a tool that a business can use to connect with existing customers and attract new customers. The concept is that your existing customers are your greatest asset - they are the people who know you and who continue to return to do business with you. Why? Because you provide great service and meet their needs. If a friend or colleague is planning to use a service that they haven't used before, for example a wedding photographer, or a caterer or a graphic designer and asks your customer for advice, your customer will probably recommend your business. All of this is great - but what if we could amplify your customer's voice? What if all of your customer's friends could see that your customer rates and uses you? This is where http://www.iusejoe.com/ comes in. Joe enables businesses to attract new business through the ratings and recommendations of existing customers. But we believe that it is not enough for a business to sit back and hope that reviews are posted - the business needs to actively encourage regular customers to post reviews. To support Business Joes (that's the name for Businesses on the site) we provide joint marketing materials (both "online and offline") and we enable the Business Joe to post a thank you comment in response to your customers comment. On top of all this, we also enable the Business Joe to track average ratings scores on the "Business Scoreboard". And because, we really do believe in the power of customer feedback, we display the top rated businesses at the top of any search query.

So there you have it. I Use Joe enables businesses to tap into the power of customer feedback helping you attract new customers. Visit http://www.iusejoe.com/ to signup now (3 month, no obligation free trial).

I hope this post helps explain what Joe is. Both myself and Bobby will be posting more in the next few days.