Path to success: Interview with Growth Voucher adviser and client

So how does a Growth Voucher work and what can you expect? We asked one of our Growth Voucher accredited advisers and his client to take us through the process from start to finish. If you want to find out more about Growth Vouchers click here.

The Growth Voucher Adviser

Name: Quentin Pain
Company Name: Legendary Business Owners Ltd
Specialist Advice Area: Marketing
How many years' experience: 35 years
Percentage of small business clients: 100%

What is your approach to strategic advice?

Successful strategies involve two components: 1) a goal, and 2) how to achieve the goal. We start by creating a strategic map for the business. A business map differs from a business and marketing plan in that it is solely concerned with strategy. This is best achieved by asking questions. These questions are designed to pinpoint the goals of a business and from that, figure out how they are to be achieved.

Why does strategic advice makes a difference?

Once you have created your map, you will have a clear path to get to your goals and a great tool to measure your progress. If you get stuck on the way, you only need ask more questions and dig deeper to find the answers. My top tip to anyone in business is:

"Always be asking questions and never assume anything. This together with taking immediate action on the answers is the fastest route to success that I know."

Tell us about the broad type of advice you gave to your Growth Voucher client

The first thing we needed to break down were the different areas the client needed help with. These were prioritised and made into a list of projects.

We started by interviewing existing clients to get an insight into why they chose Rentadesk. This became the backbone of the marketing and sales literature the business would be using to grow the business. Since the marketing and sales side of the business is largely managed online, we then looked at how the client was currently using the internet to help deliver growth and to see if any of these areas could be improved. This included looking for bottlenecks in the sales process and in particular for those that could impede future expansion. During this process we recognised that different specific sales funnels could be created and existing ones tweaked.

We then looked at the options for passive lead generation and that process is now underway. The next project is active client attraction, which will bring with it a great deal of control that the business will need in order to bring about the expansion identified at the start of the process.

The Growth Voucher Client

Business Name: Rentadesk Ltd
Name: Bleddyn Williams
Age of Business: nine years
Growth Voucher category: Marketing Strategy
Growth Voucher value: £2000 voucher (the maximum)

When did you started the growth voucher training with Quentin?

In March 2014.

Why did you want to take strategic advice?

I wanted to create a marketing strategy that we could execute with Rentadesk's limited resources.

How did it help your business?

It clarified who Rentadesk's core customer was (i.e. freelancers), how I can find them, and then provide a highly targeted message to them.

Has it helped you get to where you want to go?

Yes, it has helped me focus on and understand my customer better. This improves the Rentadesk community, as our most valuable asset is our community of members.

• Customer interview strategy - allowed me to understand my customers better, also understand who my customer wasn't (larger companies with several employees).

• Digital marketing SEO strategy to find out what my customers are searching for online.

• Digital content strategy to provide prospective customers with quality, relevant content - concluding with a sales landing page to summarise Rentadesk's unique offering.

Find out more

Find out more about the Growth Vouchers programme on the Enterprise Nation Marketplace website.

• To apply to provide strategic advice as part of the Growth Voucher programme, click here.

• To apply for Growth Vouchers to spend on strategic for your small business, click here.