Westcountry PR Services
Broadband has transformed one of Cornwall’s oldest PR businesses. Former business journalist Mike Truscott has handled thousands of successful press releases for Cornish SMEs over the past 20 years.
Until comparatively recently, however, it was nothing unusual for Mike to spend several hours a week beside a photocopier, laboriously printing up his releases and stuffing them into envelopes for posting.
Email eased that burden – and then broadband saw the business take off in dramatic fashion. The distribution of press releases – no matter how many different ones to how many different outlets, is now a matter of minutes or even seconds, rather than hours.
Not only has this led to significant growth for Mike’s core business, but the freeing up of his time has also enabled him to create two new businesses – a home study course for aspiring PR writers and an email-based PR service for SMEs nationwide.
He has set up the business as a limited company and, with his wife Janet now working near full-time as co-director and handling everything bar the researching and writing, has seen turnover rocket by over 30 per cent in three years.
The expansion of Westcountry PR Services has also been helped by funding from the actnow accelerator service for purchase of IT equipment.
“Broadband is absolutely brilliant,” says Mike. “For our business, it has been a terrific boost three times over – greatly increased productivity, much faster service to clients and the press and media, and even better press releases through greatly speeded-up research on the internet for good quality background material.
“As a bonus, we have the peace of mind of knowing that actnow are there for us if we need them. On the rare occasions we have had any problems with broadband, and have failed to solve them through ‘normal channels,’ we have turned to actnow and been hugely impressed by the quality and speed of their service.”
