Resource type: Case study

Background

Sanderson Weatherall are a national firm of estate agents with offices around the UK. They offer sales and lettings services to buyers, sellers, landlords and tenants. Diana Warr heads up the Leeds office. 

Challenges

Property viewings are a regular part of an estate agent’s working week. However, booking the viewings and making sure that they’re worthwhile is time consuming. Diana would have liked to employ more staff to support her with bookings and initial tenant vetting, but needed to make a strong business case to the head office. 

Solutions

Diana approached Get Ahead and we quickly came up with two solutions to support her. We arranged for her to use our telephone answering service: our experienced team answered her calls in person, dealing with basic queries and relaying messages to Diana. 

In parallel, we linked her up with administration expert Lisa. After a brief onboarding process, Lisa began coordinating bookings. Lisa received requests for bookings via phone calls and emails, and organised viewings by area so that Diana could use her time as effectively as possible. 

Occasionally, when Diana was away, Lisa would also coordinate viewings via online portal Viewber.

Lisa also briefly vetted potential tenants, gently extracting details like whether they could afford the property and if it were the right size for their household. This saved a lot of time in the long run – only holding viewings for tenants who are suitable makes good business sense. 

Outcomes

Diana quickly recognised how much time she saved by outsourcing basic tasks to Get Ahead. This freed her up to use her natural talent for selling and letting properties, and concentrate on her core responsibilities to her vendors, landlords and head office. 

Lisa supported Diana for eight months. In this time, Diana saw how Lisa’s role grew from just one hour a week to a whole day a week. This helped Diana to make a business case to the head office for employing a permanent member of staff to provide support with booking viewings. Ultimately, this helped the Leeds office of Sanderson Weatherall achieve its targets and provide outstanding property services to landlords and tenants in West Yorkshire. 

Background

Hive is a West Yorkshire consultancy providing specialist payments testing and quality engineering. Founded by Sean Beesting, Phil Beesting and Neill McCarthy, the business supports banks, fintechs, and financial institutions in streamlining payment certification, accelerating time to market, and ensuring regulatory compliance.

Hive was built to solve a clear market gap: many organisations lack the in-house capacity or specialist knowledge to test and certify payment systems effectively. With decades of experience in the financial services sector, Sean and Neill set out to launch a consultancy that would deliver faster, smarter, and more secure outcomes for clients globally.

Challenges

When Sean first approached Get Ahead, the business was still at concept stage. Together with co-founders Phil and Neill, they had identified a clear opportunity, validated it with potential clients, and secured early interest. However, there was no name, brand, or marketing strategy to support a successful launch.

That’s where Get Ahead’s team came in. We provided outsourced marketing expertise to help shape Hive’s identity, messaging, and go-to-market approach.

Regional director Fiona took on the role of project manager. She assembled a tailored team of marketing specialists to support Hive’s launch. Marketing consultant and copywriter Claire led on marketing strategy and messaging, supported by graphic designer Kate and web developer Jennie.

Solutions

From the outset, Hive’s leadership team including Sean, co-founder and CTO Neill McCarthy, and Operations Director Phil Beesting, collaborated closely with the Get Ahead team. A brand development session helped define Hive’s unique selling points, target audience, and values. Claire used this insight to shape the brand’s mission, tone of voice, and website messaging. Meanwhile the Hive name was finalised, reflecting both the founders’ surname and the idea of collaborative intelligence.

Kate designed a clean, professional logo featuring a stylised honeycomb in gold, while Jennie brought the brand to life with a fully responsive website. Claire developed clear, confident copy and created Hive’s LinkedIn business page, ensuring the team had a strong foundation for digital visibility and client engagement.

Outcomes

Thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Hive and Get Ahead teams, the business launched with a cohesive brand, polished messaging, and a professional online presence. Hive quickly attracted clients both in the UK and across the world and continues to grow its reputation within the financial services sector.

I’ve worked in payments quality engineering for most of my career, said Sean. But I needed the right support to take Hive to market. Get Ahead’s insights, creativity and experience were invaluable. They helped us shape a professional brand that clearly communicates what we do. We now have the tools and presence to engage confidently with clients and grow at pace.

 

Background

Gast Manufacturing is an international designer and manufacturer of air-moving products including compressors and vacuum pumps. The business supplies a number of industries including industrial manufacturing, healthcare and environmental cleanup applications. Gast’s headquarters are in the USA and its European offices are in both the Netherlands and Germany. 

Challenges

Gast’s European office faced several marketing challenges. While the organisation is recognised for the quality of its products, some markets are not aware that Gast offers a solution for their needs at all. The UK and European sales team recognised Gast needed to strengthen its PR and branding but lacked the in-house expertise to deliver it.

Gast Manufacturing’s products appear under two brand names, Gast and JUN-AIR. While there is a strong business case for this decision, it has made brand recognition more challenging, with some customers not fully aware of each brand’s identity and capabilities. 

As an international organisation, Gast also faces the challenge of overcoming cultural differences and remaining relevant in each of the territories where it markets its products. The situation is exacerbated by the fact that the British and European offices do not have their own local marketing teams.

Solutions

Digital marketing expert Rio began by developing Gast’s LinkedIn presence. She now creates regular LinkedIn posts for Gast, rolling out industry news, product updates and more. 

The Gast JUN-AIR team and Get Ahead also saw that two practical tools could move Gast towards its strategic goal of improved brand recognition. The first was an up-to-date corporate presentation for the commercial team to use in client meetings. The second was a stand for trade shows: Get Ahead’s virtual digital marketing expert Rio worked with Gast’s United States office to deliver graphics and corporate material to help the business connect with new customers. 

The final requirement was to translate Gast’s product user manuals into thirteen different languages, reflecting its diverse international markets. We called in expertise from our partner translation company, with Get Ahead acting as a central point of contact to simplify communications for Gast.

Outcomes

The EU team are delighted with the trade show stand and the presentation. They both reflect the business and describe its strengths accurately, helping Gast communicate with its target markets. The trade show stand has already been used at three business exhibitions – its evergreen headlines and on-brand design make it suitable for future expos too. 

In addition, knowing that they have up-to-date marketing tools means the team is always ready to meet a client or exhibit at an expo. This represents a great saving of time and energy, freeing up the commercial team to concentrate on their core responsibilities and drive business opportunities forward.

The ongoing social media support has yielded great results too. Rio tailors the posts to Gast’s different markets, delivering a targeted, effective approach. LinkedIn followers have increased by 205%, significantly raising Gast’s profile and reinforcing the legacy and brand within the industry. This is a great success for Gast and Get Ahead is very proud to be part of it. 

Testimonial

Working with Get Ahead has been hugely successful. Their willingness to interact with all levels of our business both directly and indirectly is a massive factor in why this relationship continues to flourish. Rio and the team have shown excellent attention to detail – she’s prepared to go the extra yard to ensure our customers know we deliver a high-quality product.

Michel Berendsen, Sales Director EMEA, Gast Manufacturing

Majestic Site Management is a business based in West Yorkshire. They offer comprehensive site management solutions, from pre-contract through to health and safety compliance. Their clients are trades within the construction industry, such as roofers, bricklayers and plumbers. These trades need to regularly review and renew their health and safety accreditations from CHAS, SafeContractor and ConstructionLine. Majestic review contractors’ work and carry out the accreditation process on their behalf freeing up their time so they can secure further work. 

Challenges

Majestic’s owner, building contractor Lee Marsden, spends most of his working week on construction sites, managing subcontractors and delivering health and safety compliance. Unfortunately, Lee’s commitment to his core offering means that he doesn’t have time to do the extensive paperwork associated with health and safety accreditation. In the past, he had employed a full-time assistant to upload health and safety paperwork and fill in pre-qualification questionnaires. However, the full-time assistant retired, leaving an admin vacuum. 

With so much to do, and with Lee being out on site most of the time, the paperwork started to build up. The system for renewing H&S accreditations broke down and Lee recognised that he needed some admin support.

Solutions

Lee approached Get Ahead and we introduced him to virtual assistant Lisa. She has provided virtual assistant services to H&S accredited businesses before so the process was somewhat familiar to her. She quickly brought the situation under control, establishing a system for managing the paperwork and accreditations. This meant Lee could quickly see whether his clients were H&S compliant and which accreditations they held. 

Outcomes

Lisa’s new system has been so effective that she now does fewer hours each week than when she started. Setting the system up required considerable focus but once it was in place, it runs itself so well that Lisa’s workload has reduced. 

However, Lisa has put the hours she has saved to good use. She now circulates a monthly newsletter to all of Majestic’s clients – some go several months without contact so the newsletter is an important way to keep in touch. This helps Majestic secure repeat business and become the go-to organisation for H&S accreditation.

Majestic has many satisfied clients and has received countless five-star reviews to prove it! Lisa understands the importance of reviews and uses some of her allotted hours to follow them up and ensure that clients are sharing testimonials. 

Lee and Lisa have established a strong working relationship. Lee trusts Lisa to work on her own initiative, recognising the value of winning his time back and letting Lisa get on with the back-office work. He’s always open to suggestions and welcomes anything that makes the business run more smoothly, with great results all round. 

 

Background

The Exceptional Leader Academy is based in Woking in Surrey and provides leadership training and development. Founded by Dene Stuart in 2012, the ELA offers a range of courses and workshops based on the principles of neuroscience, positive psychology and metaphysics. 

Challenges

Dene runs the ELA single-handed, balancing back-office tasks with delivering in-person and online leadership coaching. While he has successfully managed his time to ensure that he meets all the requirements of running a business, one-off projects pose more of a challenge. 

Dene was planning a two-day leadership workshop and identified that the most effective way to promote it was via his up-to-date email contact list. He wanted the communication to feel personal and come directly from his account, rather than using marketing email software. However, he didn’t have the time or expertise to create a marketing email to advertise the event. It was important to promote the event at the right time, maintaining momentum while also giving delegates enough time to plan and prepare. 

Solutions

Get Ahead introduced him to Sarah and Gaida who used Dene’s email template and circulated the communication from his account. 

Outcomes

The email campaign was highly effective, with many local business owners signing up for the leadership coaching workshop. Dene was delighted to find that the Get Ahead process is smooth and prompt. His outsourcing objective was to save time – he was pleased he saved time not just on the actual email campaign but also on dealing with Get Ahead. 

“Working with the team at Get Ahead was a very pleasurable experience. They understood what I needed and why and demonstrated a very commercial perspective. They are very pleasant people to work with and work hard to make sure that engagements run smoothly and to plan. I have no hesitation in recommending Get Ahead as a resource for any busy business owner.” Dene Stuart, Founder, Exceptional Leader Academy 

Background

Alive with Ideas is a creative communications agency based in Basingstoke. While they have many big public and private sector organisations among their clients, they are a small business with two directors, ten employees and a team of freelancers. 

Challenges

Founder Alex Mead and his team work very hard to deliver effective, dynamic marketing campaigns for their clients. However, as a small business with a varying workload, he and his fellow director can’t always find time to react to unexpected pressures. 

Unpaid client invoices were a particular problem, with Alex and his co-director Alan struggling to find time to follow them up. Equally, as a small business, Alive with Ideas cannot afford to let invoices go unpaid and still deliver the fantastic work they’re known for. 

Invoices were going unpaid not because of any disputes about the work, or clients trying to avoid payment. Alive with Ideas has many public sector clients – huge organisations with very complicated finance systems. If Alive with Ideas issued an invoice with no purchase order number on it, for example, the public sector client would be unable to pay it. Finding the right person to provide a purchase order number was very time consuming for Alex, meaning that he struggled to get round to addressing the problem. 

Alex and Alan toyed with the idea of taking on a part-time employee to chase unpaid invoices and review the details that were causing the problems, like missing purchase order numbers and inconsistent invoice numbers. However, they knew they were already at capacity and the recruitment process would eat even further into their precious time. But outsourcing instead of employing looked like a realistic solution.

Solutions

Alex reached out to Get Ahead. Our approach appealed to him because he liked the flexibility we offer, and was glad that he’d only pay for the time and support needed. By contrast, he would have to continue to pay an employee the same salary even if the number of invoices they dealt with varied from month to month. 

Get Ahead listened to Alex’s needs and shortlisted a number of possible finance experts from our extensive team. After introduction phone calls with a few of our experts, Alex decided bookkeeper Charlotte would be the best fit for his business. 

Charlotte began her new responsibilities with Alive with Ideas almost immediately. She began by following up unpaid invoices and spending time addressing the reasons for the delay. In most cases, the delay is caused by public sector admin which takes time and attention to detail to solve. However, Charlotte has the experience and capacity to do the work required to get every invoice paid. 

Outcomes

Charlotte quickly slotted into her new role and the ongoing working relationship is now in its fourth year. She is a great fit for Alive with Ideas and they quickly saw an increase in the number of paid invoices. Charlotte and Alex meet fortnightly to review progress, and because she’s so proactive, she doesn’t take up Alex’s time in between. 

As Alex got to know Charlotte, he discovered she has additional finance admin skills that would benefit his business. Now Charlotte deals with the day-to-day accounting and invoice reconciliation for Alive with Ideas, as well as supporting their payroll process. Alex still has an accountant who handles corporation tax. As Charlotte happens to be a trained accountant too, she understands how Alex’s other accountant works and the two have become a strong team. 

Working with Get Ahead has been a real success for Alive with Ideas and we’re delighted to be supporting such a dynamic creative communications agency.

Alex Mead says, “I would highly recommend working with Get Ahead. Their proactive approach means you’ll be matched with an expert that perfectly fits your needs. The ability to flex on working hours is a huge benefit and means you’re only paying for the support that you need.”

Background

Headline Design & Print supports B2B businesses to share their message through great design and high-quality print. Based near Guildford, they have been operating since 1986 and have become synonymous with business communication in Surrey. 

Headline’s main competitors are online printing companies. Fortunately, Headline has always managed to stay ahead by offering a more personal service, with clients able to speak directly to the team to discuss their unique design and print needs. 

Challenges

As Headline provides on-demand print services for organisations of all sizes, the service needs to be available without interruption. However, when staff were on annual leave or sick leave, managing director Mark Warner found it difficult to fill in any gaps in the production process while maintaining Headline’s high standard of service. 

Many of Headline’s clients contact Mark and the team by telephone to place orders and make inquiries. When the operation was short staffed, Mark knew the team was finding it difficult to answer the phone, but he also knew this could lead to loss of business. 

Solutions

Because of Headline’s reputation for a personal service, it was essential to find a solution that came with a personal touch. Mark recognised that he needed a telephone answering service run by real people, and discovered that Get Ahead could set this up for him. 

Get Ahead quickly connected Mark with our telephone answering team who are based in Scotland. Mark can now simply divert the Headline phone number to the telephone answering team who take any calls, transcribe them into emails and send them to the appropriate team member at Headline. While Mark pays a fixed rate for each call taken and transcribed, the service is completely flexible: Headline can use it when they need to and are free to turn it off when the office is fully staffed. Now that the process is in place, they can simply ask for it to be activated when Headline needs it. 

Outcomes

Thanks to the telephone answering service for small businesses, the Headline team are under less pressure even when someone is on holiday or sick leave. All the transcribed calls reach the right person and Headline’s customers have received a seamless service. Staff have felt more comfortable taking time off, knowing that they’re not leaving their colleagues in the lurch.

Mark says: “Get Ahead have been, and will continue to be, a key piece of the jigsaw that allows my small business to punch above its weight and deliver results that a much larger company would be proud of. In addition, the service Get Ahead deliver allows me, as the director and sales front end, to take time out of the business safe in the knowledge my clients are able to communicate with us and are not going elsewhere.”

 

Background

Coaching therapist Karen Boldy founded her business, Limelight, in Dubai in 2019, moving to Yorkshire in 2021. Karen takes a therapeutic and holistic approach to coaching, supporting her clients to embed their new ways of thinking and achieve lasting results. She works with business leaders of all levels, as well as elite sportsmen and women who are trying to improve their mindsets to stay on their game. 

Challenges

Karen branded her business as Limelight because she wanted her clients to put themselves at centre stage where they could shine. Her original logo reflected this idea, featuring images of lights in lime green, highlighting an ‘off-centre’ me’. Karen loved her logo but also recognised that it needed modernising to reflect her new and fresh approach to leadership coaching. 

Solutions

Karen already knew about Get Ahead through business networking. She approached us for support with the rebranding process and we introduced her to Kate, one of our most experienced graphic designers. 

Kate began by talking to Karen and finding out about her business. Kate recognised the conflict in Karen about the brand – Karen loved her existing logo, but also knew she needed to update it. Kate understands that changing the logo feels like a very big deal to any business owner and completely sympathised with Karen’s position. Fortunately, the two women established a connection and business owner Karen felt able to put her trust in graphic designer Kate. 

Kate began by doing some sketches, recording all her ideas visually. She felt that a simple design would be the most effective – there was no need to overcomplicate it. She ended up with a design created around the word “Limelight,” after picking up from Karen’s testimonials that the idea of “light” was important to her clients. She had found a suitable font to use as a starting point, then set about adapting it to create the strong design Karen’s business deserved. At this stage, she was using strong shades of lime and magenta, trying to reflect Karen’s drive and energy. 

When Kate showed her the new design, Karen liked the idea but felt the colours were wrong. Instead, she showed Kate shades of purple and green that she had been experimenting with herself. Karen particularly wanted to use purple  for its tranquil properties. Thanks to the trust they had built, Kate fully embraced Karen’s colour idea for the design. Now the completed logo is Kate’s design in Karen’s colours.  

Outcomes

Karen was initially surprised that the new logo was such a departure from the old one. However, she quickly came to love the message and story it tells. 

She has had new business cards printed, featuring the new logo. She took the opportunity to get rid of an obsolete phone number and improve the quality of her cards. The new cards are designed to appeal to both the senses of sight and touch, reflecting Karen’s expertise as a therapist. Now she feels even more confident giving her cards out – confidence which others pick up on. 


The new branding really makes me smile…I love it. I really enjoyed working with Kate – I hadn’t expected her to create the design she did, but when I saw what she had come up with, I knew it was right for me and my business.

Karen Boldy, Founder, Limelight

 

Background

The Original Black Garlic is a UK based food retailer and wholesaler. As the name implies (!), they sell black garlic, the must-have ingredient of the decade. The business is led by food importer Katy Heath, who came to love black garlic for both its flavour and its health benefits.

Challenges

Katy knew that strong PR could play an important part in her marketing strategy. But she also knew her business didn’t have the skills in-house to deliver a targeted PR campaign. So, she approached Get Ahead and the PR campaign started in July 2024, with a view to increasing brand awareness in time for Christmas.

Solutions

We introduced Katy to our PR expert Louise. Not only does Louise have extensive PR experience; she also has a keen interest in food and has delivered several PR campaigns for food businesses in the past.

Get Ahead worked with The Original Black Garlic to produce a detailed strategy for the PR campaigns. The strategy identified the unique selling points of black garlic, as well as the key demographics to help Louise decide which media to target.

Louise delivered a number of targeted campaigns for The Original Black Garlic. Utilising her PR expertise and contacts, she sent out samples of their products to journalists and influencers. She gained many column inches through coverage and features in national publications including the Daily Mail, the Times, the Guardian and Good Housekeeping.

The Original Black Garlic already use their own in-house marketing team for day-to-day social media posts. Get Ahead became an extension of this team and delivered additional specific campaigns alongside the work of their regular social media and marketing, complementing their posts and creating a fully integrated marketing effort.

Louise created Instagram competitions to build brand awareness, increase engagement and encourage The Original Black Garlic to trend over the Halloween and Christmas period. The competition in Good Housekeeping attracted an impressive 38,494 entries.  Our social media manager Mel repurposed content from previous years to create Christmas reels for Instagram. And our graphic designer Kate created new packaging designs which can be seen in Sainsbury’s and visuals for a full-page advert in the Guardian – her designs have popped up in social media posts too. With so much going on, it’s been important to keep Katy up to date without putting her under more time pressure. Get Ahead created monthly reports to share with Katy, so she can clearly see where her budget is going and how effective it is.

Outcomes

Katy is delighted with the results! Her mission is to move The Original Black Garlic from being a niche ingredient into the mainstream and the PR has helped her achieve it.

 We’ve loved working with Katy – she gave us great input at the beginning of the project then trusted us to get on with it. And The Original Black Garlic is gaining fans among the Get Ahead team too!

Katy says: “Get Ahead’s PR support has been invaluable. I’ve been able to concentrate on my business while Louise has delivered the PR. I love being able to use Get Ahead on an ad hoc basis – whether I need ongoing support or a one-off project, they can deliver what I need without tying me into a restrictive contract. Louise’s work has had fantastic results – I’m really proud of The Original Black Garlic and now everyone knows why!”

Background

The client’s business provides locally made home furnishings. It’s a family business with a small team, based in the West Country.

The MD received funding from a local college to cover the cost of working with an HR expert to set up the processes she needed.

Challenges

The MD had started her business because of her passion for local crafts. However, she knew that she needed clear forward planning and HR processes if her business were to grow successfully.

She was aware she needed to write a strategy and a business plan for growth. And working with the HR expert, the MD also identified that she needed support with HR contracts, job descriptions and performance reviews, all aligned with the business plan.

Unfortunately, she was also facing the pressures of running her own business, getting bogged down in day-to-day tasks. This meant she struggled to prioritise the steps she needed to take to help the business grow.

Solutions

We immediately saw the managing director’s vision for her business and felt that a more structured approach to both HR and the wider business would be beneficial.

We helped the MD to prioritise recruiting a general manager who would cover the admin and regular demands of the business. This freed the MD up to concentrate on business growth and make the HR improvements she needed to achieve it.

With the new manager appointed, the HR expert supported the MD to put a number of processes in place that would empower the staff and deliver the high standards the business deserves.

The HR expert supported the MD to map staff strengths and weaknesses. This demonstrated the MD’s faith in her team and encouraged them to take ownership of their work.

With the HR expert’s advice and support, the MD also booked one-to-one meetings with each staff member. She used these meetings to issue formal job descriptions and contracts and also carry out a performance review. The reviews covered not only capability but also general wellbeing, helping her to get more from her staff while understanding any outside pressures they were facing too.

To improve the organisation of everyday tasks, the HR expert suggested adopting a project management tool like Trello. This enabled the team to easily keep track of projects and orders, taking pressure off the MD.

Outcomes

Setting up clear HR processes had great outcomes – both productivity and morale improved! The job descriptions and performance reviews meant that each team member knew exactly what they were supposed to be doing, as well as how and why. This benefited the whole business: the staff could work more independently and not have to take every question to the MD; this meant the MD had more time to concentrate on business growth too.

Support with HR processes and business planning helped the MD to take her business to the next level and realise her vision.