POD Chiropody, Littlethorpe
As experts in the treatment of fungal nails, verrucae and warts, the use of state of the art laser technology, not often seen outside of Harley Street, is at the heart of the service POD Chiropody and Laser offer their patients. As the business started to grow, the Littlethorpe based clinic was continuously held back by unreliable internet connections, poor reception and slow speeds. Directors Zoe and Raj Zavery knew it was time to take action.
What were the challenges?
Raj: As our workload increased, we began to have more issues. It was no longer practical to operate the whole business with everyone sharing one computer; it took forever to upload large files to our website and our connection was very unreliable. You could guarantee that we’d experience problems at the most inappropriate time such as inputting data whilst a patient was waiting.
How has fibre broadband made a difference?
Zoe: As soon as we made the change to superfast fibre broadband we noticed the difference immediately. When we make changes to the website these days it’s instantaneous. No more waiting for that upload bar to crawl across the screen – it all happens at the press of a button. We have added an online shop to the site which is proving a successful addition to the practice.
We get up to 40Mbps which allows us to do lots of online tasks at once. We can upload images, read emails, update social media and surf the internet all at the same time. Because of our new set up we can also access the system from anywhere in the building on multiple devices with no issues. We now take for granted that our connection is strong and reliable; customer service is never affected. Effective
technology is critical for us, the business would not survive without it.
Are you getting the most from fibre broadband?
Raj: To help us optimise the technology, we have been on a number of excellent workshops from the
Chamber’s eBusiness Club – the latest one was ‘Blogging for Business’.
I enjoy technology and am mainly self-taught, but having that expert input on how to utilise various
applications and social media platforms to drive your business forward in an effective way is invaluable. I have honed my website building and associated skills to a point where I am frequently approached by other health-related businesses to provide websites for them.
How have you put the learning from the workshops into practice?
Raj: We use a lot of paid online advertising but following the workshop I’ve developed a better
understanding of the importance of generating content for marketing over and above self-promotion.
I’ve also learned that you need to devote the time to do it properly, professionally and in a way that you can measure your results.
Producing and sharing useful knowledge with the world in the form of a blog or a tweet endorses us as a
professional practice. Having fibre broadband and the knowledge of how to use the marketing tools available allows us to take those opportunities. The workshops also highlight areas of our business that
need development and keep us abreast of how things are changing. I’ve already signed up for another two workshops.
What are your plans for the future?
Zoe: We’re looking to upgrade our website, technology is constantly changing and you need
to be aware of how it impacts on your business. We want to have a more sophisticated online shop,
keep up to date with the developments of the key search engines and blog and use social media more
effectively.
There are also tools out there that let us test and analyse how our potential customers are accessing out site and how well they are receiving our information. Without superfast fibre broadband we wouldn’t have been able to do any of these things