SME Marketeers

07/08/2026

And finally on to the 'A's... 🐴✨

Back in 2024, we created the rather beautiful website for Astonishing Light Equine.

Every website we create is completely unique, and this one took its inspiration from the lovely logo of four horses gathered around a person. We carried that artistic feel throughout the site with soft pastel-style illustrations, subtle animations and calming design elements to perfectly reflect Sam's approach.

Sam is a qualified therapist who works with horses alongside other creative therapeutic approaches, including colouring, singing, movement and mindfulness, to support children, young people and adults with their mental health, emotional wellbeing and personal growth. Sessions provide a safe, non-judgemental space where clients can explore their feelings, build confidence and develop coping strategies – often finding it easier to connect through the horses than through traditional talking therapy alone.

It was a real pleasure to create a website that captures the warmth, compassion and peaceful atmosphere of Astonishing Light Equine.

Take a look at the finished website and discover more about the amazing work Sam does: https://www.astonishinglightequine.co.uk/

Others can tell us how strong we are, how bright we shine, what we bring to this life that no-one else can - but to truly believe it, for it to last & stay with us, we need to find this within ourselves.

03/08/2026

Staying with the 'B's', another riding club website... Blackdown Mendip Riding Club. 🐴

Although Blackdown Mendip Riding Club had many of the same requirements as Brent Knoll Riding Club, they wanted to keep some of their processes manual rather than fully automated. That's one of the advantages of a bespoke website - it can be tailored to suit the way you work, rather than forcing you to change your processes.

The website showcases the fantastic range of training and events available to both members and non-members from BMRC. Riders can browse upcoming training sessions and use integrated online forms to book their place, giving the committee all the information they need without endless email chains.

One of my favourite features is how the website supports the club's annual Club Camp. A highlight of the club calendar for members, the committee can use the Wix web and CRM solution to:

🏕️ Promote the event to members
🏕️ Offer early bird discounts
🏕️ Collect bookings and information through online forms
🏕️ Ask riders to choose their lessons
🏕️ Request payments at the appropriate time
🏕️ Send email updates with timings, catering information and accommodation details
🏕️ Share camp photos and follow-up information once the event has finished

Instead of dozens of separate emails, spreadsheets and social media posts, everything is organised in one place, making life much easier for both the committee and members.

Every club works differently, and that's exactly why I don't believe in a one-size-fits-all approach. Whether you want to automate everything or keep certain elements manual, your website should support the way your club already operates—not dictate it.

Take a look: www.blackdownmendiprc.co.uk 😊

Blackdown Mendip RC is an affiliated member of British Riding Club Area 12 and has the primary aim of helping members to become the best riders that they can be.

31/07/2026

Moving on to the 'B's', and one of my favourite projects... Brent Knoll Riding Club. 🐴 Not least as I was a member for many years!

This website is a great example of how an integrated website can become so much more than an online brochure. It's a complete digital hub for the club, bringing together bookings, payments, communications, marketing, news updates and administration into one easy-to-manage platform.

Designed specifically for the committee, different members have access to manage their own areas of the website, meaning updates can be made quickly without relying on just one person.

Members can:
🐎 Browse upcoming training sessions
🐎 Book and pay online instantly
🐎 Enter competitions and pay online
🐎 Keep up to date with club news, events and team successes
🐎 Access members-only content

For the committee, it means no more chasing payments, no endless spreadsheets, and far less administration, leaving more time to organise great events for the club.

Behind the scenes, the website works just as hard. Regular blog posts feed into newsletters and email marketing, integrating with social media to keep members engaged throughout the year. Sponsor pages provide valuable exposure for local businesses while also generating quality backlinks that help support the club's SEO.

This project demonstrates what SME Marketeers mean by our Integrated Web & Digital Marketing service. Rather than having separate systems for your website, bookings, payments, CRM, newsletters and marketing, everything works together in one seamless platform.

The Brent Knoll Riding Club website includes:
✔️ Bespoke website design
✔️ Personalised member areas
✔️ Online bookings and payments
✔️ Competition entries
✔️ CRM integration
✔️ Email newsletters and automation
✔️ Regular blog content
✔️ SEO, Google Analytics & Search Console
✔️ Social media integration

Whether you're running a riding club, sports club, visitor attraction or service-based business, bringing everything together into one place saves time, reduces costs and creates a much better experience for your customers.

Take a look and let me know what you think! 😊

Brent Knoll Riding Club is affiliated to BRC Area 12. A small but friendly club that encourages all its members to join in at any and every level. Join now.

28/07/2026

If you have been following our posts, you may recall a business we worked with called Funeral Marketing? Their 'business from a box' idea provided the template for Dereham and Fakenham Funeral Services. Whilst this is no longer active, again I'm going to share this as part of the process was providing 3 different branding solutions for D&F.

Dereham and Fakenham Funeral Services wanted to position themselves differently. Rather that the traditional dark black, they wanted to reflect that they were there to help you grieve but to celebrate the life of the lost love one. Hence the tag line Remembered in Style - a funeral service to celebrate their lives.

Threes designs were presented using elements 'native' to Norfolk - the kingfisher, the poppy and the beautiful Swallowtail butterfly.

The owner went for the Swallowtail.

24/07/2026

I'll cover two today - both are for websites that successfully relocated their businesses.

The first is Focusmont Ltd - another of the first sites we built in Weebly back in 2015. The owner was a very successful architect that had operated in Surrey for 25+ years offering not just draughtsman's expertise but advise on how best to make the most of the space and also providing planning permission support.

With a long pipeline of ongoing and repeat business in Surrey which continued when the owner relocated to Somerset, the owner wanted to promote his services locally to reduce time spent on the A303!

This site demonstrated the services available and helped to gain traction locally. The owner is now semi-retired and so with enough word of mouth business has closed down the website, but a picture of the original site with its lovely image and colour palette is below.

The second is Forest View Horse Transport was a rebrand of the successful Somerset Horsebox hire business when the owners relocated to Wales. This required careful management of the URLS so that Somerset Horsebox Hire didn't go down but redirected with a pop up to advise anyone existing customers who had missed the notification that the business had relocated without incurring a second hosting cost.

I love a bit of problem solving and successfully switched the sites over without any downtime and to reposition the offering as horse transporting services primarily rather than horsebox hire.

As the price of fuel has rocketed, this business has now closed the horse transport and diversified into offering equestrian paddock maintenance services to local customers in Wales. Again this site is now no longer in operation.

21/07/2026

Funnily enough, as we move into the 'F's', I've realised I've built quite a few websites beginning with F! Weirdly, it seems W and F have been my most popular letters... 🤷‍♀️

Sadly, however, this next business set up as Covid hit, is no longer trading. Even so, it was such a unique concept, and one that used a range of our digital marketing services, that I thought it deserved a mention.

The company was Funeral Marketing, launched in 2020 with the idea of helping people start their own funeral business through a complete "business in a box" package. (𝒴𝑒𝓈 𝐼 𝓀𝓃𝑜𝓌, 𝐼 𝒸𝑜𝓊𝓁𝒹 𝒽𝒶𝓋𝑒 𝒻𝑜𝓊𝓃𝒹 𝒶 𝒹𝑒𝓈𝒸𝓇𝒾𝓅𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝓌𝒶𝓈𝓃'𝓉 𝑔𝑜𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝑜 𝓂𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝑔𝓇𝑜𝒶𝓃!)

Working alongside the successful local funeral directors at Wells Funeral Services, new business owners would receive practical training and industry insight, while we provided the digital marketing foundations to help them launch. That included a bespoke website, SEO, Google Business Profile setup and a six-month Google Ads campaign designed to generate enquiries from day one.

The business also offered digital marketing services for established funeral directors looking to strengthen their online presence as more families turned to Google to find local services.

Working with our brilliant designer, Design by Pie, we created a professional website that reflected the sensitive nature of the industry while still performing well technically. Supported by SEO and Google Ads, the site was indexed and ranking for its target keywords within just two months.

To attract aspiring funeral directors, we undertook (𝓈𝑜𝓇𝓇𝓎... 𝒾𝓉 𝒽𝒶𝒹 𝓉𝑜 𝒷𝑒 𝒹𝑜𝓃𝑒!)meticulous keyword research, highly targeted ad copy and a dedicated landing page. The campaign produced some fantastic results:

😊 Average cost per click: 24p
😊 80 qualified leads generated over six months
😊 23 keywords achieved a click-through rate above 5%
😊 9 keywords exceeded 10% CTR
😊 2 keywords reached an impressive 20% CTR

As well as delivering high-quality leads, the Google Ads campaign generated valuable traffic and engagement signals providing Google with data and metrics to help this new site to rank well organically quickly.

Ultimately, though, the business model proved to be a difficult sell. While there was genuine interest—and several people signed up for the monthly Funeral Director tutorials—the investment required to launch a new funeral business was simply too high a barrier for most, perhaps at a time when so much was uncertain. After around 18 months, the company closed its doors.

It's a reminder that great marketing can generate awareness, enquiries and opportunities... but the commercial viability of the underlying business model still has to stack up.

17/07/2026

Moving on down the alphabet, we're into the 'I's' with Inspire Cross Country.

As Covid restrictions began to ease in the summer of 2020, owner Dom Northmore needed a quick and simple booking website that could take bookings throughout August, offering sole use of the cross-country course whether it was hired by an individual rider or groups of two, three or four.

The aim was to test whether hiring out the course would be a viable business to continue in future years, so we opted for the flexible SimplyBook.me booking system. This allowed us to get a fully functioning website up and running within a week, keeping costs low while testing the concept over a single month.

The trial was a success, and the business continued to run using SimplyBook.me each year. The site would sit dormant during the off-season, with paid hosting only required while bookings were open, making it a very cost-effective solution.

As Lane End Farm and Lane End Camping evolved, I was able to bring all of the businesses together into a single Wix website. This gave us access to the full suite of Wix features, including Wix bookings, HotelRunner integration, Wix online payments, Wix CRM solution for offers and much more.

Each business now has its own dedicated microsite, accessible either through its individual domain (such as Inspire XC or Lane End Camping) or via the main Lane End Farm hub. The result is a much smoother user journey, easier management for the client, and a more cost-effective long-term solution.

It's always satisfying when a project grows from a simple proof of concept into something that's still going strong years later! 🐎💻

www.inspirexc.co.uk

Designed to inspire and encourage young or novice horses & riders, the Inspire XC field offers various XC fences to use EXCLUSIVELY for your 2 hour slot.

13/07/2026

So having already covered the 'L's' earlier this year with the Launch of Lane End Farm and Lane End Camping, we're on to 'K'

Kazia Equine was one of the very first sites we built and it was done in Weebly (now owned by Square). It still provides the functionality required, although we now build in Wix.

Kazia is an exceptionally talented equine physiotherapist and McTimoney practitioner, and I was incredibly lucky to get my horses onto her books when I moved to Somerset - especially as she's worked with some of the UK's top competition horses and professional yards.

Based in Ilminster, Kazia provides expert rehabilitation and therapy for horses recovering from injury, surgery or illness, with purpose-built rehabilitation facilities and tailored recovery programmes. Combining Equine McTimoney treatments, physiotherapy, sports massage, veterinary-based kinesiology taping and core strengthening exercises, every rehabilitation plan is designed around the individual horse.

As Kazia says:
"Whether you want your horse to hack or compete, we are committed to giving all horses entrusted to our care the very best chance to return to their previous level of performance."

It was a real pleasure creating a website that reflects the professionalism, expertise and genuine care behind the business, while making it easy for horse owners to find the information they need. I even learnt a lot myself along the way!

Take a look and let me know what you think! 🐴💙

Kazia Equine Rehabilitation and Therapy offers a range of services to help your horse recover after an illness or injury. Contact us to see how we can help you.

01/07/2026

With a slight detour from 'M' to 'A' with the announcement of the Allerton Alpacas site, I'm now back to M's - this time with "Massage Chris."

Our journey with Chris was not to provide a website - which was already being expertly created by another web creator that we rate highly - but rather to use our 25+ years of marketing expertise to help Chris structure and package his extensive range of self-help and self-massage techniques into a format that could be delivered online.

Creating the framework for his many self-massage/self help services, we helped Chris organise the tips and techniques into 4 courses with 10 modules each - blending practical advice, educational content and guided massage techniques targeted for different needs.

The timing was significant. Following the Covid lockdowns, many people had become comfortable learning, exercising and developing new skills from home. Online courses had moved firmly into the mainstream, giving businesses new ways to share their expertise and helping customers access services at a time and place that suited them.

Today, our phones give us instant access to almost anything we need. We can learn a new skill, order dinner, book a service or watch a tutorial in seconds. Online courses allow businesses to meet customers where they are, providing flexible access to valuable knowledge without the restrictions of fixed locations or schedules.

For Chris, that meant creating a way for people to benefit from his expertise whenever they needed it.

We worked with the very talented Tom Dalgarno to shoot the videos in a wonderful location he found in Bristol. The studio was on a boat - we filmed day 2 in a storm which provided added hilarity. But we all thoroughly enjoyed pulling these courses together.

22/06/2026

𝐈'𝐦 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐬 𝐈'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐰𝐚𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐧𝐞!

I met Caroline and her wonderful alpacas last year and we created a website for her Alpaca Workshops. Held at her home in Stone Allerton, the 2-hour workshops (CEVAS and LEAF accredited) were designed to provide hands-on experiential learning for children from KS1 to KS3 to explore key elements of the National Curriculum in subjects like English, Maths, PSHE, Biology and Art through interaction and care of alpacas in a way that's active, relevant and lasting. This site went live in July 2025

At the time, Caroline was already running a successful Airbnb and attracting visitors looking for unique stays with alpacas, and she had plenty of exciting plans for expansion – including acquiring additional land and transport to take her alpacas further afield.

One year on, Caroline's herd is growing – and it's not just the alpaca family that's expanding. In 2025 she got the new 10-acre field up and running, ready to receive the boy alpacas, and added 10 rare-breed sheep to the family, with plans for goats in the near future too. The field is also home to a beautiful 2-acre ancient orchard, which Caroline is passionate about preserving and rewilding for future generations.

The alpacas are now mobile and able to attend schools for workshops, but also weddings, care homes and community events, bringing their calming presence and educational value to even more people.

With the new field and orchard, Allerton Alpacas can now offer four fantastic alpaca experiences:
🦙Mums and Crias Meet & Greet
🦙Alpaca boys & Rare-breed Sheep Meet & Greet
🦙Alpaca Walking and Care Experience - meet & greet of the boys followed by an orchard walk.
🦙Wellbeing and Crafts - calm alpaca paddock interactions with the girls followed by creative fleece crafts in our cosy barn.

It's been fantastic to see Caroline's vision continue to grow over the last year and I have thoroughly enjoyed learning more about Alpacas and creating the new updated site. I'm also looking forward to seeing what comes next for Allerton Alpacas and its ever-expanding family of animals.

If you're looking for a unique Somerset experience, Allerton Alpacas should definitely be on your list.

Rural retreats and memorable encounters. Experience Allerton Alpacas for stays near Bristol, alpaca walking, or guest hire for weddings, schools and care homes.