UFindUs – a sure fire winner

Last week UFindUs.com received another internet accolade form Hitwise. Hitwise are recognised within the industry for the accuracy of their data and are part of the Experian group. 

Having been acknowledged in 2006 as well, we have now taken 7th place in the top ten sites receiving the most web traffic for the category of Business and Finance directories.  It is a tremendous achievement and proves that UFuindUs may not be a site which will win brand awareness awards but when it comes to doing the business we keep on performing.

The interent is a an odd place and very often if a business should even be bothered to ask where the customer heard about them the answer will be I found you on the internet. More accurately it should be “I found your listing on UFindUs” or “I got your number from your website (which has achieved high rankings courtesy of UFindUs).

That aside we are concentrating on maintaining our top 10 position,and, with the rapid surge in traffic that the other Customer Street sites like Smile Local and More UK are seeing its a real win win situation for CustomerStreet customers.  

Contacting UFindUs.com

Remember that if you have anything that you want to discuss with UFindUs then there are various ways of getting in touch with us. We have our support telephone number which is 0845 013 5104 where our service reception staff will be able to direct your call in the most appropriate direction.

We also have the UFindUs feedback mailbox if you want to email your comments or queries to us. This can be done by sending your email to feedback@ufindus.com. Alternatively you can write to us at UFindUs head office marking your envelope for the relevant department. The address is  UFindus Ltd, Lancaster Business Park, Caton Road, Lancaster LA1 3RQ.

No matter how you contact us you can be assured that we will work towards dealing with your request as efficiently as possible.

Getting the most out of your UFindUs package

Its really easy to forget, when your this side of the fence, that not everyone knows or understands how the Internet works. As a business our teams here at Customer Street and UFindUs don’t assume that just because someone has taken out our package they will immediately know how to make the most out of the opportunity we put before them.

We realised a long time ago that we don’t just stumble across happy customers, we create them. We have a great product which for over5 years has continued to grow and develop alongside the Internet. But, and there is always a but, the way things work on the Internet changes on a weekly basis. What was right last week may not be right today.

We cant expect the average Customer Street or UFindUs customer to possibly keep abreast with these changes as they happen. At the end of the day they have businesses to run themselves. What we can however do is make keeping up to date with these changes a lot easier.

Our search manager Lee Johnson is on hand to get relevant snippets of information out to our customers by way of his almost daily posts on his SEO blog.  As consumers we should never underestimate the power of what can be achieved through the power of the Internet, and as Customer Street customers you shouldn’t underestimate the wealth of resources that you can draw on to make sure that the services we provide you with continue to offer excellent value by delivering a service second to none.    

Check out Lee’s blog and store it as a favourite so that you dont miss out on any of his hints and tips.

Check out the new Customer Street Website

Yesterday we launched the all new Customer Street site which has been designed to be more informative and easier to use than the previous version.

If you have a few minutes then why not check the site out  by clicking on www.customerstreet.com. Use the site to log into your own account and check out our advertisers area. One great new feature there is all the down-loadable documents which incorporate  the first steps guides to make sure you get the most out of your new package. It also includes terms and conditions to print of and read through at your leisure.  

UFindUs and Customer Street just keep growing

Having just had a passing chat with Adrian Berry, the Customer Street search engineer, who was telling me that at the last count our directories which include, Smile Local, More UK and of course UFindUs as well as over 140 trades portals, have a staggering 700,000 plus page impressions on the internet.

Is it any wonder that when you look for a tradesman or business on the internet there’s a pretty good chance that sooner rather than later you will be coming across a link to any of our hugely successful business directories or to any of the tens of thousands of websites that we have built for our customers ranging from the humble, but exceptionally search engine friendly rapidsite to our bespoke Premium Design websites.

Check out what I mean, just type in “general builder stevenage” or “electrician london”. The results speak for themselves.

Toni Schneider – wordpress is making the world a smaller place

I have just seen an interview with Toni Schneider on WallStrip. He is the CEO of Automattic. He doesn’t really do labels so his colleagues affectionately call him the “band leader”.

If you get time then check out the interview, you may need to bear with it whilst it buffers. Listening to him put me very much in mind of our own Customer Street Technical Director, Stuart Forrest. The longer I work within this industry the more people I am coming across like both Toni and Stuart.

These guys, and many more besides, never seem phased by anything, they are approachable, passionate about what they do and most of all are natural. Nothing is for show, they are who they are and a big part of why they do what they do is because they feel they can make a difference that will shape peoples lives for the better.When you listen to Toni he is very frank and open about the things he’s asked in the interview and not full of his own self importance like many CEOs in other industries.

At the end of the day the public are the ones who ultimately decide how good they are and they know that the public can on occasions be very fickle so they take nothing for granted. I would like to think that if you read Stuarts own blog you can get an insight into the man and the passion behind Customer Street.

UFindUs continue to go from strength to strength

I can help feeling more than just a little bit pleased with how the hard work of not only people like Mark Nichols, Stuart Forrest and James Wright, and myself, but also all our support staff has  played its part in really making a hugely tangible difference to how the UFindUs brand is perceived.

12 months ago, despite having phenomenal success from the point of view of customer volumes, page views and rankings we were missing something. As a business we simply lacked customer service skills. In the short space of time since then we have achieved so much in respect of giving UFindUs a “customer friendly voice”.

It is of course no good being all talk and no action, our services have altered as well to the point where we are reaching great levels of customer compliments rather than complaints. To me what is even more important is that the recognition isn’t for the work that UFindUs, Customer Street etc have done, it is actually coming in for the individuals who deal with our customers.

An example of which has been taken from an email sent by the team leader of our Customer Support department.“This customer wrote a letter of complaint to Stuart Forrest threatening possible legal action. I called the customer to discuss the issues that had been raised in the letter. The customer told me to completely disregard his letter and that Barry (our support agent) couldn’t have been any more helpful. He said anything they previously thought of the company they don’t think any longer and apologised for sending the letter!”.

Well done to Barry and all his colleagues who I know are really going to extra mille in pursuit of excellence in customer service.

Communication is the secret to good service

As part of the ever changing face of the internet UFindUs has been joined by sister directories MoreUK.com and Smilelocal.com as well as some 130 or so trade directories. These are all brought together under the Customer Street banner to form a truly formidable internet presence which few can match.

I have often said that we are constantly looking at ways of letting our customers know about what we are doing and perhaps more importantly looking at getting your feedback so that we can continue to improve our world class product.

As part of this drive we will be introducing new channels which will make it easier for you to contact us as well as enabling you to get up to date and relevant information on how to you’re your website work to your advantage, internet trends and general support queries which can affect your account. Over the coming days and weeks I will be telling you of the new links as they come online.

The best thing is that this is a brilliant opportunity for our customers to continue to make a difference helping us mould our business to meet your needs.

Graham Armstrong  - Customer Street