Explore the Messaging Review
the proof

When you can finally see the real problem

Most people don't come to me knowing exactly what needs to change with their marketing. They just have a nagging feeling that something isn't working as well as it should.

They might be struggling to explain what they do, second-guessing their marketing, changing things without feeling any more certain, or simply wondering why the right clients aren't choosing them often enough.

The stories here show what we've uncovered when we've stepped back, untangled what's really going on and worked out what needs to change.

Read the proof ↓
  • I sound like everyone else.
  • My expertise is difficult to explain.
  • My offers seem to confuse people.
  • I'm 57 AI prompts in and still confused about what to say.
  • I know there's something distinctive here, but I can't articulate it.”
  • I know where I want to go, but I'm second-guessing the strategy.
01

Alexina Cassidy

Founder, Act Now Consulting Ltd

Scope
Strategy sessions and advice
Three months

Finding the thread

Sara has an uncanny ability to get inside your brain, extract what's there and untangle it into something clear, focused and far more powerful.
Alexina CassidyAlexina CassidyFounder, Act Now Consulting Ltd

We didn't need to invent what made Alexina distinctive. It was already there in her experience. We needed to recognise it, make sense of it and give it a stronger role in the consultancy she was building.

Ten years in investment banking had become part of Alexina's backstory. It turned out to be part of her positioning.

In Alexina's words

Working with Sara has been incredibly valuable. She has an uncanny ability to get inside your brain, extract what's there and untangle it into something clear, focused and far more powerful.

She absolutely nailed it. What she came back with felt completely true to me and my business, but repositioned in a way I hadn't been able to articulate for myself.

Sara doesn't just listen to what you say; she seems to understand what sits underneath it, joins the dots and brings a clarity and strategic perspective that is incredibly difficult to achieve when you're so close to your own business.”

Alexina CassidyFounder, Act Now Consulting Ltd

Alexina already had a credible sustainability consultancy and years of experience behind her. But she felt there was more to her positioning than the business was communicating.

As we worked together, one part of her career kept resurfacing: ten years spent in investment banking.

It could easily have remained an interesting piece of career history. Instead, we started looking at what it had given her: an understanding of commercial decision-making and the realities businesses face when sustainability has to compete with other priorities.

There was the thread.

That gave us something real to distinguish her from other sustainability consultants, rather than trying to manufacture a point of difference. It also gave Alexina more confidence in the value of the perspective she already brought to the work.

That thinking gave us firmer ground for Alexina's positioning and messaging, and a clearer way to communicate why her particular experience matters to the clients she wants to help.

What's next

This is still a work in progress. Alexina is now translating the positioning and messaging we developed together into her website. She'd also like us to keep working together, building on that thinking to shape the direction for her content and thought leadership.

02

John Anderson

Former Founder, Impala Consulting Ltd

Scope
Website strategy & messaging
ongoing content & thought leadership
18 months

Getting underneath the business

What sets Sara apart is the depth of understanding she develops of a business.
John AndersonJohn AndersonFormer Founder, Impala Consulting Ltd

Before I could work out how to communicate the business, I needed to understand it properly. The website was the output. The thinking underneath it was what made the difference.

The work became a gamechanger, opening up new engagements in new territories.

In John's words

I can unequivocally recommend Sara. She completely restructured our niche global consultancy website with stunning results, a gamechanger that opened up new engagements in new territories.

Ten years on, faced with a major new challenge in a completely different sector, Sara was the first person who sprang to mind to help shape our communication strategy.

What sets Sara apart is the depth of understanding she develops of a business. She gets beneath the surface, makes sense of complexity and turns that understanding into clear, cohesive and convincing communication.”

John AndersonEx-Founder, Impala Consulting Ltd

I first worked with John around ten years ago, during my first period of self-employment.

He was one the Founder of Impala Consulting, a niche global consultancy that needed to rethink how it communicated its business online.

As I've since realised, the work went much deeper than writing copy or building a website. I needed to understand the whole business before I could work out how to communicate it.

We restructured the website around a clearer, more cohesive story, then continued working together on blogs and thought leadership that carried that thinking into the consultancy's wider marketing.

A decade later, John got back in touch.

This time it was a completely different business, in a completely different sector, facing a new communication challenge.

I was the first person he thought of.

What's next

Ten years after our first project, I'm now working with John again on The Black Bull in Godmanchester, the hospitality business he's building with his son, Will. It's a very different business and a very different brief, but the starting point is familiar: understand what they're building, find the story at the heart of it and make sure the marketing grows from there.

03

Heike Galbraith

Health Policy Consultant

Scope
Messaging Strategy

Making complex expertise easier to understand

Sara has a remarkable way of making complex communication challenges simple.
Heike GalbraithHeike GalbraithHealth Policy Consultant

Heike's expertise didn't need to become simpler. We needed to make it easier for the right people to understand why it mattered.

The challenge wasn't simplifying Heike's expertise. It was making its value easier to see.

In Heike's words

Sara has a remarkable way of making complex communication challenges simple.

She guided me through a thoughtful process that made it much easier to define my messaging as a public affairs consultant.

Her structured approach, combined with genuine warmth and always delivered with a smile, helped me reshape my messaging with ease.”

Heike GalbraithHealth Policy Consultant

Heike works in a world of complex health policy, regulation and international stakeholders. She had deep expertise and years of experience behind her, but turning all of that into messaging potential clients could quickly understand was difficult.

Our work focused on getting underneath the breadth of Heike's experience, working out what mattered most to the clients she wanted to reach and finding a clearer way to communicate that value without losing the depth behind it.

We looked across Heike's experience, the problems she was particularly well equipped to help with and what her ideal clients needed from her, then used that thinking to give her messaging a clearer structure.

The expertise didn't become simpler. It became easier to understand.

What happened next

We were about to build on Heike's new messaging with a clear direction for her content when her plans changed. The organisation she'd been consulting with two days a week offered her the opportunity to join them full time. It was a great fit for Heike, so she took the role and we brought our work together to a close.

THE THREAD GOES BACK FURTHER

I've been doing this longer than I realised

Looking back at feedback from clients I worked with during my first period of self-employment, I can see the same strengths being described long before I'd thought to call what I was doing strategic work.

The work has evolved considerably since then. The thread running through it hasn't.

Sara has the ability to ingest complex businesses and processes and to then withdraw herself from the minutia to draw out what's important and why, in order to create a very clear value proposition.

In In2itive's case, that value proposition was underpinned with a web and content marketing strategy for our complex software solutions that typically had a gestation period of 6–12 months, helping us to reduce that gestation period down to 2 months in some cases.”

Darren HumberDarren HumberManaging Director, In2itive Business Solutions Ltd

Sara is skilled at understanding organisational goals, services and products and communicating them in a way that appeals to your ideal customer.”

Ian HarveyIan HarveyFounding Architect

Not sure what's getting in the way?

The £300 Messaging Review is a focused look across your positioning, offers, messaging and marketing to work out where the disconnects are and what I'd prioritise first.

You'll leave with clear priorities and recommendations for what to address next. You may have everything you need to move forward from there.

If you'd like my support with what comes next, I'll credit the £300 in full towards Capable to Chosen.

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