We spoke to Clive Withinshaw, Director at HACCP International, to ask him about his experience using LinkedIn and working with the Lucy Bingle team.
What type of business is HACCP International?
HACCP International provides certification and advisory services to the food industry.
Considering its absolute necessity most people don’t think much about where their food comes from, or how its processed, until something goes wrong. Food safety depends upon a host of factors, which are the responsibility of various participants in the food chain. The farmer is one link in the production chain of food safety but there are many others also responsible for food safely moving from paddock to plate.
The part of HACCP International’s business which Lucy Bingle was engaged to assist with is product certification. HACCP International provides certification to the manufacturers of equipment used in the food industry. It’s quite interesting to think of the range of equipment this covers – from the obvious like fridges – to the not so obvious like the type of gloves or pest chemicals to safely use in a food production environment.
A good example of a typical HACCP International client could be a freezer manufacturer who has developed a new type of commercial food freezer. To successfully sell this new freezer it is important that potential customers know it will be safe to use. HACCP International can provide the manufacturer with a specialised food industry-specific certification which gives customers the assurance they need.
Why did you choose LinkedIn and Lucy Bingle?
“We chose LinkedIn as our preferred social platform because we realised that our target customers were much more likely to be on LinkedIn.”
And why Lucy Bingle?
“Initially we used an agency in London for LinkedIn, then we decided to do it ourselves in house. We realised fairly quickly that by doing it internally we weren’t giving it the attention it needed. It was too important just to have it as a sort of side-part to people’s main jobs. So, we went looking for someone who was an expert in LinkedIn. We came across Lucy Bingle in our search and liked that fact that they only focus on LinkedIn – a do one thing and do it well approach.”
What did HACCP want to achieve by using LinkedIn?
Clive says that traditional marketing approaches weren’t working anymore.
“We used to print and distribute a magazine as a way of connecting with our customers, which was successful but with soaring printing and distribution costs it became financially impossible to justify. We decided to switch to an electronic newsletter and to use LinkedIn to post additional content which would be of interest to our customers and keep us front of mind – and in a way – give the ‘polish’ to our brand that the magazine used to provide.”
What were your main objectives?
“It was to grow brand awareness and attract potential customers for HACCP International’s product certification business.”
What do you like about working with the Lucy Bingle team?
“I like that our account manager really took the time to understand our business and to develop a suitable LinkedIn strategy. They understand the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ and what type of content works best and attracts our customers. This gives us good ‘bang for buck’.
Another thing I like is that they’re prepared to be measured by data and to be held accountable. This helps develop our approach and it also demonstrates the value the strategy is having.”
Clive also likes having an expert in control.
“I’m a firm believer in hiring experts to do a job and then getting out of the way but holding them accountable for results.”
What results has Lucy Bingle helped HACCP International achieve?
Clive is pleased about the growth in the number of followers of HACCP International on LinkedIn.
“When we started with Lucy Bingle, we had about 4,000 followers and right now we’re at over 27,000. That’s potential customers who have taken the time to press the ‘follow’ button, which is really great.
Another good thing is the quality of those followers. We always take the time to look at who the new followers are and many of them are senior people who work at the right type of companies in the right sort of roles. By ‘right’ I mean our target type of potential customers. This is who we want to be attracting as followers.
We’re happy with how our LinkedIn strategy is progressing and we’re harsh critics, if it wasn’t giving us value, we’d stop doing it and try something else – but that’s not the case.”
