The workshop in Kuala Lumpur on 28/29 June explored the implications of customer profitability on overall marketing strategy.

A number of topics were discussed, including customer importance, the effect of customer satisfaction on customer loyalty and lifetime value and the use of CRM techniques to help deliver the total customer experience.

Most of the attendees where from the banking sector and telecoms sectors. The following organisations were represented: Citibank, Telecom Malaysia, Eon Bank and CIMB Investment Bank.

Already delegates have said they are amending their marketing strategy as a result of this important workshop. TMS are looking forward to delivering further workshops together with organisers UNI Strategic to deliver further workshops later in the year.

TMS has been working with Exeter Golf and Country Club for a number of months, helping them to develop and implement a new sales and marketing strategy. As part of this work, we identified the need for a Sales and Marketing Manager to drive the business forward.

Working together with EGCC General Manager Martine Halse, TMS developed an appropriate brief and project-managed the recruitment process. Jenni Taffs was sucessfully recruited to the role and is now responsible for the development of sales - both in membership and in conferences and banqueting - and the marketing of one of Devon's premier leisure resorts. "We identified a need for a Sales and Marketing Manager early on in our work with EGCC," says TSM Managing Director, Mark Brewerton. "We were delighted to be able to find someone of Jenni's calibre who will be able to continue and expand on the sales and marketing strategy work we have already undertaken for EGCC."

TMS is delighted to welcome Melanie on board as part of a team of highly-qualified and experienced marketing consultants. "Melanie's creative background in the service sector complements our existing range of skills and expertise perfectly," says TMS Managing Director, Mark Brewerton. "We're really pleased to be able to welcome a consultant with Melanie's breadth and depth of experience to the team," says Mark.

Melanie is an experienced marketing consultant and has delivered results for organisations including the NHS, charities, local authorities, associations and professional services companies. As a service marketer, Melanie brings to the team her knowledge in developing customer experiences and an appreciation of their importance in an organisation's overall approach to marketing.

Melanie has an MA in marketing from Bristol Business School, is a Member of the Charted Institute of Marketing and is a Chartered Marketer. You can contact Melanie on 0845 201 1618.

Rennie's wide experience covers a broad range of sectors - from automotive and chemicals to financial and professional services. Rennie has worked with major organisations throughout Europe, the United States, South America and the Middle East. Following a management career with the Ford Motor Company, consultancy projects undertaken to date have included Natwest, the Royal Mail and Experian.

Rennie is also a skilled facilitator and workshop leader, having led development programmes in most areas of sales and marketing. He holds and MBA from Cranfield Business School and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing. He is also a Visiting Lecturer in Marketing at Cardiff Business School.

Says TMS Managing Director Mark Brewerton, "We're delighted to be able to welcome Rennie to the TMS team. He brings with him a real wealth of experience and expertise on both a national and international level."

The Marketing Masterclass will be delivered by TMS consultant Rennie Gould on 31st May, focussing on the importance of the customer and profitability for the development of sound marketing strategy.

Leading business conference organisers UNI arrange marketing-based events throughout Asia. Says TMS Managing Director Mark Brewerton, "Rennie has an outstanding record for helping clients develop and implement their sales and marketing strategy. He's also an experienced course facilitator and conference speaker and so is ideally suited to deliver this masterclass."

To find our more about Rennie click here or visit the Our Team page on our website.

"We're extremely pleased to be able to welcome David to TMS," says Mark Brewerton, Managing Director of Total Marketing Solutions. "David really brings a fantastic depth of marketing experience. His expertise in the public and private sectors, both within the UK and internationally, will prove invaluable as we continue to grow the business."

David has extensive marketing and business experience, having worked for a number of large companies such as Boots, Nestle, Unilever and Duracell.David brings considerable consultancy expertise too - initially working for Saatchi & Saatchi Marketing before ultimately establishing his own consultancy. He's also a member of the CIM and has an MA in Marketing.

It's been a month now since our new website was dragged screaming into the world and, whilst we are smugly pleased with it, we wanted to make sure that it had achieved its main objective - to work harder for us by bringing in new, quality enquiries. So we've been feverishly monitoring its progress through google analytics - something we do for all our customers who launch a new website as part of their strategy development. So here are the stats, the proof of the pudding:

Month on month enquiries have trebled - compared with January 2009 we have received three times as many enquiries in January 2010. And what's more, these have been good quality enquiries from companies who understand the strategic nature of what we do and want to work with us.

Traffic to the website - it's up 35% compared with this time last year. By anyone's reckoning that's pretty good!

Bounce rate - in other words, a visitor who lands on a page and then leaves from the same page without looking anywhere else (because it's just not interesting enough), has gone down by 10%. So our new site is enticing more visitors to look further and find out more.

Time spent on the site and pages viewed - The average length of time spent on the site and the average number of pages viewed have both increased by 10%. Again, this is another clear indication that the site is more engaging and more accurately getting the right information to the right people.

SEO still fantastic - whilst we were a little concerned that any tweaks to the site might impact on our rather fantastic SEO rankings (just type in "Marketing consultant" to see where we are!), we're delighted that our rankings have stayed as strong as ever, if not a little higher in some instances.

And whilst we are now working with the companies who enquired via the website in January 2010 to develop them into customers, we are at this early stage more than pleased with the improved results our new website has delivered. After all, if we can't do it for ourselves, how could we possibly claim to do it for other companies?

If you'd like to find our more about any of the above, please call Mark on 0845 210 1618 for an informal chat. He promises not to be too smug about our new site!

Our newly-developed online Marketing Audit Analysis has been designed to provide a step by step approach to carefully looking at each element of your business and how you currently market it. It will also help you to take a close look at what you currently do and why.

This analysis - always a starting point for us before we look at developing any sort of strategic direction for our clients - will help you get your thinking straight before you develop your marketing strategy. It will then help you to identify ways to improve the effectiveness of your marketing - making sure you are heading off in the right direction whilst maximising the effectiveness of any marketing activity you undertake.

So what are you waiting for? It's totally free, completely confidential - and it could be just the right way to start the new year.

We've put a lot of effort into redeveloping our website into a fresher, more interactive version. We're extremely pleased with the results, thanks to our wonderful design partner Paul at Firefly Design and to our web guru Andy at Four Degrees West.

Our new site really gives you a flavour of what we do and why we do it. Visit "Our Services" to find out how we go about developing a marketing strategy for clients across all market sectors. We have also included information on our new Marketing Project Management and Market & Customer Research services.

If you visit our "Success Stories", you'll also be able to see just how we go about achieving our results with real case studies covering a range of marketing challenges - from brand communications through to developing and managing an online marketing strategy.

We've also launched a new free Marketing Audit Self-assessment tool, which involves a short series of questions you can complete in confidence online to help you start to think about analysing the future direction of your marketing activities.

In short, there's an awful lot packed into this website, which we think really conveys what we do and why. But it's not up to us to judge - take a look for yourself and let us know what you think!

"We're extremely pleased with the site but, more importantly, the client is very happy indeed with the end result," says Mark Brewerton. "We have delivered the brief, which was to create a clean-looking, brochure site that accurately represented the quality of the Sysmex brand. It communicates the strength of the Sysmex proposition whilst engaging with the whole range of stakeholders - from laboratory scientists through to senior NHS manager and decision-makers."

Take a look at the new website here to judge for yourself!

"We're really excited to have won this contract," says Mark Brewerton, TMS Managing Director. "We have worked with a number of companies in the leisure and tourism sector in the past and are keen to apply our expertise to this new project."

Exeter Golf and Country Club has an enviable reputation in the South West and benefits from a truly unique location. The Club is looking to build on its core strengths to achieve its corporate objectives for the future. Continues Mark, "We're looking forward to helping the Club maximise its position as one of the leading golfing, meetings and weddings venues in the region."

TMS will be helping 360CRM develop a robust marketing strategy to enable them to take their new product - Chronos - to market nationally. We'll also be helping them to identify new product and market opportunities to secure future growth for the company. Take a look at their website here.

TMS has recently won a significant contract to undertake the development of a new market and business strategy for a leading technology provider to the business travel market. The project, on behalf of Travel Centric Technology, will encompass research into the business travel market and potential opportunities to form the basis of new strategy development.

"We're really please to have won the Travel Centric Technology business and are looking forward to gaining a good understanding of the way their industry works," says TMS Managing Director, Mark Brewerton. "We put considerable time and effort into the initial research stage to ensure that we gain an in-depth understanding of a specific market and its characteristics. This ensures that our strategy development is sound, applicable and relevant. Travel Centre Technology have a unique product offering and we are confident we shall be able to help them find the right solutions to fully exploit this new business opportunity."

The Total Marketing Solutions team has been further strengthened by the arrival of Brian O'Donnell as a Consultant. Brian brings with him a real depth of marketing experience, with particular expertise in online marketing and customer acquisition. Brian has joined us from Suttons Consumer Products, where he was involved in marketing brands including Suttons Seeds. Educated in Ireland, Brian has an MBA from London Guildhall University.

"We are really pleased to have Brian on board," says Mark Brewerton, Managing Director of Total Marketing Solutions. "He has a real passion for what he does and brings with him a mix of marketing skills, which will complement our current team perfectly."

TMS Managing Director Mark Brewerton has been appointed a Fellow to the Chartered Institute of Marketing in recognition of his expertise in marketing strategy development and marketing consultancy. "I am extremely pleased that the TMS approach to marketing has been recognised by our industries' leading professional body," says Mark. "I strive to ensure that TMS always provides marketing advice of the highest calibre whilst delivering real results for customers."

Mark is already Vice Chair for the CIM in Cornwall with a remit to help the organisation become the champion of small to medium-sized businesses throughout the county.

TMS have recently started working with leading financial software developers, JHC. Based in the City of London, JHC provide software solutions for financial institutions, wealth managers and both retail and institutional stockbrokers. The company are looking to develop a Sales and Business Development plan to achieve their objectives for growth and turned to TMS to help them.

As strategic marketing specialists, TMS have been looking at their different markets and products and services proposition in order to assess their marketplace and the opportunities available to them. With this strategic understanding, TMS is now in the process of prioritising future sales and marketing activities and also providing guidance in the further development of products and services. "We have been able to look at JHC's markets through in-depth, one-to-one interviews, which form the basis of our strategy development. It's absolutely critical to get your thinking straight at this stage in the strategy development process," says Mark. "Too many companies just don't do their research and come unstuck further down the process. As strategic marketing experts, this is where we are really able to make a difference to a company's future preformance."

A leading supplier of market intelligence reports to process industries, Protel Projects, based in Somerset, has chosen TMS to help reinvigorate business growth. As a first step, TMS have been carrying out comprehensive research into their customers' awareness and perceptions of the brand in order to better understand customer needs.

With this information, TMS is now exploring ways in which Protel can extend their products and services offering to greatest effect. "We place a lot of emphasis on doing our homework right at the beginning of a poject," says TMS Managing Director Mark Brewerton. "That way, we know we are heading in the right direction when it comes to strategy development. It sounds obvious, but too many companies decide on a course of action without having all the necessary information on which to base a sound judgement. This goes to the very heart of how we operate and enables us devise strategies which really work for our clients."

Dave Wilson, a digital marketing expert, has joined TMS as a consultant. Dave has a wealth of experience in business strategy development, particularly in sales and marketing, with a focus on digital marketing. Dave has previously managed projects for customers as varied as Siemens, Cadbury and Yell.com.

"We're really excited to have Dave on board," says TMS Managing Director, Mark Brewerton. "He has a passion for delivery, quality and creativity, which mirrors our own approach to doing business. He complements our existing range of skills and brings a real understanding of how to help businesses grow their sales and profitability."

Sandra Lawes has recently joined forces with Total Marketing Solutions as a Consultant, building on success achieved in a variety of senior marketing roles in a number of sectors including healthcare, IT, construction and travel. Sandra has worked in companies as varied as Fisons, Thomas Cook and BUPA.  She also has experience within a major advertising agency, working on accounts such as Bovis Homes, Twinings and public sector clients.

More recently, Sandra has focussed her energies on working with clients in the healthcare sector, carrying out market assessment and feasibility studies for various public and private healthcare providers. "Sandra brings with her an excellent understanding of strategic marketing, particularly in the healthcare sector. She is a real pleasure to work with and we're looking forward to working  on some exciting future projects together," says TMS Managing Director, Mark Brewerton.

Sandra has an MBA and holds the Chartered Institute of Marketing's Post Graduate Diploma in Marketing. She is also a Chartered Marketer.

TMS has launched a new service - the Digital Marketing Strategy Audit.  The Audit has been designed to help customers maximise their online marketing budget and ensure their web presence is working to maximum effect. "We developed this audit because, whilst it might be pointing out the obvious, most businesses today - whether B2B or B2C - use the web in some way to either promote their business or as a sales / business development channel. They invest agreat deal of money to do this and as a result have high expectations," says TMS Managing Director Mark Brewerton.

TMS Consultant and digital marketing specialist Brian O'Donnell, who developed the Audit together with colleague Dave Wilson (see below) explains the rationale behind the audit: "Unfortunately our experience as marketing consultants has shown us that much of this investment is either inefficient or ineffective - meaning that the potential level of return from the web is never truly realised."

This unique product will, according to Brian, "help our clients get the most out of their investment in the web. The Digital Strategy Marketing Audit service enables us to take a holistic approach to analysing all the components of a customer's digital marketing activity and to then develop an action plan to will make these activities deliver more."

Click on the image on the right to a short but informative online presentation on just how this new service works. To view the presentation just click the 'play' symbol.