Note: I live inside this website Monday to Friday 9am-6pm, to give you the very best service and make your experience a happy one! - I am Ling, accept no substitutes
This is where I keep all my press cuttings. Some people visit my webpage, see my cars and they think I am spoofing it! Crazy, but true. No; cars are real, I am real, website real! Published articles below should help you believe I exist in real life! I am human person, you can trust me and that I really live in Gateshead and have a Chinese Army nuclear rocket truck. What else you want? DNA??? ...Enjoy to read...
My thanks go to RMS PR who offer me incredible support to assist me in promoting my business. They are fantastic, they even get me in press in China! They also had a brand new Honda CRV from me! I recommend them 200% - Ling
"THE INQUIRER" News, Reviews, Fact and Friction By Tony Dennis May 2008
Chinese bird goes mobile - Entrepreneur moves from cars to phones
OH JOY. Yet another mobile phone comparison site. This one, however, is run by Ling Valentine, a Chinese-born, British-based entrepreneur, made famous by an appearance on TV's Dragon's Den.
She happily describes herself as "a Chinese bird who flogs cars".
Ling claims her online car-leasing site, lingscars.com, has gone from zero to a turnover of £5 million in five years.
Now she plans to shake up the UK's mobile contract phone business. Her company claims that the site price checks over 75,000 mobile contract offerings and then shows the best 10 deals.
Valentine spotted the opportunity when her car-leasing customers asked her about Bluetooth and car kits for their cars.
Ever one to grab publicity, Valentine makes a reference to the recent UK TV expose of the mobile phone industry's worst practices on Channel 4's Dispatches programme. She says her recommendations will steer clear of "cashback offers, free gifts and other worthless offers."
We wonder if she realises just how fierce the competition is amongst mobile phone comparison sites.
Ling Valentine launches website for mobile bargain-hunters May 2008, By Stuart Dredge
I have to admit, I hadn’t heard of Ling Valentine, but apparently she’s a self-made millionaire thanks to her internet-based car leasing service.
Anyway, she’s turned her attention to mobile handsets, with a new site called LingsMobiles which promises a simpler approach to finding a new handset. In short, it furtles through more than 75,000 different mobile contract offers, then serves up the ten best deals for whatever phone you’re interested in. The site multiplies the monthly contract by its length in months, and adds the initial price in the handset (for example, the total cost of a Nokia N95 might be £15 times 18 months, plus £239.99 for the phone, making £509.99 in total).
“I hate the mis-selling side of mobile phones where less savvy consumers are enticed by those awful redemption cashback offers,” says Valentine. “They’re difficult to claim and can result in massive contract charges. I have no allegiance to any retailers or networks so I exclude redemption cashback offers, free gifts and other worthless offers.”
"REAL BUSINESS" Connecting and Inspiring Entrepreneurs by Catherine Woods April 2008
27 ways to raise your company's profile. Wise up to the ways you can market your business and boost brand awareness.
1 Consider stunts
Stunts may be risky but they can be very effective if done in a witty and relevant way, says author and “ideas man” Shed Simove. “The best are those that show you have the skills relevant to what a person wants,” he says. Ling’s Cars founder Ling Valentine put a missile truck on the side of the A1 motorway to promote her firm. “People’s opinions changed from ‘you’re mad’ to ‘that’s clever’,” she says. “When Tony Blair forced me to remove the rocket, I was inundated with messages asking where it had gone, and was interviewed on radio and TV.”
2 Try something different
On occasion, it’s good to change tack, says Ronnie Bartlett. His family’s 60-year-old root vegetable business, Albert Bartlett, became a sponsor of iconic horse racing festival Cheltenham. He explains: “We’re getting to the male consumer because that can drive demand. Cheltenham is covered all across the world, so it’s huge exposure for us. "There’s a lot of trade involved in the festival over the week; punters get to try our products. Everyone who eats a potato at Cheltenham will eat one of ours.”
3 Personalise and differentiate
Shed Simove, who writes about success and creativity in business, recommends adding a personal touch to your offering. “Target decision-makers but strike an emotional connection. Don’t do what everyone else will do,” he says. “One time, to win a client, I found out all about the company’s boss, discovered his favourite character in Coronation Street was Mike Baldwin and then got the actor in question to sign a photo with a special message on it.”
4 Hire a PR firm for your business
It’s an oldie but a goodie. Hiring a good PR firm is one of the easiest ways to increase awareness of your business. Dean Horridge, founder of children’s activity company Fit for Sport, recently hired his first PR company. “We were sending a lot of mixed messages about what we did through some of our initiatives – we wanted clarity on brand awareness across the UK,” he says.
5 Hire a PR firm for you
One of the services Rostrum Communications offers is “personal” PR. Founder Mark Houlding explains why it can be useful: “It can create credibility for the company by giving it a human face and personality, which can add value if you’re competing against larger firms with bigger budgets and brands.”
6 Pick a firm that knows your market
“An agency is not going to be able to do a great job of positioning your brand and finding the opportunities and dealing with journalists in a professional manner if it doesn’t know your market,” says London-based Jay O’Connor, MD of European operations for PR firm Racepoint Group. She also says it’s important to check a potential PR partner’s contacts and references.
7 Be eponymous Ling Valentine of Ling’s Cars believes putting herself in the firing line has been the most successful tactic to raise the profile of her business. “Every other company in the car-leasing sector trades as a generic-style firm, such as XYZ Leasing, but I trade as myself. People know who they’re dealing with,” she says. “Sticking my head above the parapet includes putting myself on TV [Valentine turned down funding on Dragons’ Den], representing myself on my webpage and personally taking care of my customers.”
8 Network online
The Results Academy founder Fraser Hay says he’s become well known through the use of online social networks such as Ecademy and Facebook. “I’ve been able to generate leads, get referrals from people in many different places and create pre-qualified prospects without having to cold call,” he says. To make this sort of networking work, however, Hay says you need to identify what peoples’ problems are and how you can help.
9 Don’t be intimidated
Networking is a great way to raise your profile, but Liz Taylor, founder of £3.5m-turnover events company the Taylor Lynn Corporation, says you’ll make more of an impact if you’re not easily intimidated. “You should always have the confidence to speak to anybody,” she says.
10 Know your objectives and your audience
You won’t get anywhere if you don’t know what you want to achieve and who you’re trying to target, says Jay O’Connor. She advises business owners to ask themselves a few questions before embarking on a publicity drive: “Why are you doing this? Who do you want to reach? How do you reach those audiences? Who influences them?”
11 Target obvious customers
Ronnie Bartlett, who runs Albert Bartlett, his family’s root vegetable business, says the company successfully raised its profile by targeting relevant media outlets. “We featured in Good Food magazines around the world, as well as sponsoring the Food Channel and other food programmes,” he says.
12 Strike the right partnerships
To raise the profile of his new business, iammoving.com, Simon Preston, former chief of Tiscali UK, has partnered with organisations his clients have to deal with when they’re moving house. “We have a partnership with the Royal Mail, which deals with redirections,” he says. “You’ll see us gradually growing relationships with other people, such as letting agents.”
13 Align with big names
Luxury shirt maker Emma Willis was featured in a recently published report called Face Value: Your Reputation as a Business Asset, published by private bank Coutts. “People bank with Coutts all over the world, so it’s a really good affiliation,” she says. “I have also collaborated with young British fashion label Rodnik. It distinguishes you from being just another shirt maker in Jermyn Street.”
14 Hire a celebrity
Neville Upton brought former England rugby captain Lawrence Dallaglio on board as a director of motivation for his £26m-turnover customer relations firm, The Listening Company. As well as inspiring the 2,000-strong workforce, Upton says Dallaglio also spends time with clients. “Everyone knows who he is. He’s an impressive person and he’s helped raise the company’s profile a great deal,” Upton says, adding that the initiative has been “very good value for money”.
15 Focus on content
Jay O’Connor, from PR group Racepoint, says whatever your message, the content you’re putting out there has to be relevant to the audience. “You need to focus on the benefits of your products or services and what’s going to matter to clients or consumers, not the technical aspects that people won’t care about,” she says.
16 Champion a cause
IT services specialist Connect has helped grow awareness of the company by undertaking initiatives to boost the number of women in IT. For example, Connect has formed a group for women IT specialists, worked with schools to promote the IT sector to female students and taken part in industry-wide groups investigating the issue. CEO Mark MacGregor says: “It helps us stand out from the crowd because it’s not just about us launching a new product.”
17 Be an expert
Writing opinion pieces, joining the speakers’ circuit or running an event that shows your expertise is a good way to get yourself known, according to Judith Germain, the managing director of leadership company Dynamic Transitions. She says: “I’ve published a lot of articles on the web. I’ve also written a lead article for Talent Management Review, as well as running online and offline business communities.”
18 Be accessible to journalists
If you’re positioning yourself as an industry commentator in the media, Rostrum Communications founder Mark Houlding recommends: “Be readily available and give an interesting and different point of view.” He warns against becoming a “rent-a-quote”, saying it’s easier to build an image in one specialist area.
19 Befriend the right writers
Emma Willis says dealing with the press is “absolutely critical” to building up your profile. “I’ve worked hard – on my own and with PR agencies – to be written about in quality publications my customers read, such as the Financial Times and Vogue,” she says. “I will personally go and meet the relevant journalists, even those in the US. I give them a good idea about what I do.”
20 Join a business organisation
“I’m involved in quite a lot of other business activities,” says iammoving.com’s Simon Preston. “I’m an international board director of the Young Presidents’ Organisation. We have a relatively low public profile, but it’s all about business leaders networking together, sharing experiences, ideas and education.”
21 Be charitable
Helping a charity to raise money not only means using your skills to help others – it may also put you in touch with potential partners. Liz Taylor, founder of events firm the Taylor Lynn Corporation, works with the Prince’s Trust Fundraising Committee. She advises: “You’ve got to be a little bit canny and make it work commercially for you.
Find out who supports the charity, who’s involved, where they come from and what they’re trying to achieve.”
22 Target students
James Lott is the co-founder of business management tool provider The Working Knowledge Group, which runs competitions with university students as a way of promoting its products and services. “Students use a derivative of our strategy tool,” he says. “Throughout the competition, they keep seeing this tool and think ‘I could use this in my future business’.”
23 Be transparent
Today’s consumers are demanding more information about the products they buy and the companies that supply them. Tapping into that can help give your business a better profile. Take vegetable company Albert Bartlett. Boss Ronnie Bartlett says: “Our packaging tells you the name of the grower and you can also read about them on our website. It’s good for everyone, as the growers are focused on promotion as well.”
24 Get sporty
Bulldog is the official grooming supplier to rugby team the London Wasps. “We sponsor the back of the shorts,” adds co-founder Rhodri Ferrier. He says that while it’s hard to measure the tangible benefits of sports club sponsorship, the club did get a lot of publicity during the Rugby World Cup. “It’s a great tie-up because it’s a good club that stands for the things we stand for.”
25 Apply for a business award
Many organisations, Real Business included, give out annual awards to the great and the good in a particular area. Winning an award can earn you coverage in the press, the respect of your peers and make potential clients aware of you.
26 Jump on the bandwagon
While we would never advise changing your business to take advantage of trends, it’s worth promoting a particular side of your business if it’s relevant to a hot issue. Kelly Smith’s company, Smartbunker, offers customers a data centre that uses zero-carbon energy and green technology. “We have a truly unique proposition, which marks us out in a crowded marketplace – that’s why we’re getting so much publicity,” he says.
27 Be consistent
No one is going to take you seriously if you don’t come across as genuine or consistent. Dynamic Transitions’ Judith Germain says consistency is often a problem when people cross from offline to online: “A lot of people feel they can write stuff online and act in a certain way, then be very different offline. Everything on the web
can be googled.”
"RMS PR" Case Studies: About LINGsCARS April 2008, By Ruth Shearn
LINGsCARS.com
Many of you will remember seeing the diminutive Chinese motor trader, Ling Valentine, turning down 'The Dragons' offer of a £50,000 investment in her online contract hire business with the withering remark, 'Chinese eat dragons for breakfast'.
What you may not know is that this 8-minute peak time opportunity on the BBC hit show, which doubled the size of her business overnight, resulted from RMS's involvement.
Ling started her business with a computer on her dining room table six years ago. She now employs seven people at her dedicated office in Gateshead and leases more than £50 million worth of cars a year. Her sales have doubled year-on-year.
Until investing in a small regional TV advertising campaign earlier this year, PR was the only marketing tool used to promote her company's extraordinary growth and success.
RMS PR started the ball rolling with a page in the Financial Times containing a dramatic photo of Ling with her 'mobile thermo nuclear rocket launcher' roadside attention grabbing truck (we've YouTube-d it here for you to view). The press and publicity section of her website chronicles the appearance of some hundreds of items of publicity since then.
The company's lifeblood - website hits - have reached a consistent 50,000 + per month on the strength of the accumulated momentum created by a constant stream of news, comment, conjecture and the chimera of mildly anarchic lunacy that disguises the fiercely customer service driven ethos of the business. Word-of-mouth and renewals by loyal 'converts' have created exponential, perpetual growth.
We love Ling and she loves RMS PR.
"SHIELDS GAZETTE" North and South Shields Newspaper March 2008
Jarrow firm helps Dragons' Den contestant
A SOUTH Tyneside film company has put a contestant from TV's Dragons Den in the picture.
YourFilm, based at Tedco Business Centre, Jarrow, secured a contract with Ling Valentine, owner of LINGsCARS.com.
The company was commissioned after initially creating successful video podcasts for the car hire specialists. Then YourFilm was asked by Ms Ling, 34, who was a recent contestant on the popular TV business show, to create TV ads for her car company.
The Jarrow film firm came up with the ImproPlug, a unique type of visual advertisement, which can be shown on TV and also on LINGsCARS' website.
Kevin Owens, director of YourFilm, said: "We're very excited about working with Ling and the creation of the ImproPlug comes from a shared vision. We are proving that moving image marketing can be achieved without the traditionally over-inflated production budgets."
"Ling is quite a character and these ads are sure to cause a stir among TV viewers."
Ms Valentine said: "YourFilm were just great. LINGsCARS have collaborated to break new ground for this exciting new genre of advertising. I'm extremely proud to be the first advertiser to use this new format of TV ads. It has been great fun making them. I already have over 200,000 views of my YouTube films, now a much larger audience of millions will see the ImproPlugs."
Kevin Owens and co-director Matthew Newman have been running their Jarrow-based digital film production business for three years.
YourFilm recently completed a nationally shown promotional film for leisure group Tiger Tiger and the company is working with Gateshead Council on various film projects.
"CODEWORKS CONNECT" Improplug TV adverts March 2008, By Neil Kumar, news editor
YourFilm creates unique TV ads for Lingscars.com
YOURFILM, a Jarrow-based film production business, has secured a contract with Dragons Den contestant Ling Valentine of Lingscars.com.
The film producers secured the contract with the car contract hire specialists after initially creating successful video podcasts. The TV ads have been filmed at Lingscars HQ in Gateshead and star Ling herself.
The brief was to create something that stood out amongst mainstream TV commercials – hence the ‘ImproPlug’ was devised; a unique style of visual advertisement, which allowed Ling to improvise getting her message across.
The advertisement will be shown not just on TV, but also on the Lingscars website and as part of a viral marketing campaign.
The ImproPlug is an improvised, low-cost alternative to spending thousands or millions of pounds on the production of a single, 30-second television commercial.
Kevin Owens, director of YourFilm, said: “We’re very excited about working with Ling, and the creation of the ImproPlug comes from a shared vision. We are proving that moving image marketing can be achieved without the traditionally over-inflated production budgets.
“Ling is quite a character, and these ads are sure to cause a stir to TV viewers.”
Big global corporations often spend millions of pounds on one international commercial.ImproPlugs bring the 'hands-on, one-to-one, treat customers as people' philosophy to TV. The owner of a relatively small businesscan get up front and personal with potential customers on the box, on the net and by e-mail.
It's the opposite of the anonymous call-centre in a foreign country and the overdubbed glossy TV advert. The viewer gets the chance to look who they're dealing with in the eye. And they know the price paid for the goods isn't being squandered on lavish TV budgets.
TV's first ImproPlug star, Ling Valentine, said: “I'm extremely proud to be the first advertiser to use this new format of TV ads. It has been great fun making them. I already have over 200,000 views of my YouTube films, now a much larger audience will see the ImproPlugs.
“Some of my ImproPlugs have snippets in Chinese. It doesn't matter. The viewers see me chatting to them in quick-cut clips, in YouTube format. It's the TV/PC crossover advert, and it is set to take the world by storm.
“YourFilm were just great. Lingscars has collaborated to break new ground for this exciting new genre of advertising. Just wait until the snotty-nosed London agencies see these ImproPlugs, their reaction will be enough to make the whole of the North East chuckle.”
"BUSINESSZONE.co.uk" For UK Businesses Februaury 2008
Funding from the Dragons? We're out, say SMEs
Nearly 65% of small businesses say that they would turn down an offer from TV programme Dragons’ Den if they didn’t think it represented good value for money.
According to a survey of just under 750 business owners, accounting software company Kashflow found that businesses would prefer to turn to banks or private backers for a more reasonable rate or split of the business.
Of those who would accept, 36% said it was because of the experience the dragon could bring to the company, while 27% said they would use it to try and grow their company.
A further 24% said they would only accept for the positive public relations opportunities.
Ling Valentine, owner of LINGsCARS.com, is a small business owner who decided to turn down the Dragon’s offers of investment.
She said: “I had two joint offers from dragons Bannatyne and Farleigh, but they wanted too much [of my business.] I refused both of their offers.
“LINGsCARS.com has more than doubled turnover to £28m in 2007 and I am really glad I walked away.”
“Businesses who jump at their first offer must be desperate or barmy,” she added.
Duane Jackson, managing director at Kashflow, advised: “Many business owners don’t realise that if they kept a better eye on their business expense they would probably not need to approach television shows for funding and could get a much better offer either from a private financial backer or the banks.”
"BLOGSTORM" It all started with a gravestone Feb 20th 2008, by Patrick Altoft
It all started with a gravestone.
On a motor industry forum, some contributor had posted about a man called Jeff Smith, who is a well-respected and well-known UK Motor Industry trainer. Jeff runs www.askinsight.com. As well as speaking at conferences and product launches around the world, Jeff continues to work with motor manufacturers developing training courses for their dealer networks and he also runs open training courses and bespoke in-house programmes for individual dealerships and major groups. You get the idea of his provenance.
So, I took this silly post on this quiet forum and thinking it looked like an epitaph, turned it into a gravestone – pointing out that I was doing this to make the post look silly, not Jeff himself. I had quite a lot of respect for Jeff.
Now, I did not know Jeff at all, I had never spoken to him. I may sell cars, but I’m certainly not part of the UK motor industry establishment.
Obviously, someone on the forum knew Jeff Smith and suddenly an email from the great man arrived saying “just for the record, I would like to make the point that as of 15:00 on Tuesday 19 February, I am still very much alive and kicking so don't write me off too quickly :))))))))”. Wow, I was impressed, this man who is the author of the definitive and best selling Motor Trade Key Performance Indicator bible “The KPI Book”, was talking to me! His book provides profit-based guidance in parts, service, sales and general management. It sits on most motor-managers’ desks.
We exchanged a couple of polite emails and I pointed out to him that my livelihood at LINGsCARS.com depended on generating Google visitors from free searches, who then saw the opportunities in my brand-new, cheap, contract hire cars which are rented for 2 or 3 years. Over 50% of my incoming business is as a result of natural links on Google.
“Oh”, said Jeff, “I dominate Google with The KPI Book”
Hmmm, “you dominate Google, huh?”, I said. That was like a red rag to the Chinese bull! “Give me 10 minutes, I’ll put my neck on the line to show you your Google dominance”.
I had 10 minutes, so I (copied and pasted most of it from Jeff’s website) began to blog (here) about Jeff and his damn book. I included a couple of pictures with nice names, and tried to fit in as many keywords as I could within 10 minutes. Pressed “save”. I panicked. I emailed Jeff Smith: “I’ve put my money where my mouth is. Google is now digesting me and you together. Wait. Either I will fall flat on my face, or I will amaze you.”
Jeff emailed back “What do I do now?”
“Search for “The KPI Book”, Mr Dominance”, I told him. I had everything crossed.
Within 2 minutes the reply: “Whoa!!! Now I'm mega impressed - when can we have coffee? I need to know this stuff.”
The results he saw on Google, linking to LINGsCARS.com, astonished him.
Google: "the kpi book" – LINGsCARS comes 5th
Google: "service kpi book" - 2nd
Google "parts kpi book" - 2nd
Google "read the kpi book" - 3rd
Google "kpi motor industry" - 4th
Google "jeff smith the kpi book" - 5th
Google "jeff smith explains the kpi book" - 2nd
Google "jeff smith trainer" – 2nd
Google " motor trade kpi indicators" – 2nd - on this search I even beat Jeff Smith!
This 10-minute result was impressive, even to me, and especially as Jeff owns the domain www.kpi-book.co.uk. I was beating Amazon, where the book had been available for years! I made sure my blog article was favourable to Jeff Smith and contained a link to his website, I didn’t want to steal his customers. The result of my “domination demonstration” was, I had an instant new friend - one of the Motor Industry’s top guys. It shows the power of blogging and the effects of a clearly written article. Jeff wants to talk to me about using this stuff in his training. Who knows what will come from this?
Thanks from me, go especially to Patrick Altoft who has given me help and guidance that has enabled me to pull off this 10-minute trick, and thanks to Google, my business lifeline, for working so efficiently, quickly and superbly – as ever!
"STARTUPS.co.uk" Inspiring New Businesses Februaury 2008
Dragons' Den bad value for money, say small businesses
Nearly 65% of small businesses say that they would turn down an offer from TV programme Dragons’ Den if they didn’t think it represented good value for money.
According to a survey of just under 750 business owners, accounting software company Kashflow found that businesses would prefer to turn to banks or private backers for a more reasonable rate or split of the business.
Of those who would accept, 36% said it was because of the experience the dragon could bring to the company, while 27% said they would use it to try and grow their company.
A further 24% said they would only accept for the positive public relations opportunities.
Ling Valentine, owner of LINGsCARS.com, is a small business owner who decided to turn down the Dragon’s offers of investment.
She said: “I had two joint offers from dragons Bannatyne and Farleigh, but they wanted too much [of my business.] I refused both of their offers.
“LINGsCARS.com has more than doubled turnover to £28m in 2007 and I am really glad I walked away.”
“Businesses who jump at their first offer must be desperate or barmy,” she added.
Duane Jackson, managing director at Kashflow, advised: “Many business owners don’t realise that if they kept a better eye on their business expense they would probably not need to approach television shows for funding and could get a much better offer either from a private financial backer or the banks.”
"AUTOMOTIVE MANAGEMENT AWARDS 2008!" 27th February, The ICC - Birmingham Feb 2008
Winning an AM Award is about more that getting your face in AM and collecting a trophy at the prestigious black-tie awards ceremony...
It's a chance to pit yourself against your peers, to give your staff a boost by proving they are the best in the business and to raise the reputation of your company with your customers.
AM Awards auditor Carter & Carter will call each business that has entered one of the seven company categories to obtain further information on performance and planning before carrying out a full audit of shortlisted companies. Their independent audit will focus on key areas of the business, including business planning, financial performance, people management and customer relationship management. Category changes this year include a new award, Dealer website of the year, and revisions to the two dealership awards - the split is now based on turnover, rather than car sales.
The host for the evening is Huw Edwards. Huw Edwards anchors the BBC’s Ten O’Clock News. Previously, he was Chief Political Correspondent for BBC News 24 and has hosted the Six O’Clock News. Huw has presented a range of BBC programmes, including Newsnight, Panorama and Breakfast News. He combined this with presenting programmes on classical music for BBC TWO, Radio 3 and Radio 4. He co-hosted General Elections for Radio 4 and presented The Story of Wales, Songs of Praise, and hosted coverage of the Queen's Golden Jubilee Service at St Paul's Cathedral.
Huw’s other BBC duties include training young journalists. He conducts writing workshops for young people in schools during the year and is a patron of Skillset. In 2005 he was appointed Patron of the National College of Music.
The RAC are sponsors of the Best Environmental Policy Award, the category entered by LINGsCARS.com. You can read Ling's entry HERE.
"SELF MADE MINDS .com" Earning by Learning Februaury 2008
Today’s post is an interview with Ling Valentine, she was the 2006 North East Entrepreneur of the year and owns and runs the super successful website LINGsCARS.
Ling became a legend when she pitched for investment on Dragons Den and famously turned down 2 different offers from the Dragons, you can see a video of her pitch over on the Dragons’ Den site which includes the classic line “Chinese eats dragons for breakfast”.
Like herself, Ling’s website and blog are exceedingly unique and it proves that if you have the passion and give your customers what they want with excellent service that you can succeed. So without further ado here’s what Ling had to share with us.
1/ Can you give us specifics as to the traffic you generated through your website through being on BBC2 Dragons Den especially on the night it was aired?
On the Dragons’ Den night - 14th Feb 2006, after the first minute of the programme, my website activity went mental. I use “WhosOn” (www.whoson.com - fantastic British software) to monitor LINGsCARS.com and live visitors went up to over 550 concurrent. The “clicks” of arriving visitors sounded like a machine-gun! My server was disk-swapping like hell. At one stage the server that monitors the live visitors crashed, too, it was overloaded. On that first night, I had over 5000 unique visitors (between 8pm and midnight). The next day, I had over 10,000 visitors. This volume settled to a doubling of pre-DD levels and has stayed pretty constant since then. All the Google links and stories posted on the web about me helped enormously, of course. I’m always surprised that many other businesses on Dragons’ Den don’t have a website to promote to give instant gratification to the 2m TV viewers.
***if you want technical*** My webserver is an AMD-powered unix dedicated server and runs 4GB of RAM. LINGsCARS is programmed mainly in php and ajax and runs a MySQL database.
2/ You used to sell over £1 million worth of cars a month, can you tell us how much car sales you managed to achieve in 2007 and your targets for ‘08?
In 2006, I was selling just over £1m of new cars a month, at retail prices. My turnover in 2006 was £125,000 which is finance commission income. In 2007, I have moved over £28m of new cars (£2.3m per month), my commission income reaching over £280,000 (£282,986 to be precise). I am targeting over £40m of new car sales in 2008, to generate a gross income of over £400,000. This seems steep, but I think I can achieve it. Matter of fact, £1m of income would be possible but I am not brave enough to gamble on that much marketing. Plus, I have to cope with the work I generate. I have moved into my new office I bought - “LINGsCARS World Headquarters”. I am planning TV advertising later this year.
3/ You say the website should be an extension of yourself, do you till update the site yourself or have you managed to delegate and let others take more responsibility, do you still change your website everyday?
I do live inside my website. I am constantly updating it; I really enjoy to do this. Most of my time is spent modifying or changing and adding cars and prices. I also spend a lot of time monitoring who is visiting the site, using “Who’s On”. For instance, as I type this I can see 30 visitors online, 16 from random Google searches (not AdWords). Often I spend 30 minutes just watching customers navigate around LINGsCARS. I do my best to add some customer letters every day, add news articles and every week I modify at least one form. I employ two part-time IT students from Sunderland University and pay them very good money and feed them free doughnuts. We work on long-term projects such as a customer management side to the website, as well as new features, fun stuff and operational improvements. I have developed 9 extra videos to accompany emails at various stages of my sales process. This means I can take a more hands-off approach, yet customers get “Lingged” more than they ever did
before.
4/ Your website is something on the busy side, is this intentional and do you think it may confuse some of your visitors?
Yes, it’s intentional. In this World, you generally have just one chance to grab a visitor, and I try to do this by being different. Often visitors can spend a whole hour inside my site. I try to engage with them emotionally instead of the standard about>contact us>home>order approach most companies use. My professionalism is in my service to the customers, but my shop (my website) is as unique in my industry as I can make it. I give customers so much information, treat them like adults not idiots, and allow them to pick and choose what they need. It may confuse some people, but most customers are ABC123 and are quite intelligent enough to find their way around. Most other car sites seem to want to bore people to death instead of entertaining them. Google also seems to like my approach.
5/ Do you feel your blog helps greatly with traffic flow and sales of cars through to the main part of your website?
Yes. My blog is mainly auto-updated from my customer letters and my added car deals. Google loves to index it, of course it pings out every time it updates. As well as the blog, a great tool is the live chat. I have dozens of live chats with website visitors each day and have webcams in my office during office hours. I simply try to give the best experience to any website visitor. I can’t work miracles, I’m Chinese - not Catholic; but customers can see I am doing my best for them.
6/ You are something of a master at offline marketing and promotion can you give us some examples of your must successful offline marketing campaigns?
Well, they all have an online side to them, my whole purpose is to attract the maximum number of intelligent, credit worthy users to my website.
I have my nuclear missile truck which brings in loads of visits every time I park it next to a motorway. Unfortunately the town planners don’t like that rocket. Also, I make movies of everything I get up to. I have over 140,000 views of my movies on You Tube. These include my rescue” of Northern Rock, my adventures sponsoring UK Rallycross and photo-shoot for the Financial Times. I offer “free lunch” for 10 visitors every day, and post out “FUKU” brand noodles and Chinese coffee.
7/ You’ve made a fantastic success with Lings Cars, do you have any other business ideas and plans for the future?
I would like to start another business, but LINGsCARS takes up all my time. I am really not even scratching the surface; I market to the whole of the UK. This way of financing cars is so popular in America, it takes over 20% of the market. In the UK it takes less than 1%, so you can see the potential.
I would encourage anyone to have a go at running a business website, it can be lots of fun. As long as you get loads of visitors, that’s the key. I would advise to talk to customers in personal terms, for example to show them who is behind the website and manage email enquiries in double-fast time. In the motor industry (for example) email replies can take between 24-48 hours, that’s not unusual. I speed that up to 24 minutes at the outside. Often I grab customers when they are still logged into to Outlook and they commit after a few ping-pong questions. It’s all common sense really, but very few other businesses in my business sector take the web seriously. Go for it!
Thank you very much Ling for taking the time to share your answer with our us and our readers, we all wish you every success for the future. If you would like to ask Ling any other questions check out Lings Cars and feel free to drop her a question via a comment.
"BLOGSTORM" 5 Killer Ways to Promote Your Website Offline Jan 7th 2008, by Patrick Altoft
Print your url on a fake rocket
Former Dragons Den contestant and winner of North East Entrepreneur of the Year Ling Valentine has a unique method of promoting her car leasing website.
In 2005 Ling had a 6 wheeled military truck imported from the People’s Liberation Army in Shanghai and her husband built a giant nuclear missile to go on top. The truck was parked next to the A1 motorway in North East England for a couple of years before being moved to one of the busiest motorways in Western Europe, the M62, where it remains.
Millions of motorists see the missile truck every year and it is no doubt a much better investment than any online advertising campaign in such a competitive industry.
Pitch in the Dragons Den
Hundreds of companies pitch in the Dragons Den every year but only a few of them are web based businesses. Some of the most famous are Lings Cars (owner of the rocket above), Gaming Alerts and most recently Hungry House.
The one thing these sites have in common is a huge influx of traffic after the show. The day after Hungry House were on TV thousands of people were searching for them on Google and even competing sites saw an increase in business because of it. Their Alexa Rank went through the roof and continues to rise even today.
"LIFE OUT LOUD .co.uk" Website for the over 50's December 2007
Ling slams disabled VAT scammers
The UK's only female, Chinese new car dealer has slammed fraudsters operating a multi-million-pound scam involving the tax-free sale of top of the range luxury cars.
The cars, including Range Rovers, Land Rover Discoverys, Bentleys and an Aston Martin - are being bought VAT-free as part of a tax break to help the handicapped.
The vehicles are then resold to dealers who share in the profits from the 17.5% VAT saving. In some cases the car never leaves the showroom as it is bought back by the dealer who sold it. Two weeks ago, South Yorkshire police arrested six people as part of an investigation into VAT fraud on cars such as Lamborghinis and Maseratis that had been adapted for disabled users.
Ling Valentine, owner of online car contract-hire company LINGsCARS.com, which is based in Gateshead, said, "It seems to be just the tip of the iceberg". She has slammed these greedy disabled customers; as well as senior management of dealers and manufacturers who, she says "must be complicit in these multi-million pound scams".
"This VAT scam seems to have become widespread in the past 18 months. It spread by word of mouth among some unscrupulous disabled people and once they saw how easy it was, they were all for it. A number of major dealers seem to be turning a blind eye to repeated purchases of luxury cars again and again by the same disabled customers. The scammers earn between £1,000 and £3,000 on each purchase, which could be just half an hour's work as the paperwork and financing is often organised for them. In order to obtain the tax break, disabled people have to confirm that the car is being purchased for their own use. The dealer takes a photograph of the interior of the car to show that it has been adapted. It's an absolute disgrace".
In reality, some people are given the cash to buy their cars by middlemen who already had customers for the car. For example, a scammer could buy a new Luxury Range Rover worth £62,000 for just £53,000 once the VAT has been deducted. The middlemen then buy the car back for perhaps £55,000, leaving the scammer with a £2,000 profit.
The car is then bought by a dealership for £57,000 who could sell it on. The spoils can be even greater on some of the more expensive luxury cars such as the Bentley GTC, which can cost more than £145,000 new.
These are not the only scams being conducted, according to car-boss Valentine. "Last year I was repeatedly offered a number of Nissan Navara pick-ups which attracted additional factory (Nissan staff) discounts, I was told to offer these to individuals and businesses at reduced rates. It turned out to be a scam; I saw an email asking for people to register them in their names for the payment of £50 each. I saw right through it. It seems this underhand activity goes on in many forms. Apart from greed by the individuals, financial strains on unprofitable car dealerships probably play a large part. In my experience, senior dealership management often turn a blind eye to these tactics, certainly there must be some high-level complicity. I would be happy to expose dodgy dealers that are trying to pull a fast one over the authorities. More dealers should speak up about what is going on."
Stephen Fox, a fraud expert at national law firm Ralli, said: "It may not actually be illegal and there are certain loopholes that may be exploited. A scheme to evade would be illegal as would a conspiracy to cheat but merely benefiting from the scheme when it is a term that you do not do so may be a civil breach of contract. A disabled car dealer who changes his car say twice per annum could be an interesting scenario.
"The evidence that may be used against these people may not even stand up in court. It is not surprising to me that so many people are getting caught up in this scam and that dealers are being approached to collude in this sort of activity. VAT fraud is big business which costs the authorities billions of pounds but it is a grey area and there many innocent people embroiled in it.
Internet car entrepreneur Valentine claims some dealers, manufacturers and suppliers gag her from "critical" publicity about cars. She says that a major Japanese manufacturer has officially "black-listed" her partly because she published truthful customer letters about their new cars on her website, LINGsCARS.com. She displays over 600 fully attributed customer letters and says she refuses to gag her customers or doctor the hundreds of letters she receives. "I am often told I should be more careful about being truthful", she adds, "but that is one reason I prefer the UK to China, and speaking the truth here seems like the right thing to do".
"BLOGSTORM" The World's Top 10 WORST Websites Oct 31st 2007, by Patrick Altoft
Do you ever open up a really badly designed website and wish you hadn't? I've had the misfortune to visit a few shocking sites recently and here is a list of the very worst. If you are a designer feel free to send them an email offering your services.
If your website is on this list please don't be offended, although you may wish to consider a redesign.
Top of our list and probably the worst of the bunch is this UK insurance company. Not content with using yellow and pale green on the same page they have made the page refresh every single second just so you don't miss it. Also check out the quality pages such as this one with more html errors (check the title tag) than you can count. Extra points granted due to the waste of a good domain name.
Its not really clear what (or who) Franz is but you won't miss that "Home" button. The title is nice and descriptive as well.
MSY is an Australian technology company boasting "more than 10 years in the computer industry". Unfortunately their definition of "computer industry" clearly doesn't encompass web design as pages such as this one selling Flash memory and other assorted products demonstrates.
Seriously this is painful to watch. Would you hire VF Designer?
This online ministry website seems to think that making people blind will help spread the faith. They even helpfully provide a series of well designed banners for you to use when you link to them.
This image heavy Norwegian gadget site has more pictures than flickr and takes an age to load thanks to the html image resizing. It didn't seem to render properly in any of my browsers.
Another site wasting a great domain name is 00.com which utilises the least user friendly Flash navigation system we have had the pleasure to use.
Web Wizz have been given the dubious honour of having designed two sites on the list. Lets hope www.posture.co.uk is suitably pleased with the design work. Helpfully Web Wizz will register a domain name for just £89.99 initially, plus £2 per month.
Ling's Cars was featured recently on the BBC's
Dragons Den program and really tries hard to provide a personal touch to her car leasing website. Unfortunately this means ignoring a few of the user friendly features on more conventional sites. Just try navigating round a few pages and you will see that the mass of information at the top isn't just on the homepage, its on all the pages.
Helpfully Ling has created a nice guide on how you should be building your site: "Most business make mistake of paying a company to build page, without learning. Learn! Modify, change. Don't pay the idiots to do this, do it yourself. Treat webpage like business office or shop. If you want to move a desk in office you move it. Put calendar on wall, you put. Do the same on website. Do every day. So simple. All your customers can see this. They get "feeling" from it."
Ling responds to being a Top 10 Worst Website
It seems that Ling is loving the publicity of being in my list of the Top 10 Worst Websites, you can read her comment here. That (Worst Websites) post has had over 30,000 readers so far (WOW! - Ling) so it must have sent a lot of traffic to the sites involved but only Ling has responded with a comment to show she cares about her online reputation.
"BBC Radio TEES" Local radio for Teesside 25th October 2007
BBC Interview
BBC Radio Tees called me and said they wanted an interview about 6-months on after Dragons' Den. So I jumped in my car and nipped to Middlesbrough for a chat with ex-Emmerdale star Alex Hall. Video below...
