I spent a day going through your marketing. The surprise is how much already exists.
I expected gaps. I found a business that built most of a marketing operation and then stopped looking after it. That's a cheaper problem. Everything here comes from your website and your agency's published work.
The proof is all there. Nobody's minding it.
Twenty-five case studies, including Kensington Palace. The homepage shows two, and they aren't in the menu. The blog stopped in February 2025. There's Lorem ipsum on your commercial case studies page.
There's only one way in
Every button asks for a conversation. There's nothing for someone who isn't ready to talk, so they leave and you never know they were there.
The architects
They specify most Control4 and Lutron work before the homeowner is involved. You have the referral programme, a Museums & Historic Sites page, and Kensington Palace. None of it has been shown to a practice.
You don't need someone to build a marketing engine. Most of it is built.
Your ad asks for someone to build one. I don't think that's the job. Nobody owns what's already there.
Twenty-five commercial case studies across three pages. Balliol. Pembroke. The Bodleian. The Weston Library. St Paul's. Kensington Palace, where you lit the King's State Apartments without touching the historic interiors.
A blog with ten-plus real posts. Application pages for hotels, colleges, schools, warehouses, and museums and historic sites. A pricing page. A referral programme. And numbers most competitors would kill for: false alarms 600% below the industry average, 98% of services on time, 90% fixed first time.
That's more than most companies your size have.
The last blog post is 10 February 2025.
There's Lorem ipsum on the commercial case studies page, on the Fire System Maintenance card. That page was updated on 8 July 2026, a week before I looked.
There are three phone numbers: 782444, 692688 and 692686. Two are one digit apart, so one is a typo. The address is spelled two ways in two footers on one page.
That isn't incompetence. It's what happens when a job belongs to everyone.
Every button says the same thing. Contact us. Talk to an expert. Get a free quote. There's nothing for the person who's nine months out and wants to read something first.
That explains the email brief in your ad. It's all about existing customers because the list only grows when sales wins someone.
The site was rebuilt in November 2025 on Elementor, and the page source credits Invanity. I found that in your code, not from a person.
They're good. Silver at the European Search Awards, with case studies taking clients from 70 enquiries a month to 900. The site they built converts.
But the Lorem ipsum has been live for eight months, and that isn't an agency failure. Agencies ship and move to the next client. Someone here has to read the pages afterwards.
You don't need more case studies. You need the twenty-five you have to do some work.
They're written. They're invisible. And there's one that should exist and doesn't.
Henley Royal Regatta is quoted on your homepage by Imogen Mercer, and I couldn't find a case study behind it. It's your best untold story: several sites, several years, maintenance rather than an install. Maintenance is the hardest kind to write and the most worth having, because it's the revenue you want more of.
Here's the shape of it, from public sources only. Where I'd have had to invent something, I left the gap in.
An event that can't be moved, and a system that can't fail
What made it hard. The Regatta happens on a fixed date in a fixed place, and the place isn't a building. It's a temporary town, put up and taken down every year across several sites on the Thames. The systems sit dormant most of the year, then work flat out, outdoors, in front of [how many people?] over [how many days?].
What failure would cost. You can't reschedule a Regatta. [Ask: what's protected — enclosures, hospitality, boat tents, HQ? What licensing makes it non-optional?]
Why they chose you. They've worked with Chris Lewis for several years across several sites. [Ask Imogen Mercer: who had it before, and what went wrong?] She's said publicly that the equipment is properly maintained and kept up to date, and that it gives her peace of mind. That's what an operations manager says when she means she's stopped thinking about it.
What you did. [Needs the engineer: what's the annual cycle? Off-season versus the fortnight before? What are you designing against — water, power, crowds, false alarms?]
The result. [Needs a number: how many Regattas without an incident? First-time fix rate on this account?]
What happened next. [Ask: contract length, has the scope grown, has it led anywhere else?]
The questions I'd ask
with the client
- What were you putting up with before us?
- What made you finally do something? Why that month and not a year earlier?
- Who else did you look at? Was it the kit or the people?
- Was there a point where you thought this was going wrong?
- What can you stop worrying about now?
- Put a number on it. Hours, incidents, downtime, insurance, sleep.
- Has anything happened since that tested it? How did we do?
- Who else do you know with the problem you had?
Four, six and seven do the work. Most write-ups skip them because they're awkward. Eight is the referral, asked at the one moment the answer is likely to be yes.
with the engineer
- What was hard about this that the customer would never notice?
- What did you do that a cheaper contractor wouldn't have, and what would have happened in five years if they hadn't?
These two matter most. They're the difference between a case study that reads like every other installer's and one an estate manager recognises. Engineers won't offer it up, because it's obvious to them. They'll answer if you ask straight.
twenty-five
Mostly distribution, not writing. Case studies in the main menu. A rotating set on the homepage. Each service page linked to the case studies that prove it, so Kensington Palace sits next to smart lighting where a homeowner will meet it. A one-pager each for proposals.
Then one new one a month: interview, draft in five working days, approval with a date on it, publish, share. The date is the step people forget, and it's why most companies have a folder of half-finished case studies.
Your ad asks for SEO-led articles. You've written them for years. OSDP vs. Wiegand is good technical writing and the sort of thing an estates manager forwards to a colleague. It's also the last thing you published.
One a month. Each has to answer something people search for and be sendable mid-deal. Restarting a blog with ten years behind it is cheaper than starting one.
Ten things I found on your website.
All on the live site, each checkable in under a minute. None need a rebuild.
There's Lorem ipsum on your commercial case studies page.
Under Our Services, on the Fire System Maintenance card. The page was updated on 8 July 2026, a week before I looked.
chrislewis.co.uk/business/case-studies/ ↗The blog stopped in February 2025.
Seventeen months, with ten-plus good posts behind it. The two on your homepage are only there because they're the newest.
There's no lower-commitment option.
Every button asks for a conversation. Nothing catches the person who's only researching, so nothing reaches HubSpot until sales has won them.
Twenty-five case studies, and the homepage shows two.
Three pages of them at /business/case-studies/, and they aren't in the group menu. You have to already be in the business section to find your best proof.
Your best numbers are on the wrong pages.
False alarms 600% below industry average. 98% of services on time. 90% fixed first time. All buried on service pages. The homepage says you've been going 30+ years instead.
Three phone numbers, two of them one digit apart.
01865 782444, 692688 and 692686. One of the last two is a typo. The address is spelled two ways in two footers on the same page.
Three links are swapped in the mobile menu.
Business Intruder Alarm goes to residential. Residential Intruder Alarms goes to business. Business Fire Alarms goes to residential. Desktop is correct, so it only hits people on phones.
The accreditation logos have no alt text.
NSI Gold, BAFE, FIA, ECA, Control4 Pinnacle, Lutron Platinum, CEDIA, Cyber Essentials Plus. Every trust signal you have is invisible to search, to AI answers, and to screen readers.
The referral programme is in the footer.
You already have what section four needs. No partner terms, nobody running it.
The case studies use three different URL patterns.
From one index page: Heyford Hotel at /case-studies/, Balliol at /business/case-studies/, Kensington Palace at /residential/case-studies/ while listed under business. Harmless now, a redirect headache later.
What I'd fix first
The marketing backlog your ad asks for, ordered by most difference for least work. Six of the seven are housekeeping, which is the point.
5 minutes
1 week
1 hour
3 hours
ongoing
3 weeks
2 weeks
Reporting, and Google Ads
Your ad asks for someone to hold them to SLAs and performance metrics. Traffic isn't an SLA. One page a month, same shape, sent whether the news is good or bad: leads by source and sector, how many became qualified opportunities, conversion by landing page, ranking on the twenty terms that sell rather than the hundred that flatter, and whether the backlog shipped on time.
Your ad calls it nice to have. I'd keep it that way for a quarter. Paid search sends people to a page, and every page currently ends in a phone call, so you'd pay for traffic that leaves. Once the guide is live, it's worth doing properly. The number is cost per qualified opportunity, not cost per click.
The architects decide before the homeowner calls you.
On a Control4 or Lutron job it's settled at RIBA Stage 2 or 3, when the electrics are drawn. This is the ABM and co-marketing your ad asks for, with real names on it.
This is the clearest case of the pattern. You have a Museums & Historic Sites page. You have the Bodleian Proscholium, a Grade 1 listed entrance. You have the Weston Library. You have Kensington Palace. You have a referral programme.
Every part of a heritage pitch aimed at architects is on your website today. As far as I can tell, none of it has been put in front of one.
Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds, picked on three things. They work on listed buildings, where Kensington Palace and the Bodleian aren't a bonus but the qualification. They design early, so they hold the decision. And they're close enough to Cowley that you can be there the same day, which London can't offer.
Several do private houses and listed commercial work. One relationship can feed both sides of the group.
whole decision
HollandGreen, Burford. Architecture, interiors, landscape and project management under one roof. They work directly with Historic England. On their list once, you're on it for every project.
Design Storey, Beaumont Street. Four RIBA awards. They say publicly they cherry-pick who they work with.
William Green Architects, Oxfordshire and London. Grade II and II* specialists. Modern work inside old buildings, which is the problem a hidden sensor solves.
the way in
Spirit Architecture, Stow-on-the-Wold. Matthew Hollingsworth is an accredited conservation architect across Grade I, II* and II. He'll care what your cabling does to an old wall.
Tyack Architects, Moreton-in-Marsh. In the Cotswolds since 1974. Colleges and churches too, which bridges to the commercial side.
Ashleigh Clarke Architects, Cotswolds. Listed and heritage alterations, happy to work with specialists.
how it looks
Louise Holt Interior Design, Oxfordshire. Start here. A BIID member who draws her own electrical and lighting layouts in CAD. She's already drawing the thing a Lutron Platinum Partner should be drawing with her. Kensington Palace is the opening line.
JT Interiors, Oxfordshire. The volume one, and the one that bridges both businesses. Eight designers, houses and commercial, often listed. One account, both revenue lines.
Studio Bellord, Great Rissington. Country houses, few projects a year, real influence.
Lauren Gilberthorpe Interiors, Cotswolds. Interior architecture with a craftsmen network worth getting into.
Not coffee. Architects need CPD hours, and RIBA-registered CPD is the accepted way a supplier gets an hour of their full attention. Almost nobody in fire and security uses it, because almost nobody has the credentials.
The talk: fire, security and control in listed buildings, without wrecking them. Their studio, lunchtime, sandwiches. Not a pitch. Where detection can and can't go in historic fabric. Wireless versus wired when you can't chase walls. VESDA in tall spaces. The Listed Building Consent traps that cost twelve weeks.
Reference a real project of theirs, never a mail-merge. Offer the hour. Deliver it. Leave the guide behind, the same one from item six. Ask to go on their approved list. Write the referral terms. Then invite the network to the showcase your ad already asks for. Autumn, and it keeps everyone warm without anyone selling. The photos and write-ups carry the next quarter's emails.
Measure me on: practices that have had the talk, practices that added you to their list, specs won, revenue from referral.
What I'd actually do.
Short, and last on purpose. Most of month one is housekeeping, because you don't need building work. You need someone to move in.
Defects first: Lorem ipsum, phone numbers, mobile menu, alt text. Case studies into the group menu. Interview the three clients already quoted on your homepage. Audit HubSpot. Agree the monthly report with the agency.
By the end: defects gone, case studies visible, two drafted including Henley, reporting agreed.
Restart the blog. Write the listed buildings guide, build the landing page and the emails behind it. Open the ABM programme with the top three practices and the CPD offer.
By the end: blog live again, guide live, first contacts sales hasn't met, first CPD booked.
Deliver the first CPD sessions. Third case study. Reactivation campaign to the maintenance customers who've gone quiet, using Henley as the proof. Scope the autumn showcase.
By the end: practices engaged, reactivation reported, showcase dated and invited.
What this is, and what it isn't.
Public sources only: your website — homepage, blog, all three pages of commercial case studies, the service and application pages, and the page source of several — plus Companies House, your agency's published work, and the ten practices' own sites. I don't know your revenue, your pipeline, or what's in HubSpot. Where a claim needed any of that, I haven't made it.
Everything in section three is on the live site and checkable in a minute. If any of it is fixed by the time you read this, good.
The Henley piece isn't a case study. It's the shape of one, with every invented fact left out. Your ad says everything should feel premium and consistent, and a premium brand can't afford a marketer who guesses.
Some of the ten you may know about and have decided to live with. I wouldn't know from outside. Judge me on whether I picked the right seven and put them in the right order, not on whether I found ten faults.