Lynk.bm safely connects clients to rated, reliable contractors, trades persons and service providers of all manner, size and genre
Callan Bassett is an enthusiastic, results-driven marketing, public relations and business development specialist with a long track record of driving company growth through the successful planning and execution of marketing strategies.
After spending the past two years as business development manager at Age Concern Mr Bassett is launching his own business to connect clients with local contractors, trades persons and service providers, via an online directory, fittingly named lynk.bm.
“I’m about to launch lynk.bm, which is an online directory for local contractors, trades persons and services providers to put up their listings get customer reviews and star ratings,” explained Bassett, who has been talking to various individuals, business owners, church groups and other collectives ahead of the official launch. “I connect with customers across the Island.”
But why such an enterprise? Bassett told of how the idea for lynk.bm came as a result of his engaging the many members of Age Concern.
“I spent the last two years running the membership department at Age Concern and what I was responsible for was the 6,000 members we had at the age of 50 and above,” said Bassett. “In my department they would come to me with all of the issues and questions they had had throughout their life and the main concern, by far, was the fact that they could not find contractors that they could trust.
“We listened to hundreds of stories of members who would hire someone, pay them $10,000-$15,000 to do a railing, paint or whatever and they would disappear or do a shoddy job.
“So, basically, they would come to us to find out what we could do or they could do, but there’s not much that can be done at that point, if the guy had did some work and been paid, outside of going through the courts, which presents greater expense.
“On the other hand we’ve had contractors coming to us, saying, ‘I have this new service. I’m trying to find customers. I can’t pay for newspaper ads. Can you help me to contact your members?’
“I realised that these two groups of people having a need top contact each other, without an avenue to do it, which is where lynk.bm comes into play.
“Lynk is a local type version of Angies List.
“As of right now, if people want to find a landscaper they go to the yellow pages look for landscapers, see a hundred of them and just make a guess, because there’s no real way to check quality of service.
“So that’s what this is. On lynk.bm customers will be able to go on, search for the services they need and then find out via the star rating and customer views and be able to trust who they’re hiring.
• How does lynk.bm verify who is legitimate?
“That’s the good thing about this platform, in that it’s organically regulated,” said Bassett. “If you do a bad job you get bad reviews, bad star ratings and people are going to see that.
“I do have a process where a contractor can challenge a bad review, which is why one has to create an account before being able to post a review.”
Registration is free and requires submission of one’s email and if one posts a review that a contractor queries Bassett will contact both parties and, if legitimate, leave the review as is and, if not such delete the review.
• How does lynk.bm generate income? Via fees paid by those being listed.
“We have three tiers of payments,” said Bassett. “For one listing it’s $19.95 a month. For two listing it’s 34.95 per month and for for unlimited listing it’s $49.95 a month .
“So, if you’re a landscaper, a painter, as well as a trucker you can have three different profiles under three different categories under one account, which will incur one payment.
“Contractors can sign up for free until November 1, during our launch promotion.”
• What has the response been like so far?
“The response so far has been amazing. I opened up and have over 100 companies listed already and that’s before the launch,” said Bassett. “That’s just with me speaking to people, church groups, businesses directly, but people love it.
“And it’s not just for house work. There’s babysitting, photography, massage therapy, personal training, things like that, so whatever type of service you have we have a listing category for it and you can get your ad out there.
“The website is not just for established businesses, it’s also for people’s side hustles and start-ups, all are welcome.”
Those wishing to list can log on at lynk.bm and open up their business to a whole new level of clientèle.
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