RS Training Services
“Microsoft Office Live has given my business an online presence and a whole new lease of life, which I just couldn't have afforded otherwise – I can't thank Microsoft enough.” – Rebecca Swift, Owner, RS Training Services (www.rebecca-swift.co.uk)
Rebecca Swift is a sort of one-woman Open University. She designs courses that range from criminal law to child development. Many of her courses are for distance learning but she also offers home tuition and in-house training for businesses.
She started the business at the end of 2005. As a 24-year old single parent, she admits that she faced significant challenges. “I ran it on a part-time basis and built it up.” It was a flexible alternative to a part-time teaching job.
Problem
Rebecca wanted to take her business online. Her competitors already had professional-looking websites and, if she wanted to be taken seriously, she needed one too. It’s simply a case of looking professional. She also hoped that a website would attract new business through search engine marketing – people looking for the kind of training she provides online and finding her site. No site, no search engine hits.
She faced two problems. First, she couldn’t afford to pay a professional web developer to build a site for her. Second, she didn’t have enough technical skill or time to do it herself. She put the idea of a website on the shelf.
Solution
Then she heard about Microsoft Office Live. This service allows people to register a domain name (a website address, like www.rebecca-swift.co.uk) and create a website without any technical skills. Site builders do everything through a website so there is no software to buy and no expensive designers to hire.
The Basics version of Office Live lets you do all this free of charge. This is the version that Rebecca chose. Other versions have a monthly fee but offer more functionality, such as customer relationship management and document sharing, for businesses with more than one employee.
Benefit
Rebecca created her site in a few hours one evening. She found it easy to do and making improvements and adding new content is just as straightforward. One Office Live feature is the ability to add keywords to pages to make them easier to search. “The next thing you know you’re on the top of search page results,” says Rebecca. She’s already had new leads from the website, and her customers tell her that they also use the website to decide which course they want to study before calling her.
Rebecca’s story is inspiring. As much as any contestant in Dragon’s Den or The Apprentice, she has shown entrepreneurship and guts in starting her business. Microsoft Office Live has enabled her to go further and do more at a price (free!) that is hard to beat. “It has been absolutely great for me,” she says. “I wouldn’t have had a website without Microsoft.”
