I am delighted to show you my very new website and brand!

I wanted to take the time to write about my experience about this website coming to life. This is my very first blog so I am in unchartered territory!

I have been self employed for the last five years and as a psychotherapist in private practice for the last year and to be honest in some ways didn’t need a website. I work from a busy counselling center in Clondalkin and get many referrals from this practice. However, it makes good business sense for me to have a website for a few reasons:

• It is a extension of me/my brand

• It is a space to hold a new potential client until they can make contact with me

• It is a great way for new clients or peers to learn about me professionally

• It highlights my offering and my niche in practice

• It is a channel for clients to book in and pay

• It widens my routes for people to find me rather be dependent on one source of referrals

So considering all this it made sense to go for it!

First thing that I knew I wanted to do was to avail of the trading online voucher from the Local Enterprise Office. The trading online voucher (TOV) is a grant to help you grow your business online with help through the Government’s National Digital Strategy. The Trading Online Voucher Scheme is designed to assist small businesses with up to ten employees to trade more online, boost sales and reach new markets. It offers financial assistance of up to €2,500 with co-funding of 50% from the business. There are some requirements, such as you need to be in registered in business for at least six months and attend a training webinar. To find the full list of requirements and if you are eligible click here.

Once that was done I had to find my service provider and that for me was going to be the tricky be bit. I needed to connect with someone who understood my mission for the service I want to provide initially and for my long-term vision and for the site to be able to evolve with me and my business and that’s when I found her from a recommendation of a trusted associate. So who is she I hear you ask???

From our first meeting I knew I found the right person and her name is Orla Fitzmaurice. She too is on a mission to help women in her field… the first star just aligned. We had a 30 minute initial consultation (could’ve talked all day) and I was so excited afterwards I pretty much emailed her back straight away to say let’s do this. Orla had various packages on offer and I chose the co-creation package. Click here to see more detail.

What I loved about this was that Orla understood my vision, hopes and goals for the website but had the professional experience that I don’t in this realm. She also had a layer of objectivity that I didn’t always have as the passion and excitement sometimes overflowed or I couldn’t see the wood for the trees. I trusted her input as she got my vision and my story. The best bit for me is that the co-creation kept me in check and to top it all off it was done in under ten hours over two days. Her experience went beyond just the website design and creation, scheduler, electronic payment, domain, emails - she left me with a collection of assets on Canva where she is a whizz that now enables me to use my socials and website to the max! I am walking away fully invested and excited to use this to it’s full ability. I know as my business evolves so too will my website and I now feel this working relationship with Orla is one that will be tapped into over the years. If you are a woman in business do yourself a favour and check out her full website here.

In summary the entire process of investing in a website, applying for the grant and website creation was a big success and I am so glad I did it.

Thanks for taking the time to read this and show the website some love,

Martina