How Rated Locksmiths is Stimulating Competition for Locksmiths in the UK

Rated Locksmiths is a nationwide network of independent domestic and residential locksmiths providing services to customers located in the UK. The platform helps locksmiths by generating quality leads from local customers while facilitating the process of finding qualified locksmiths for users.

Please Tell Us About Your Background

Back in the old pioneering days of the internet, I worked in web-related service sales. For about seven years, I worked with leading web hosting provider UKFast and always tried to stay up-to-date with trends in the digital space, particularly digital marketing.

Naturally, this made for a good foundation for my entrepreneurial spirit which I’ve had ever since I was a child. I’ve launched a number of successful web-based platforms in the UK including myWindscreen, Rubbish.com, and in 2019, Rated Locksmiths.

What Sorts Of Tips Would You Give Yourself If You Could Go Back In Time a Few Years?

Well, I now understand now perhaps more than before how important it really is to provide the customer what they want and expect as best as I can. Knowing the needs of your target market means you can provide quality leads – in the case of Rated Locksmiths, to member locksmiths listed on our platform. By bridging the gap between users and locksmiths and making the user experience as clean and straightforward as possible means everyone’s happy. Customers get quick access to qualified professionals while the locksmiths benefit from getting quality leads.

Which Problem(s) Does Your Platform Solve?

From the perspective of users on Rated Locksmiths, they’re searching for reliable and affordable commercial or residential locksmiths in the UK, often urgently as they’ve perhaps locked themselves out of their property or need to have their door or window locks replaced after a burglary to secure the property.

For member locksmiths, they’re often trying to compete with many other small locksmithing businesses online and often lack the resources to devote to search engine optimisation (SEO) and other digital marketing strategies.

Rated Locksmiths endeavours to benefit both customers and locksmiths by making the entire process simple and straightforward. Moreover, we’re trying to uphold integrity in the unregulated locksmithing industry in the UK by only working with honest locksmiths. This helps property owners avoid the many locksmith scams now (unfortunately) occurring in the UK.

What Was The Inspiration For Rated Locksmiths?

I launched this business in 2019 after seeing tremendous success with my other business ventures here in the UK such as myWindscreen and Rubbish.com, and the operating model is similar although – naturally – the types of services offered and the types of members that join are unique within their respective industries (automotive glazing, rubbish removal).

In the past, I’ve had my share of challenges with big national brands here in the UK when I needed my windscreen repaired and thought to myself that there had to be a better way. As someone that supports small and independent local businesses, I wondered if there could be a way to improve the digital presence of these types of small businesses to better compete with big national brands.

In the case of Rated Locksmiths, locksmithing is far more decentralised in the UK yet the need for good digital marketing in today’s day and age is extremely relevant.

What’s The USP Of Rated Locksmiths?

We aim to be a marketplace where users can find affordable, reliable residential and commercial locksmithing services anywhere in the UK. This makes us quite hands-off in terms of the actual service delivered, as we believe that the locksmith members we work with already excel at their jobs and simply need a more consistent stream of quality leads.

Our unique selling proposition is that we deliver value to both users and to locksmith members listed on our platform. For users, there’s no need to have a membership or to login, no fees or spam, anything like that. All they need to do is enter their postcode and contact a nearby locksmith over the telephone.

For locksmiths, we don’t charge expensive per-lead fees as many competitors do. We simply charge a yearly membership and require members to meet our criteria for quality and integrity to maintain a consistently high level of service. Members receive a landing page with SEO-optimised content as well as ranking higher on search engines due to our specialisation in digital marketing and SEO for locksmiths in the UK.

What Are Your Future Plans For Rated Locksmiths?

We’ve recently redesigned the layout of the website to improve the overall user experience and we endeavour to continue adding quality content that is informative for visitors. In the coming months and years, we’re hoping to continue growing the number of visitors as well as onboarding more locksmiths so that customers have a greater choice.