In a sign of the market's growth and maturity, the UK's first completely online public relations and marketing consultancy Consult the Guru launched on 5 May, offering to bring top-level marketing advice within financial reach of even the smallest companies.

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Their award-winning team of PR and marketing experts style their offering as "big ideas for little bucks."

To use the consultancy service, customers simply visit www.consulttheguru.com and complete a marketing brief, which is brainstormed by the Consult the Guru creative team. Within two working days, the customer receives an attention-grabbing marketing tactic, tailor-made for their business, together with information on how to make it happen. They are hoping to attract publicity-hungry SMEs with a starting price fee that represents a small fraction of the fees charged by traditional offline consultancies.

Arlo Guthrie, managing director of Consult the Guru, gave some bacground to the businesses inception: "I spent years working for mainstream London agencies which wouldn’t even consider taking on a client with less than £100,000 in the kitty. It struck me that there must be literally millions of small businesses around the world that can handle the logistics of marketing and PR in-house: they just need a good idea to get started and advice on what works and doesn’t."

The first customer to use the service was David Williams MBE, chief executive of GEM Motoring Assist. He says: "We were looking for a way to increase the membership of our low-cost national breakdown recovery club. Within 48 hours of submitting a marketing brief, Consult the Guru delivered a truly excellent concept for a marketing campaign. We think the idea is so strong, it could be one of the most effective campaigns we have ever undertaken."

As well as helping small to medium enterprises, Consult the Guru caters for large businesses. Arlo explains: "We hope brand and marketing managers in bigger companies will see our service as a great way to benchmark the advice given by traditional agencies. After all, an original idea is probably the single most important aspect of any marketing campaign, and if you’re going to all that trouble to brief other agencies, it makes sense to spend five minutes getting a second opinion."

Consult the Guru is run by a formidable creative management team. Indeed, with such an experienced team behind it, the company hopes that www.consulttheguru.com won’t just be the place to get a good second opinion, but, as the site proclaims: "your first stop for inspirational PR and marketing ideas."

The wider industry will surely gain some insights into the state of the overall online market by keeping an eye on their progress.

About Consult the Guru:

Managing Director Arlo Guthrie is a winner of the Grand Prix des Relations Presse Relations Publique. He is joined by Lisa ter Haar, previously a board director at Hill and Knowlton - one of the world’s largest marketing communications companies. Also on the management team are Richard ‘Ray’ Simpson, an ex national newspaper journalist who has spent the last three years retained by a major international pharmaceuticals company, and Nigel Kennedy, an internet communications specialist and programmer of best-selling Windows software. www.consulttheguru.com