59 of 61 on the list are inside the service area (91 short of 150). Last week down 54 on the week before. No source tracking yet, so none of this can be traced to a group or a post.
Overall progress
Waiting, not stuck: the Week 1 post in Local Trades & Services (Barnstaple/Braunton/Georgeham) has sat in admin approval since 13 July. Leave it, do not resubmit.
Done so far
Waiting-list site live
tarkaboilers.co.uk, collecting signups
Live site built
tarkaboilersbarnstaple.co.uk, ready to point traffic at
Pricing set
Standard service £105 · full service £145 · CP12 £85 · standard/full service + CP12 £145/£185 · cylinder service £105 · standard/full boiler + cylinder £157/£197 · repair minimum £105 · over-25-mile travel £30, all inc VAT
Facebook group research
North Devon groups mapped with rules, days and member counts
Group posting running, weeks 1–2
Week 1 intro submitted from 13 July, week 2 summer servicing live
Video scripts 1–4 written
video-scripts-july.md
Welcome automation live
EmailOctopus: 60 sent, 62% opened, zero unsubscribes
60 signups banked
~20 a week for three weeks, on trend for 160 by launch
Facebook ads plan + ad scripts
facebook-waiting-list-ads.md and video scripts written
CAC model built
Break-even corrected to 10 jobs/wk; a free job worth two bought ones
Launch Plan v2 written
26 July, with dependency chain and revised calendar
This week Mon 27 Jul – Sun 2 Aug · week 4 of 8
Write the GBP definition spec unblocks everything
Categories, every service with description and price, service areas, hours. Needs no address. The site, ads and profile all copy this one document.
Fix Kent reviews labelling on live site legal risk
DMCC Act 2024. Relabel honestly ("Homeowner, Kent, customer of George's previous business"). Flagged 7 July, still unconfirmed.
Create Google Ads Manager account (MCC)
Done 26 July. Developer token application in — approval usually 24–48 hours, so check for Google's decision by Tuesday.
Add email validation to the signup form
4 of 60 addresses bounced (6.7%). Bad bounce rate risks the launch email landing in spam.
Clear bounced addresses from EmailOctopus
Remove the four bad addresses before any launch send
Analytics on the waiting-list site
Visitors → form starts → completions, so a slow week says traffic problem or page problem
Meta pixel on both sites
Builds the retargeting audiences for launch morning. Only useful if it collects for weeks first.
Fix weekly signup reporting
Get the number visible weekly without depending on the posting tracker (19 July review failed on tooling)
Approve an image for week 2+ group posts
Weekly review flag: no image assigned, and posts must not reuse week 1's automatically
Start Facebook video ads, £10/day
~£350 total to launch, targeting North Devon towns. Tag paid signups separately.
FB theme 4 posts + video 4
The normal weekly rhythm carries on underneath everything else
Week 5 3 – 9 Aug · site realignment
Service pages matching the GBP spec
One page per service, same names verbatim, in the site repo
Location pages for the service areas
Barnstaple, Bideford, Ilfracombe, Braunton, South Molton, Torrington
LocalBusiness + Service schema
Mirrors the spec exactly, real 01271 number only
Google Cloud project + Ads API
API enabled, OAuth and refresh token working
FB round 2 posts + video 5
Week 6 10 – 16 Aug · ads + tracking
Build the Ads account: full service-by-location matrix
One ad group per keyword. Heavy negative lists from day one, installations especially.
Paid landing pages live
Separate from the organic service pages
WhatConverts + conversion tracking, tested end to end gates ad spend
Number swap on paid traffic only. Organic, schema and citations keep the real 01271.
Review request Worker built and tested
ServiceM8 job-complete webhook → same-day SMS with the review link. Highest value per build hour in the plan.
Draft press release for the North Devon Journal
Signup checkpoint: ~120 by 16 Aug
Below 100 means the rate has halved: more posting in no-limit groups plus £3–5/day boost
Video 6
Week 7 17 – 23 Aug · staging
Launch email sequence staged
1: we're live, 25% off · 2: diary filling (+3 days) · 3: landlords, CP12 before winter tenancies
GBP photo pack from Thames ServiceM8
Van, tools, boiler close-ups, before/afters. No house exteriors. Strip EXIF before upload.
"Launch date announced" email to the list
Video 7
Ops setup any week before launch
ServiceM8 loaded
Services and prices, job templates for service / CP12 / both / repair, on-my-way SMS templates
Missed-call text-back and a warm voicemail, whatever the answering arrangement
Review gate Worker
Rating form routes by score: high to Google, low privately to you
Lead capture Worker
Site and landing-page forms into ServiceM8 with source tag preserved
Move week 24 – 30 Aug · keep it light
Video 8 pre-recorded
Before the move, not during it
Create GBP the day the address is live starts 60-day clock
Service-area business, address hidden, covering the towns. Verify immediately (video for SABs). Every day earlier brings the December API date forward.
Launch day ~1 Sep
Launch email to the full list, morning
25% off honoured, book by link or phone, expiry 31 October
Ads on, same morning
Tracking already proven. Budget you can afford to lose for a fortnight while the account learns.
Launch posts rotated across FB groups
Over the week on allowed days, never all at once
301 the waiting-list domain
So the two sites stop competing
Press release out
Diary opens — triage rule in force
Repairs first, then service+CP12 bundles, standalone services can wait, landlord bundles always taken. Six a day stays the ceiling.
After launch Sep – Oct
Same-day review request after every job
By text, Google first. Target 20+ reviews by end of October.
Letting agent letter, week 2 of trading
Agents arrive 5–20 properties at a time, for nothing
Free citations once the address exists
Bing Places, Apple Business Connect, Yell free tier, Nextdoor, Gas Safe register
Make.com proxy for weekly GBP posts
One webhook, one router, three createAPost branches. No business logic in Make.
Weekly rhythm running
Monday emails and admin, one video, Friday numbers check vs the jobs table plus cost per booked job
December: swap Make proxy for direct GBP API
Calendar note set, or it quietly becomes permanent