WestBridge Group, which provides specialist tax advice to businesses and their owners, and independent administration, consultancy, and trustee services for Small Self-Administered Pension Schemes (SSAS) has appointed Chris Darlington and Simple Marketing Consultancy to lead its marketing strategy.
Chris joins as group marketing director having formerly been the head of the Leicester offices for BDO, Tenon and latterly Mazars.
Simple Marketing Consultancy (SMC) is jointly run by Bev Cook who was previously the head of marketing for Tenon. She has worked for a number of other professional services firms including BDO and Grant Thornton and has been running her own outsourced marketing consultancy with business partner Elliot Cook since 2010.
In their new roles they will lead the marketing strategy and help to raise the profile of the group which has its main office in Leicester. In 2020, the group acquired a book of small self-administered pension schemes from financial services provider James Hay and now employs a UK wide team of 40 people who operate under the WestBridge Tax and WestBridge SSAS brands.
Commenting on the appointment, Chris Darlington said: “I am delighted to be joining the group during a very exciting time in its development. We have some ambitious plans for growth and our main goal will be to ensure we implement a focused and co-ordinated programme of marketing activity that ensures our audiences understand the benefits of the specialist advice we can offer to help clients protect their corporate and personal wealth.
“Having previously worked with Bev & Elliot, I’m confident that our combined skillsets will help to create an award winning firm that is renowned for the quality of its advisory solutions and service.”
Group director Tom Moore added: “There are significant advantages to be gained by going to market as a Group rather than separate brands, particularly as we add more new services. We recognise that the same market sectors can benefit from our solutions and Chris and SMC have previous experience of implementing highly effective marketing plans on a UK wide basis.”
