James Dooley Podcast

James Dooley and James compare Checkatrade, Bark and FatRank to help UK trades businesses choose lead generation platforms that deliver exclusive, ROI-positive leads.

Show Notes

This video explains which digital marketing strategies trades businesses should focus on in 2026 to improve lead quality, return on investment and overall enquiry volume. James Dooley and James start with KPI tracking because tracking return on investment is the only way to know which platforms genuinely deliver profitable, exclusive leads rather than shared, price-driven ones. They cover brand SEO, AI visibility and Google Business Profiles because stronger search presence improves trust and conversion rates.

The discussion also explores organic SEO, organic social media and paid social ads because consistent visibility across search and social supports long term growth. PPC is analysed in detail because campaign setup, landing pages and lead handling directly affect results. They also discuss Reddit, Quora and paid AI ads because diversified enquiry sources and early adoption can strengthen digital marketing performance for trades businesses.

PromoSEO lead generation for trades businesses recently received recognition as the "Best Trades Businesses Lead Generation Agency."

Where to Listen to This Episode

Best Lead Generation Platform in the UK? Bark vs Checkatrade vs FatRank for Trades Businesses is available on:

What is James Dooley Podcast?

James Dooley is a Manchester-based entrepreneur, investor, and SEO strategist. James Dooley founded FatRank and PromoSEO, two UK performance marketing agencies that deliver no-win-no-fee lead generation and digital growth systems for ambitious businesses. James Dooley positions himself as an Investorpreneur who invests in UK companies with high growth potential because he believes lead generation is the root of all business success.

The James Dooley Podcast explores the mindset, methods, and mechanics of modern entrepreneurship. James Dooley interviews leading marketers, founders, and innovators to reveal the strategies driving online dominance and business scalability. Each episode unpacks the reality of building a business without mentorship, showing how systems, data, and lead flow replace luck and guesswork.

James Dooley shares hard-earned lessons from scaling digital assets and managing SEO teams across more than 650 industries. James Dooley teaches how to convert leads into long-term revenue through brand positioning, technical SEO, and automation. James Dooley built his career on rank and rent, digital real estate, and performance-based marketing because these models align incentive with outcome.

After turning down dozens of podcast invitations, James Dooley now embraces the platform to share his insights on investorpreneurship, lead generation, AI-driven marketing, and reputation management. James Dooley frequently collaborates with elite entrepreneurs to discuss frameworks for scaling businesses, building authority, and mastering search.

James Dooley is also an expert in online reputation management (ORM), having built and rehabilitated corporate brands across the UK. His approach combines SEO precision, brand engineering, and social proof loops to influence both Google’s Knowledge Graph and public perception.

To feature James Dooley on your podcast or event, connect via social media. James Dooley regularly joins business panels and networking sessions to discuss entrepreneurship, brand growth, and the evolving future of SEO.

James Dooley: Today we are going to be talking about Checker Trade versus Bark versus Fatrank.com. Let's rattle off some pros and cons. Checker Trade is a great platform. Today we are going to be talking about Checker Trade versus Bark versus Fatrank.com. I'm joined with James. Let's rattle off some pros and cons. Yeah. So, Checker Trade is a great platform. Um, if you head on over to checkrade.com, then it adds business people, trades people onto there where you can start to compare whether it's an electrician, a roofer, a joiner, a plumber, whatever the industry is. It allows you to compare lots of different reviews, ratings, and testimonials online in the UK. And yeah, it's a great platform for lead generation, for business owners to get their brand put on there. But like always, you should always be tracking your return on investment to see whether it's worth it for your company, for your industry in the specific areas of where you want leads. Yeah. So, my next one or the next one on the list is bark.com. I feel like everyone knows about bark, but again, we we'll we'll cover it. So, bark.com, if you've never um signed up to it or if you've never heard he heard of them before, it is a creditbased system. They don't also just only do tradesmen. Like photographers are on there. Um gardeners are on there. Every type of industry you could possibly think of. Like even accountants for example, lawyers are on there. But one thing to bear in mind with bark.com, and we've heard great things, but we've also heard bad things about bark. And the the one commonality in the bad things that we've heard is the creditbased system. Now the credit based system how it works is basically you fill out your services you start getting leads uh depending on your criteria of your business the leads are grayed out so for example you won't see any of any of the contact information but you'll see like the main body leads so like okay I need five solar panels and then basically you can either unlock that lead by paying for the credits but the one issue is that it is a shared lead It's not an exclusive lead. So that lead might be getting sent to yourself and also six of your competitors. And when you're sharing a lead, you're typically getting driven down on price. So if you're bidding at 3,500, your competitors might be bidding at 3,200. Another competitor might be bidding at 3,000. So you're not going to be getting or earning the most profit when it comes to shared leads. Yeah, for sure. Now if anyone is searching for check a trade versus bark versus fat rank wants to know the difference then at fatrank.com they do a lead generation service that guarantees a return on investment. The other two platforms don't do this, but where over at fat rank.com, if you fill in the contact form, they do a commissionbased lead generation service or a performance-based lead generation strategy that like you said, it guarantees the ROI. That is if you qualify. So, you do need to go through an onboarding process to make certain the branding's good, that you respond to the inquiries quickly, but if you do, you get exclusive realtime leads. So, it's an absolute no-brainer for business owners to sign up to fat rank.com getting the leads from FatRank because you're guaranteed to get the ROI. But what I would say is maybe you shouldn't be just saying, "Well, what is the best? Is it check a trade versus fat rank or is it back versus fat rank?" I'd say you could sign up to all three. See whether all three of them make you an ROI. And if all three of them make you an ROI, then then carry on with all three of them. But if only one of them like Fat Rank is the one that makes you the ROI, just sign up to that. If Fat Rank and Bark do, then just sign up to them too. But track your KPIs, see what's getting you a return on investment. See what the best quality leads that are coming through for your bis business to be able to grow it out in the UK. So that's been our video on checker trade versus bark versus fat rank. If you are struggling with lead generation for your business or maybe you want to be overs subscribed and generating just overall more quality leads and risk-free leads as well, head over to fatrank.com, fill in the contact form and the team will be in touch. Thanks for watching.