Referrals are the growth engine, so the marketing centres on the GP audience.
Allevia Cardiology Ascot
Thirteen years of marketing leadership, from five cardiologists to fifteen
Where it began
Allevia Cardiology Ascot, formerly Ascot Cardiology Group and Ascot Angiography, is a specialist private cardiology service in Greenlane, Auckland. James has personally led this client’s marketing since 2012, and has continued as their partner since founding Xennial in 2018, making it one of the longest relationships in the business.
Back then the practice had five cardiologists, and each worked largely in their own silo. The goal was to build one trusted brand that GPs would recognise and refer their patients to, because in specialist cardiology, GP referrals are the engine of growth. That meant uniting the cardiologists under a single masterbrand and earning a strong reputation across the GP community.
The strategic approach
As the practice’s Fractional CMO, our role has never been to run one-off campaigns. It has been to provide ongoing marketing leadership: setting the plan, mentoring the internal team, and keeping the marketing pointed at the one thing that drives growth, GP referrals.
The central challenge in a specialist practice is that the people best placed to build GP relationships, the cardiologists, are also the busiest and the most protective of their time. So the approach had to earn GP trust and referrals without drawing the specialists away from patient care.
Three priorities guide the work:
Put GP relationships first
1.
Educate without
adding load
2.
Deliver genuinely useful, CME-accredited education for GPs, designed so it does not add to the specialists’ workload.
Stay consistently present
3.
A steady rhythm across the symposium, education evenings, digital communication and in-person visits.
The Work
The GP engagement programme brings those priorities to life, informed by referral data so that effort goes where it matters most.
Annual GP Symposium:
A half-day event that draws around 300 GPs, bringing them together with the cardiologists around the latest in cardiac care, accredited for CME points.
GP education evenings:
Smaller sessions hosted at the practice, focused on education, discussion and patient pathways, also CME-accredited.
GP communication plan
A sustained flow of clinical articles, LinkedIn posts and emails to the GP database, keeping the practice front of mind between events.
GP practice visits, with branded cupcakes:
Personable, in-person visits to referring practices. A deliberately old-school touch alongside the digital programme.
Continuity through change
In 2025, the practice joined the Allevia Health Group and consolidated its diagnostic and procedure services under one brand: Allevia Cardiology Ascot. Two offerings that had grown up separately, the cardiology group and the angiography service, came together as a single, clearer proposition for patients and referrers.
The rebrand and new website were led by Allevia Health’s own agencies. As the practice’s long-standing Fractional CMO, Xennial’s role through the transition was continuity: guiding the local implementation of the new brand, keeping GP engagement and communications running without interruption, and carrying more than a decade of momentum into the new structure.
The impact
Over the course of the partnership, the practice has grown from five cardiologists to fifteen, with a matching growth in referrals from the GP community. More telling than any single number is the length of the relationship itself: a foundation client that has kept Xennial as its marketing partner for over a decade, through growth and a change of ownership. That continuity is the clearest proof of the Fractional CMO model, an adviser who stays, learns the business deeply, and grows with it.
In their words
“James has assisted us over several years, providing varying levels of marketing support including branding and website development as well as our annual Cardiology Symposium. We have appreciated James’s expertise, enthusiasm and flexibility in his approach. We regard James as a member of our team. He is a great resource for our business and we enjoy working with him.”
Allevia Cardiology Ascot
Sarah MacLean,
General Manager