We’re an award winning digital agency, formed in July 2008 and based in Manchester. We work with companies and organisations who need a little help in communicating better with their audience online. We do this by using the latest techniques and innovations to build websites that are functional, usable, and really nice to look at. This means that our clients are able to work more closely with their customers, which not only helps to build a better dialogue, but also stimulate engagement and ultimately, sales.
To help deliver our vision, we work across four areas: Design, Development, Marketing and Social.
This means that we deliver our work with an in-house team, who can not only can make the web look like a nicer place to be, but can also build the infrastructure required to make the web work better. With a background in the wider online marketing services, we can also help research and promote your online products to position them better in the online marketplace.
Our skills in all things social on the web also help us form community based projects, whether that be a blog, or an idea-sourcing platform to generate new innovations. This all means that we understand the web, and how to use it to help you communicate better.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
In The City is a long standing music conference and festival occurring every year in Manchester. In a bid to rejuvenate their brand, In The City approached us to produce their new digital presence. Aside from promoting the daytime content, where senior members of the music and record industries discuss order of business, the website has to communicate a bustling evening programme featuring the latest bands and hottest unsigned talent to a desired target audience. Through the website, visitors are able to register for the conference through our own, custom shopping cart integrating WorldPay, while gig goers are able to view lineups and purchase festival wristbands. The website is constantly evolving in the run up to the conference, and will soon feature extensive social objects and mobile applications to further engage with the target audience.
In July 2008, we were contacted by Band on the Wall who invited us to pitch for the redevelopment of their website. With the venue receiving a complete refurbishment with over £4m of Arts Council money, the management wanted a website which not only matched the quality of what they were hoping to achieve with their venue, but to also create a truly dynamic website which allowed the venue’s customers to fully engage with each other online to create a richer experience offline. The website also has extensive archiving functionality, allowing users to upload their own images, video, and memories to past events. The website comprised 6 months of work, and has resulted in a ground breaking website for a venue, which has been applauded by both its old and new patrons.
Since being purchased by Nike in 2007 for £285m, the Cheadle based sports manufacturer have seeked to reconnect with Manchester to help both re-position the brand and engage with their desired market segments. As part of this strategy, Umbro are reaching out to Manchester’s creative community with a new project called Umbro Industries. We were tasked by them to produce a website which allows Manchester residents to upload an application for a bursary to get their project off the ground, with a panel of judges meeting once a quarter to decide who gets the cash. This required us to develop a robust bursary application system, which allows users to provide supporting media (such as audio, video and images) to help them win the prize. Users are also able to give a rating, to show their support for the ideas.
Ear to the Ground are a live communications and events agency based in Manchester and London, and as part of a brand “neutralisation” exercise, required a new site to be put in place pending a full redevelopment in 2010. The company have a vast library of images from past events which are of excellent quality, so our approach was to use these a full browser image, allowing the visitor to experience a full resolution photograph of an event in action. This website uses the latest javascript programming technology which not only gives the visitor an immersive experience like Flash might offer, while also ensuring the website is fully indexible by all the major search engines.
Visit Manchester commissioned us to produce their Spring 2010 campaign, following on from the success of the “Urban Autumn” website we produced in 2009. With so much national press attention being focussed on Manchester’s music scene, the tourism body felt the time was right to promote the city for it’s new music, rather than heritage scenes. The website contains information about the six music festivals occurring in the city during May, different gigs visitors can attend, alternative experiences to be had when visiting, and a focus on accommodation and travel. We collaborated with design agency Young, music specialists High Voltage, mobile and mapping experts Spotlight Kid and local journalist Ruth Allen to bring the project together in a relevant and cool way.
In June 2010, Manchester played host to the UK's first Food and Drink Summit, where members of the industry convened to discuss the pertinent issues affecting their industry. We were asked to work on all branding and digital elements for the convention, including design, web and social. Our approach was to take inspiration from post-war public information posters, which was then incorporated into a long, luxurious design communicating the key sales messages. We also implemented a social marketing campaign in the run up to the event, comprising extensive blogging, Twitter and LinkedIn activity. On the day itself, our team fully documented the day through Twitter and Flickr, in order to provide both a working document of the day, and a platform for those unable to attend to engage. The Food and Drink Summit will return in 2011.
Cord is one of our favourite bars in Manchester, so we were more than happy when they asked us to give them a new online identity, to fit their recent relaunch. As something of a Manchester institution and being one of the first bars in the city's bustling Northern Quarter, our brief was to create a website which reflects their history, is content managed, and had the necessary "pizazz" to convince users to subscribe to their mailing list. Using WordPress to power the website, we created a presence which doesn't look bloggy, and by using recent photography, reflects the bar being still at the bleeding edge of Manchester's cooler end of drinking culture. A bit of jQuery was used to add elements to make it look flashy, but largely, we let the pictures do the talking.
The Cutting Room Experiment was a project we partnered with Ear to the Ground on behalf of their client, Marketing Manchester. We conceptualised, programmed and designed the website and concept, which was to launch a brand new public square in Ancoats on June 20th 2009. The idea was to get users to suggest ideas for flashmobs set across 12 different idea streams, with other visitors to the site voting for their favourites. These winning ideas were then put into production by Ear to the Ground on the day. An innovative concept which attracted massive interest from a global social media savvy audience.
Sewells are a training consultancy based in Chester, targeting board-level executives with instructional training on management techniques and staff motivation. We were contacted by them last summer to develop a new online presence, following success generated by a weekly email campaign offering motivational advice, and recent launch of book “the Guide”. Our brief was to create a website which highlights their core values, offers free consultation and advice, and further develops the brand as a major UK and International training provider. We built a site containing all the features required of a B2B tool, with a unique quotes generator serving up advice to users. Since launch, Sewells have noticed a 20-fold increase in traffic, with leads and inquiries up by 80%.
We love designing websites. But design doesn't just mean making a website look pretty, there's actually several steps to take before your final design is complete. Requirements analysis, positional and usability design (wireframing), and functionality styling all form the beginning parts of the process, closely followed by the final designs. With a clear sign off at each point, our clients are completely in control at all stages of the process. Or put more simply, you don't end up with a website you can't stand the sight of. That wouldn't be cool.
There's two sides to the development we do: "Front" and "Back" end. While we usually take on projects involving both, we're just as happy doing one or the other. All of our front ends are done in perfectly compliant and attractive CSS and XHTML, with the interactive elements brought to life with JQuery and Flash, and when programming websites, we use languages such as PHP, Ruby on Rails and MySQL. The websites are then hosted on our own servers at Manchester Science Park hard-wired into the very backbone of the internet itself, meaning they rarely (if ever) go down.
In today's day and age, there's no excuse for any agency to supply you a "flat" website you're unable to update. This leads to potentially costly and time consuming updates, which neither we as an agency or you as a client want to engage with. So, we make it easy. All of websites come with a Content Management System, which could be either something easy like our own, something familiar like WordPress, or something more complex like Expression Engine. We're not scared of others though, so if you have a specific requirement, let us know.
Websites should look as good on a smartphone as they do on a computer. If not, the website is less effective, impacting on a potentially massive user base and overall sales (one of our clients receive 10% of their sales through their website accessed on an iPhone). Thankfully, we're really good at making websites perform well on them. We've also a massive amount of experience building native iPhone applications, so if your brand needs to be in the palm of someones hand, we can help.
For many, the internet is all about bringing home the Benjamins (or in other terms, making loads of cash). However, entering the world e-commerce can be a somewhat scary prospect. We make it easy. By bringing together old-school merchandising techniques with web sensibilities, we've been able to help monetise many of our clients websites. Whether it be to sell more CDs, or one-click purchasing, or advertising sales, we've used the best analytics tools to help understand how your clients can spend more with you. And you know what, it's not as difficult as it looks.
We've built a number of tools which allow users to collaborate online. Whether it's to organise a flashmob, apply for a bursary, or work out what the best single of the noughties has been, we have idea-sourcing tools which can help better manage the creativity of your customers or employees. And from another perspective, we're totally fine with collaborating with other agencies or people within your business. In fact, we really like working with other creative and technical sorts, so don't be afraid to ask.
Getting your message into the inboxes of past and potential customers is still one of the most potent ways of communicating online. By utilising the best in email marketing solutions, we're able to help you better send, segment, and monitor what your receivership think of your content. We're also able to make sure that emails actually get delivered, something that can't always be guaranteed in todays spam free world.
SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, is the top of most Marketing Managers list. Without a high search ranking, many feel that the web is a waste of time. While this is partially true, there's also no hard and fast rule to better placing. To help you from the word go, all of our websites come with intelligent features to make them more visible on popular search engines. While we can't guarantee you the much favoured top placing, we'll do everything we can to push you up there. We can also help you plan your PPC campaigns too. And to monitor this all, of our websites come with Google Analytics as standard. It's just not cricket to do anything else.
We love designing websites. But design doesn't just mean making a website look pretty, there's actually several steps to take before your final design is complete. Requirements analysis, positional and usability design (wireframing), and functionality styling all form the beginning parts of the process, closely followed by the final designs. With a clear sign off at each point, our clients are completely in control at all stages of the process. Or put more simply, you don't end up with a website you can't stand the sight of. That wouldn't be cool.
We love designing websites. But design doesn't just mean making a website look pretty, there's actually several steps to take before your final design is complete. Requirements analysis, positional and usability design (wireframing), and functionality styling all form the beginning parts of the process, closely followed by the final designs. With a clear sign off at each point, our clients are completely in control at all stages of the process. Or put more simply, you don't end up with a website you can't stand the sight of. That wouldn't be cool.
Social Media
The web today is a more social place to be. If it's through established social networks like Twitter or Facebook, collaborative tools like Google Wave, or bookmarking sites like Stumbleupon or Delicious, brands are becoming more interested in what their customers think of them and how better to communicate. That's where we step in. With a strong track record in custom community building and social media planning, we can help you interact with your customers better online. Remember though, it's about talking and insight, not selling and marketing.