Member News

We are working closely with Vaccoda Design on Mediclub Financial Services’ website and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Mediclub Financial Services are one of the best-known names across the dental and medical fields and are run by established investment firm Chantler Kent Investments. Having provided a fee based advisory service and various other financial services and offerings, they approached Vaccoda with regards to their website.

Having provided Mediclub with a new, updated website run off the WordPress content management system (CMS) for ease of use and improved functionality, Mediclub faced the challenge of only limited online users finding them via organic searches [those via search engines]. We have therefore commenced a structured SEO programme to ensure their rankings are improved, relevant and closely tied with their business goals.

What we have done

With a fairly large website that incorporates a regularly updated news section, Mediclub have not faced the challenges of many others; not having anywhere near enough content. Rather, a problem faced by their website has been a lack of SEO-friendly crawling factors, content requiring updating and improving with regards to their services and a backlink profile that needs strengthening.

Prior to undertaking those improvements, we undertook comprehensive keyword research as part of a ‘discovery’ phase to identify and work with the keywords for Mediclub’s targets and service offerings. Having found a range of relevant keywords such as ‘dental practice finance’ amongst others, we have planned a number of landing pages to support them.

These pages include a significant amount of original and informative content, fully optimised meta data, internal and external links and various other SEO ranking factors. The aim for these pages is to rank highly across Google and other search engines for a plethora of relevant terms. Filling these pages with useful content also means that users are far more likely to engage with the site and get in touch with Mediclub.

We have also undertaken an approach to their site speed which is becoming an increasingly important factor in SEO. Because slower sites show increased bounce rates and decreased engagement, we have been working on the speed of Mediclub. This has entailed a number of development-related updates that we are continuing to work with Vaccoda on implementing.

These include improving load times, decreasing site response times and ensuring there are a minimal number of 301 and 302 redirects across the site; all of which add a number of seconds to the site’s response, having a detrimental effect on the overall speed.

In addition, we have been providing up to date and search engine-friendly meta data; titles and descriptions to all pages. This allows all search engines to better rank and read all pages and appropriately place them online for users. Supplementing the meta data, we have also implemented an xml sitemap and are working on a new structure for the site pages to strengthen it in respect of user experience.

Mediclub have already seen many of their rankings jump significantly including ‘buying a dental practice’ already moving from page 10 to page 6 at this early stage and we are looking forward to the further progress to be made on and off site. We look forward to continuing our work on this exciting project for a well-renowned company in conjunction with Vaccoda Design.

The Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) team at Tudor Lodge Consultants are pleased to announce that working with OverThrow Digital, we are working on the online presence, SEO and website for Cube Funder who provide short to medium term business loans and alternatives to merchant loans to a wide range of businesses throughout the UK.

Cube Funder are a brand-new company and have started their campaign from a blank canvas. Working with the design and development teams at OverThrow Digital, we have been able to be involved in this exciting project from its outset. There have been a number of challenges for Cube Funder, mainly not existing prior to starting the online marketing campaign. This has meant that they have not been present on Google and other search engines.

We have therefore undertaken in-depth and detailed keyword research around their target industry and around their target customers’ searches to identify where there is keyword and search traffic worth targeting. From the design phase with OverThrow Digital we have been working to make sure that the design of the site is as clean as possible and that the user experiences are as easy and efficient as possible. This has been a strong emphasis in order to maintain users who arrive on the site.

As part of the initial planning process we have also been working closely with both OverThrow Digital and the team at Cube Funder to make sure that the site architecture is easily navigated upon arrival.

Having launched the website for Cube Funder we have been designing, planning and writing a broad range of landing pages for some of their specific services. These highly optimised pages are designed to rank strongly on Google and other search engines. Through SEO-friendly use of written and visual content, meta data and other criteria we have launched very effective landing pages for the site.

Furthermore, we have gone through all other pages of the website to ensure that they fulfil all of the necessary criteria. This has meant providing every site page with its own unique set of meta data (titles and descriptions). This allows Google to crawl and rank the site in the best possible way; ranking it for the most relevant target terms.

We are now in the process of undertaking a comprehensive content strategy in which we will be improving and increasing their website’s content offering across their services, industry knowledge and offerings to the wider business community in the UK. This has already entailed a large degree of planning and writing of useful information for a dedicated section on the site.

In addition, Cube Funder do not have a substantial link profile as they are new to the inline world. Therefore, we are continuing to build them a clean, strong and reputable link profile around their industry which will see them improve further for their already promising keyword and search term rankings.

Cube Funder are already ranking at this early stage for a number of target keywords such as ‘medium term business loan’ and others. We look forward to continuing on this already successful path and building on these early successes with Cube Funder.

The OPEN Youth Trust (OPEN) are launching their inaugural Youth Awards, celebrating the achievements of young people in Norfolk and are looking for sponsors for the awards.

OPEN has been working alongside young people for eleven years now and these awards are designed to highlight young people’s astonishing achievements and to give them the recognition and encouragement they deserve.

Nominations for these awards will be aimed at young people in Norfolk aged between 11-19 years of age (or up to 25 years for those with additional needs), with the exception of the Hero Award which will be for young people to nominate an adult who in their eyes is a ‘hero’ or champion, will open on Friday 8th September.  The awards will be judged by an independent panel of judges and Joe Crowley, Ambassador for OPEN and presenter of The One Show and Countryfile will host the Awards ceremony which will take place on Wednesday 28th February 2018.

To make these awards “super exciting”, “the very best they can be”, “go with a bang” – take your pick – OPEN is calling for sponsors to support them.  As sponsors you will be joining media partners the EDP and Evening News as well as the following organisations who have signed up as category sponsors: Leathes Prior (Outstanding Achievement), Active Norfolk (Sport Individual), Hugh J Boswell (Education), Norfolk Constabulary (Hero) and Larking Gowen (Entrepreneur).

OPEN is looking for headline sponsors for the awards as well as a further six for the remaining categories:

• Community 
• Sport (Team)
• Arts
• Charity
• Perseverance
• Volunteer

John Gordon-Saker, CEO for OPEN said: “Following the format of the former Bernard Matthew Youth Awards, OPEN wanted to re-establish these awards to recognise the inspirational young people we have living in Norfolk.  This is an amazing opportunity to honour the future generation of the region and we are inviting anyone interested to join us to champion them by sponsoring these awards”.

Anyone interested in getting involved should contact Grainne Buckley, Head of Fundraising at OPEN on 01603 25 2112 or email grainne@opennorwich.org.uk

Visit Youth Awards for more information.

Now the largest fishing retailer in the UK, Angling Direct was originally set up by Martyn Page (seen above) and William Hill when they purchased their first fishing store in Wroxham in 1986. 

Company Chairman and co-founder, Martyn Page CTA, TEP is generally regarded as the visionary behind Angling Direct’s culture and strategy. As a keen and successful fisherman he wanted to provide a modern and more experiential retail offering to the angling community and this purpose coupled with both his and his fellow co founder, William Hill’s, professional experience have guided the company from start up to floatation on the London Stock Exchange Alternative Investment Market (AIM).

Martyn is and William was, until he retired this year, a partner with M+A Partners, Norfolk Accountants and Business advisers. 

“Apart from my desire to improve and inspire the angling lifestyle, William and I could see a commercial opportunity and we were keen to roll up our sleeves and experience the real problems and challenges faced by businesses both daily and as they grow. M+A Partners advises businesses from owner managed start ups to multi-million pound plus groups on growth, strategy, taxation, succession etc. Whilst I strongly believe that professional advisers generally have excellent technical knowledge, the added practical experience of running and growing ones own business is invaluable to our clients; I think clients regard me as different to the usual accountant and see me more of their entrepreneurial adviser.” Said Martyn 

Read more >>>

Briar Chemicals launched its new initiative, the ‘Farm to Fork’ campaign, earlier this month by facilitating a trip for pupils from Mile Cross Primary School to a local farm.

Briar’s new ‘Farm to Fork’ campaign is being introduced into local schools to teach children about the lifecycle of crops and how Briar play a part in helping farmers maintain healthy crops and increase yields.

The campaign features three stages; fun and interactive experiments about how sunlight and water helps our food grow, farm visits to see where the crops grow followed by providing grow-your-own vegetable packages for the children to grow in the gardens at their school.

Tim Green, Site Manager at Briar Chemicals said: “Bringing science to life is the best way to create curiosity. Our aim is to educate young people about important topics including food production, nutrition, sustainability and how they can contribute.”

During the visit to Easton and Otley College farm, Mile Cross Primary pupils learnt how and what crops need to grow, about the machinery used and what each crop produces. The children enjoyed hands-on activities such as grinding wheat and crushing rape seed to produce oil.

Farm visits provide hands-on sensory experiences; learning where food comes from and the natural cycles from planting through to harvesting. Easton & Otley, an agricultural farming college, provide educational sessions for children up to KS4.

Ruth Cannon, Schools Technician at Easton & Otley College said: “We always enjoy hosting school visits at our Easton Campus. The visits enable school projects on food and farming to come to life. We would like to thank Briar Chemicals for their sponsorship of the Mile Cross Primary School visit.”

As part of the ‘Farm to Fork’ campaign, Briar also work with Mad Science, a local science educational organisation who provides science workshops aligned to STEM objectives and the curriculum.

Mile Cross Primary school pupils had a visit from Dr Dee Enay at Mad Science to help teach them about the importance of the sun in food production. They had the opportunity to take part in fun experiments learning about photosynthesis and prisms.

Briar’s Science in Schools programme, aimed at children aged 5-11 years old, is designed to make science learning fun, informative and capture imaginations.

Briar facilitate trips to other educational hubs across the region creating opportunities for children to learn about the environment around them.

We are pleased to announce that we are working with Electricians Blackheath, in conjunction with Vaccoda Design to improve their online presence, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and content. Electricians Blackheath is a local electrician and electrical services business based in South London in the Blackheath, Bromley and Kent areas. They have many decades of experience in their practice area and as such, have dozens of satisfied customers from over the years.

We were approached by Electricians Blackheath through the development team at Vaccoda who had already been working on their site for some time, developing and improving the look and feel of the site.

However, things were starting to plateau online, with almost no rankings for their website and therefore, they saw the need for some SEO work in order to address and improve this and to make their site fit for purpose.

We started the SEO campaign by assessing the current site and where it sat online. With almost zero views for their site via organic search, the first port of call for them was to ensure the website could be crawled [read and ranked] by Google and other search engines. We applied all necessary updates to their website’s content management system (CMS). Their website is based on the very user friendly and SEO-friendly CMS, WordPress.

Working with Vaccoda’s developers, we went about installing SEO-related updates and site improvements such as ensuring full integration with the Yoast SEO plugin and creating for them a new and Google-friendly sitemap (an xml file submitted to Google with all site pages in a logical order.)

We then undertook keyword research to identify the keywords that Electricians Blackheath were not being ranked for. We also identified a variety of keywords that their site should be ranking for but that due to crawling factors were not. As a result of this, we went about fixing all of their crawling factors and criteria. This has included fully optimising their meta data (titles and descriptions.) By making sure their data that is read by Google is optimised to the best standards, the site ‘encourages’ search engines to read its pages.

In addition to the meta data we have made sure that every site page has an H1 tag [title]. This is the title of the page that Google looks at immediately after the meta data and it must therefore be closely tied to the written copy on the page.

We have now commenced our content building strategy for the website too. The Electricians Blackheath site did not arrive with much content apart from detailing what services were offered. Through our keyword research and client discussions, we have a list of content pages around their services and who they are in order to improve and increase the content offerings on the site; a critical ranking factor for SEO.

The link building for them has also commenced. Having previously had a non-existent link profile it has been of paramount importance that we work on a number of links and content opportunities from established and strong websites. This includes websites such as TechRound and others.

We are looking forward to continuing our work with Vaccoda design and Electricians Blackheath, building on our already strong progress for the future.

Fete smiles on Hillington Square

The summer fete is back again at Hillington Square this Saturday, 15 July 2017, from 12 – 3pm.

The Square will be packed with food and fun for all the family, with music and games on offer throughout the afternoon.

The Mayor of King’s Lynn and West Norfolk, Councillor Carol Bower, will also be in attendance to support the fete and take part in some of the activities on offer.

Flukes ukulele band will be providing music, whilst face painting, a bouncy castle and a number of crafts and activities will be on offer to keep young and old entertained.

Freebridge Director of Housing, Robert Clarke, said: “The Hillington Square Fete is one of the highlights of the summer for Freebridge, and this year looks set to be better than ever.

“The work of our Providence Street Placeshaping Team has meant that we can offer a wider range stalls and activities and we are looking forward to welcoming the wider community into Hillington Square.”

As well as Accounts, Taxation, Software and Practice Management, a large part of the training package in the first six months is dedicated to Business Development.

This is crucial training, during which the franchisee learns and develops their skills to win and retain business.  Actual performance to date is then measured against their business plan.

Sarah Robertson, TaxAssist Accountants Group Operations Director comments, “One of the most daunting areas for new franchisees is ‘Where will my clients come from?’

“During one of our regular ‘Discovery Days’ in Norwich, we speak to potential franchisees about how the thousands of leads created each year, which are immediately qualified and allocated to the network, are converted into fee paying clients.

“The 1-in-2 conversion rate of these leads takes work and dedication, and this added to our franchisees’ own activities including networking and self-promotion has helped to create some impressive results.”

Six months after they launch their business, new franchisees are asked to report on client acquisition and fees signed. TaxAssist received some great feedback from franchisees and they shared some impressive figures.

Sarah added: “The actuals vs. planned results are very rewarding and a testament to the TaxAssist Training Academy and the hard work of the franchisees.

“Even a franchisee who didn’t manage their planned Client Acquisition level still managed to far exceed their projected Fee Bank level!”

Anyone interested in learning more about TaxAssist Accountants should phone 0800 0188297 for an informal conversation before booking onto a Discovery Day. 

June 2017

Leading construction company Bateman Groundworks is looking for 12 new apprentices to join its growing workforce on sites across East Anglia.

Apprentices are the key to future growth of one of the UK’s most dynamic small businesses and it invests heavily in training to secure a skilled staff for decades to come.

The company, based at Little Plumstead, near Norwich, provides groundworks and civil engineering for blue chip house building companies across East Anglia. It currently employs more than 160 people, a growth of more than 30 from the start of the year, with a target workforce of 174 by the end of the year.

Richard Bateman, managing director, said apprentices taken on now would help to achieve desired growth beyond 2020.

The two-year apprenticeships will start in September.

Every apprentice spends four-week blocks of residential training at the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) centre at Bircham Newton, interspersed with on-site training.

 “The apprenticeship scheme, which has been tailored specifically for our needs, works extremely well for us and will give us the skilled workforce we need for the future”.

“We prefer our apprentices to have completed a two-year college course in a construction or engineering related qualification or to have a keen interest in construction before they join us.”

Bateman Groundworks, which marks its 20th anniversary in September, offers a clear career path for its apprentices.

The company’s pipeline of work includes 10-year developments. Its clients include large housebuilder clients Bovis Homes, Taylor Wimpey and Persimmon Homes as well as regional developers like Hopkins Homes and Cripps Development.

The estimated 10,000 new homes along Norwich’s £178m Northern Distributor Road (NDR) are future targets.

“We struggle to recruit skilled staff. We moved to Little Plumstead to make the company more attractive to potential employees. Being closer to Norwich widens the pool for a qualified workforce.”

This year, the company celebrated its first apprentice to be promoted through all 11 staff levels to become a site manager, now in charge of 12 people on site for a prime residential development in Norfolk.

Sam Allen is now managing a site at Round House Park, Cringleford, for Bovis Homes eight years after he started his first job there on its first phase after completing his apprenticeship.

The newest apprentice, Jack Thurbon, is learning slabbing, excavations, ledges, concrete and other skills after trying several courses at sixth form.

“I preferred the practical side of the work and enjoy being outside. The apprenticeship has made me more confident and skilled, and I am seeing more where my career can go.”

“I would like to progress and make my way up the ladder here and move into the engineering side.”

Bateman Groundworks teams are first on site to lay the foundations and prepare the site for the development.

To apply, visit www.batemangroundworks.co.uk

Our Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) team, working in close conjunction with the development and design departments at Vaccoda Design are pleased to announce that we are working with Psychology People on their website’s online status, position and Google rankings. A recruiter for a whole range of psychology-related jobs across a number of areas, Psychology People have been looking to expand themselves online and SEO has been a natural step forward for them.

They approached Vaccoda a few months ago with some development related issues that were quickly resolved, but then started looking at the swathes of benefits available through undertaking an SEO campaign. They currently list numerous psychology jobs for temporary, contract, locum and fulltime positions across the UK and have been looking at expanding both their client base as well as their candidate network.

Their website is built on the WordPress content management system (CMS) which has allowed us and Vaccoda’s teams full access to all the site elements we require. We started the project with a clean-up of Psychology People’s website from an SEO point of view. It has been very important that before progressing their site and its various offerings through a fresh strategy, that we ensure all is up to scratch.

This has included updating their CMS to the attest SEO-friendly standards and ensuring that all of their plugins and functionality in the back-end of the site is totally necessary. Next, we moved onto cleaning up what they already had on the with regards to the many pages of jobs and content throughout the site. We provided all of the necessary pages with unique meta titles and meta descriptions to allow Google to crawl [read] the site for ranking purposes.

We then went through their backlink profile to assess where all of their inbound links are coming from; some reputable sources, others not. We collated all of the spammy and potentially harmful link providers using one of our analysis tools and disavowed them from the backlink profile of the website. This is important as in recent times Google has devalued and even penalised sites that have many spammy sites referencing theirs.

Next, we performed in-depth and detailed keyword analysis to see what Psychology People were already ranking for and to identify some further targets for them to target through the SEO campaign. We have set up tracking to monitor their progress on Google and continue to monitor their progress.

Based on the keyword research we have already implemented some on-site content to increase their offering to Google to offer users more and to increase their online standings. We continue to carry out keyword research and content generation as the site is fairly thin for permanent (non-job) content. A link building strategy is also underway and we are working with several websites of strong authority to provide natural and SEO-friendly content that will aid Psychology People’s online standing and Google rankings.

We are moving towards assessing the overall sitemap of the site and the user navigation, experience and journeys; all of which need further work to improve the rankings of Psychology People online. We look forward to continuing what is already promising to be a very enjoyable and exciting project with all of the team at Psychology People.

Norwich Airport invites comment on masterplan Norwich Airport has published a draft masterplan setting out a vision for the airport’s continued growth over the next 30 years.

It explains how the airport can increase its significant contribution to the local economy while improving the experience of passengers and boosting East Anglia’s connectivity for business and leisure at home and abroad.

Passenger numbers exceeded 500,000 for the first time last year since 2008, and could rise to 1.4 million by 2045. Norwich Airport is worth some £70 million to the local economy and this could increase to £170 million in the same period. The draft masterplan outlines options for how the airport could grow in a sustainable way, and is now available for comment at local council offices and via www.norwichairport.co.uk/masterplan

Richard Pace, Managing Director of Norwich Airport, said: “The masterplan sets out the vision for the future development of Norwich Airport and its continued vital role in supporting our region’s economy.

“As well as projected passenger growth, the aim is to continue to be the transport hub for the offshore oil, gas and renewable industries for the Southern North Sea, and a centre of excellence for the maintenance, repair and overhaul of aircraft, closely linked to the International Aviation Academy Norwich in which we are a founding partner.

“We also address the implications for growth and the need to ensure that it is delivered in an incremental and sustainable way. By continuing to engage with the community we look forward to the airport further enhancing the connectivity and the social and economic fortunes of our region.”

The draft masterplan is open to consultation until 17th August 2017. Copy ends Notes to Editors About Norwich Airport Norwich Airport is part of Regional & City Airports, the airport management division of Rigby Group plc having been acquired in June 2014. The airport employs 250 people. The Airport offers direct scheduled flights to Amsterdam (with connections to over 600 destinations worldwide), Aberdeen, Alicante, Edinburgh, Exeter, Guernsey, Jersey, Malaga and Manchester.

Connections through Manchester enable passengers to reach Belfast, Glasgow, Isle of Man, Inverness and many more. Holiday flights operate to the Balearic and Canary Islands, Cyprus, Greece, Bulgaria, Italy, Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, Switzerland and Lapland.

The scheduled airlines and charter operators currently active from the Airport are: • KLM, Eastern Airways, bmi regional, Flybe and Loganair • Thomson, Balkan Holidays, Newmarket Holidays and Omega Holidays

The airport is a key hub for the southern North Sea offshore oil and gas industry. Four major offshore helicopter operators are based at the airport. These are Bristow, Bond, CHC and NHV. Last year 100,000 passengers travelled offshore from the Airport.

About Rigby Group plc

Rigby Group plc is the parent company for a portfolio of family-owned and highly successful businesses operating across Europe and the Middle East. Diversifying from its origins as a principally technology-led business, Rigby Group plc has evolved over four decades- through smart, strategic acquisitions – into a £2bn British success story employing over 7,500 people.

Rigby Group comprises six key divisions: Technology (SCC – Europe’s largest independent IT services business), Airports (Regional & City Airports, Norwich Airport, Exeter Airport and Coventry Airport), Hotels (the Eden Hotel Collection), Real Estate (Rigby & Rigby superprime property development, Rigby Group Real Estate including Imperial Park, Coventry), Aviation (British International Helicopters and Capital Air Ambulance), and Finance (Rigby Private Equity, Rigby Investments and Rigby Capital).

About Regional & City Airports (RCA)

Regional & City Airports (RCA) is Rigby Group’s highly-innovative airport management company. RCA owns and operates Norwich Airport, Exeter Airport and Coventry Airport, holds management contracts for Blackpool International Airport, City of Derry Airport and Lee on Solent airfield, and is actively building its portfolio of owned or managed airport assets across the next five years.

Regional airports are vitally important to the economic development of regions, not just in the UK but across the world. To survive and prosper, smaller regional airports need to cooperate and collaborate – enabling them to benefit from the economies of scale and sharing of best practice traditionally enjoyed by larger hub airports. This is the vision behind RCA. RCA has built a reputation as an efficient, safe and commercially-savvy airport operator, driving improvements to route development, commercial revenues, operating costs and capital investment in order to deliver a consistently sound commercial return.

As RCA grows it is increasingly able to leverage significant buying power and shared expertise. Already employing more than 650 people, RCA is on its way to becoming a leading player in the regional airport sector and is taking advantage of the lack of capacity at major hub airports in the UK to demonstrate how regional airports can ease the strain.

City College Norwich is delighted with a successful first year for its revamped Information Technology and Computing course, saying that the input of employers has been crucial in preparing its students for a wide range of tech job opportunities.     

Computing returned to the college’s course offering last September, following an overhaul which saw employers consulted on the skills they wanted to see in college leavers and the key technical areas they said were most important to include.

That input from 20 employers has directly shaped what students learn on the 1-year Level 3 course, ensuring that web development and mobile app development both featured as units on the course.

Employer involvement has extended beyond the set-up of the course to include industry experts giving workshops on key topics, employer-led careers talks, and employers coming in to the college to judge computing challenges. 

This engagement has helped students to better understand how IT projects are carried out in real business environments, as well as putting the students in direct contact with potential future employers.

The level of challenge on the course has been high, but its first cohort of students are on track to successfully pass the BTEC qualification.  Crucially, all are now set to enter the labour market – directly into jobs or apprenticeships – or to complete an optional second year of study to further their computing knowledge.

Computing student David Peck feels that the course has helped him become clearer about which area of IT he wants to work in, saying:

“I knew I was interested in tech and computing, but I wasn’t sure what specific area.  This course has shown me that web development is what I am interested in.  I have applied for a fair amount of jobs because of this course.”   

He continued, “I definitely think the course is relevant.  We’ve had contact with Aviva, who specifically contacted us because of the course that we are doing.  So a few of us have had interviews there for apprenticeships that they are running.”

Fellow student, Daniel Hayes, 20, added:

“A big part of it is definitely relevant to getting a job in IT.  They’ve taught us real world things, how projects go, how everything works within say web development or building an app.  They’ve taught us the steps in doing it, like how they would do it in a job.  So it’s made it very relevant, showing us the skills and what you need to do in a job.”  

Information Technology Lecturer Laura Flood, commented:

“The support we have had from employers to help us get the content for the course right has been fantastic.  Having employers and IT professionals coming in to contribute to sessions has added to the links to the world of work.  We are now looking to build on this success and we would love to hear from other local employers and tech professionals who would be interested in getting involved with the course next year.” 

To find out more about linking up with the Information Technology and Computing course at City College Norwich, contact Laura.Flood@ccn.ac.uk.