Published by Nick Brown at 27/03/2020 for accelerate-agency.com
The challenges for many companies are inevitable during the COVID-19 outbreak. In a flash, many are nervously thinking about their physical well-being and the health of their businesses. Many companies have immediately cut back on their marketing campaigns. They decided to trim budgets, which is completely reasonable. However, now is an excellent time for small and large businesses to rev up their search engine optimization (SEO) efforts.
Smart business owners will use the coronavirus downtime to focus on growing their company. SEO and content marketing allow your business to keep in touch with your customers, while most of us are reliant on digital communication. For you to understand the long-term benefits of search engine marketing, we listed six reasons why you should focus on SEO at this time.
One major reason why you can’t just stop your SEO efforts is that consumers are too invested digitally. With work-from-home set-ups, it is evident that people will spend more time on their computers and mobile devices. This is already happening as the spike in traffic on Pornhub makes clear.
Of course, it’s not just porn that people are watching. Ecommerce giant Amazon is only one of a range of companies that have seen a sudden surge in demand for their services. This surge in demand is the result of a robust digital presence. SEO and content marketing can be your solution to combat the impact of coronavirus on your business.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/617136/digital-population-worldwide/
As businesses are settling into the new normal, we will be forced to spend more time researching and finding products and services online. This isn’t just conjecture. A study from Vodafone reports that internet usage has surged up by 50% in some European countries. It’s a prime time to produce and release content to an audience of potential customers who want to do more than slouch on the couch watching Netflix.
The big winners of this situation will be companies offering digital products and services that help companies operate online and ecommerce stores that deliver the goods we need to our doors. This is an opportunity to get in front of a larger market than you would otherwise be able to access.
Because of the pandemic, many goods won’t be easy to find. Furthermore, As some manufacturers will cease operations, scarcity is sure to ensue. Note that when goods are insufficient, people will look for them online, and they will explore alternatives if some products are not available from their usual supplier. While I was primarily discussing goods, the same thing will be happening with businesses and consumers looking online for service providers.
If you are involved in a business offering products or services that are in high demand, you need to start working to rank for the items that you offer. It also pays to work to rank your content by introducing topics around the products that consumers demand.
A lot of companies will scale down on their marketing campaigns. This is understandable. It’s also an opportunity. While others are focused on keeping abreast of the latest news on social media, you can double down on your marketing.
The current crisis, while severe, does give you the space to focus on improving your marketing efforts while others slack off. It’s this focus on the end goal that separates successful businesses from the crowd.
Some of the things you should be focusing on include optimizing your sales pages for conversions, reviewing your content marketing strategy, and guest posting. This is essential work, especially considering that we don’t know how many weeks or months this current crisis will last.
While there is uncertainty over when things will get back to normal, the COVID-19 pandemic will not last forever. As a business owner, you must see the “big picture.” Although short-term business plans are essential, they cannot be made at the expense of long-term strategies. It pays to think months ahead of where you want your company to be in the future.
Note that optimizing your business’ web presence takes a lot of months of work. If you work through this time to build your content, you can prepare your business to see better sales in the next months. Stopping SEO marketing can negatively impact your business. This is because you won’t be able to rank high in SERPs and connect with your customers.
SEO marketing will remain to be one of the most effective ways to reach your target market after the outbreak. Businesses that carry out powerful search engine marketing campaigns will reap the benefits of their investments when things normalize.
With the right SEO and content marketing strategies, your content can be the light of many during this dark time. Communicating your brand identity and company values is especially important. Through your SEO and content efforts, your customers will be aware that you are still offering your products or services.
As you provide consumers with valuable content, you will increase brand awareness and customer engagement. Through effective content marketing, you can provide valuable content that helps solve the problems many people face. Slowly, you will become your customers’ ally in this difficult time.
Your SEO campaign will increase your online exposure, and this will be a long term gain. The advantages you gain now will last longer than the current crisis.
When allocating your marketing budget, it’s important to choose a channel that offers a clear ROI. SEO is measurable and quantifiable. Thanks to tools like Google Search Console, you can track your search rankings, see the number of people who visited your site, and with Google Analytics, you can track the conversion rate from visitors to customers.
This ability to track improvements and measure the result makes SEO one of the most effective marketing channels. Certainly, it offers clear benefits over PPC, which offers traffic on tap, but only if you have a budget to pay for it on an ongoing basis.
There are also subsequent gains that you can accrue from SEO. For example, you can convert visitors to your site onto your email list, grow a PPC retargeting list and more. All of these are marketing resources that you can utilize for future campaigns.
Truly, it is important to be highly strategical in a challenging time like this. We may see an economic downturn in the next months to come. When that happens, some businesses will not thrive and others will. Considering the fast-changing global landscape, squeezing all possibilities to be successful is essential. Your actions now will separate your business from others.
A recession because of the coronavirus may be inevitable. However, with a plan in place, you can prevent your business suffering from the impacts. Maintain your market share by investing in long-term digital marketing strategies like SEO. Start by hiring a reliable marketing agency to increase the number of relevant visits to your site.
Republished from Accelerate Agency’s website https://www.accelerate-agency.com/6-reasons-why-you-should-focus-on-seo-during-covid19
We want to let our members and the community know that we are still very much in operation during this challenging period. Whilst our keynotes, member lunches, workshops, and initiatives are currently on pause, we will continue to deliver value and support the local creative community by sharing advice and positive stories via our digital network.
We recognise that this will be a very difficult time for most of us and to get through it we all need to support each other. Remote working can be challenging but it’s been heart-warming to see some brilliant initiatives appearing within the network.
We’ve already come across some great examples of ideas to help creative businesses get through these turbulent times. For instance, ‘Digital Guzzle’ Friday’s from the Noisy Little Monkey clan, Virtual Book Clubs with Armadillo, and members offering free services such as copywriting, tips for remote working and how to manage your finances.
Our region is known for its unique collaborative spirit, so, we have an ask: share your initiatives and offers of support with us and we’ll add them to this blog page where we’re compiling positive news and stories to keep you going.
Are you offering free drop-ins for creative businesses? Have you set up a virtual networking event to help people connect? Written a blog about weathering the storm? We want to hear it!
Let us know by emailing Kirsty with details of your initiative, including a summary of what you’re offering, who it’s for, your online link (this can be a LinkedIn post, tweet, blog etc), plus details for how people can get in touch. We’ll be regularly adding to the blog so keep checking back for updates.
If you’re a member, we’d encourage you to self-publish your own articles and share the positive activity and good news with the network. Please also continue to post your job opportunities and virtual events to our website over the coming months. The more positivity we can circulate the better.
To kick things off, Chris Thurling (our Chair, business coach, mentor and serial networker!) is opening a virtual drop-in where members can book a free 20-minute coaching and mentoring session. Chris has earned multiple battle scars through surviving three periods of recession, so can provide useful advice and words of wisdom he’s learned throughout his journey.
Slots are available on Wednesday afternoons (between 2pm – 4pm) on 25th March, 1st April and 8th April. If you’re a Bristol Media member and would like to book, please email Chris.
If you’re a local business offering a short-term or freelance role for people working within the creative industries, please get in touch. You can advertise the vacancy for free on our Jobs board until the end of April.
We appreciate that for the smaller businesses and self-employed amongst you, it’s going to be a particularly testing time. The environment is changing at a rapid rate, so we’ve created a Slack channel for our freelance members to share info, resources, opportunities, and anything that will help support the local gig economy through the current situation. If you’d like an invite, please email Alli.
We will continue to work with local businesses and networks to ensure we are all actively supporting the creative industries in our region. If you are an organisation who can offer your services to support creative businesses in Bristol, Bath and the South West, please let us know.
If you have any questions or would like to speak to one of the team, please get in touch.
Together, we are greater than the sum of our parts.
Whether you travel regularly for business or just like exploring new places, travelling brings a whole set of digital security threats. While business travellers are especially vulnerable because they have all sorts of business data stored in their devices, everyone is at risk of security breaches, including identity theft, credit card fraud, or cyberstalking.
If you maintain your digital security when you travel, there is no reason to cancel your travel plans out of fear that you might get hacked. Here are some ways you can keep your data and devices safe when you travel abroad.
Keeping your devices locked is your first line of defense in case you misplace them or lose them to pickpockets. An unprotected device can and will result in the theft of company or personal information.
If you’re travelling with a company-issued laptop or device, your IT department will already have set up a PGP key or device password. If your device doesn’t have one yet, ask your IT department to create it. Once you receive your password, change it to something that you will remember easily, but is too complicated or obscure for thieves to hack.
If you have a smartphone or tablet, it probably comes with security settings that will allow you to lock and unlock it with a PIN, a pattern, a fingerprint, or facial recognition. If possible, make your PIN longer than four digits (six digits is good enough for most purposes) and avoid using a very common password, like 1234 or 0000.
The point of locking your devices is to make your data harder to access, buying you time to recover it or, in extreme cases, to delete it. The more complicated your device’s unlocking mechanism is, the more difficult it is for an unauthorized person to use it.
We’ve already discussed changing your device passwords as soon as your IT department has set them up. The reason you should change your default password is that you don’t know who’s had access to your device, whether it’s physically or online, and you should always keep other people guessing.
Some businesses don’t require password changes. However, most organisations require password changes every 90 days, which is an industry best practice. If you are travelling with your devices, you should be more careful and change your password a bit more frequently
The best passwords are those that are completely generated randomly. But the problem with coming up with a strong password is that the thing that makes it hard to crack is also the same thing that makes it hard to remember.
Here is a table that illustrates the differences between strong passwords and weak ones.
Strong passwords
Longer than 8 characters
Phrases or sentences
Combination of letters, numbers, symbols, punctuation marks
Uncommon combinations of words, riddles, or slogans that are easy to remember but hard to guess for an outsider
Weak passwords
Shorter than 8 characters
Single word or number string
Letters only
Easy-to-guess strings, like “Password”, “Love”, names, birthdays, or anniversaries
In addition, you should have different passwords for each app or website that you use to keep those who gain access to your devices from stealing your information or engaging in fraudulent activity. While it’s hard to remember all your passwords for multiple apps, a good password manager will help you sign into each one without much trouble. If possible, enable two-factor authentication, which requires you to enter both a password and a one-time code that is sent to your email or phone.
Changing your passwords regularly will make it difficult for someone to break into your device and steal your data. Using different uncommon passwords for your apps and accounts will make hacking even harder and will improve your digital security drastically.
You might find Bluetooth useful for such things as transferring files between devices and listening to music with wireless earphones, but it also leaves your devices vulnerable to all sorts of cyber security threats.
If you leave your Bluetooth radio on, anyone with a Bluetooth device can connect to it and hack into your devices. From there, there’s no guessing what they could do. Keep Bluetooth disabled as much as possible when you travel. If you absolutely need to use it, set up a strong password and don’t give it out to others.
You should also protect your mobile hotspot the same way. If at all possible, don’t use it; if you can’t avoid using it, like when you work in a place without a good, secure wi-fi connection, make your password as strong as you can make it.
Free wi-fi access can be very appealing for travellers, especially if data charges in the places they visit are expensive. However, not all EU countries comply with GDPR or have stringent cybersecurity laws, so you can’t be too sure you’ll have the same level of protection that you enjoy in your own country.
Using an unencrypted wi-fi network is probably the worst thing you could do in terms of data security when travel. It will leave your device vulnerable to hacking and open it up to different kinds of security breaches. If you use VPNs to torrent privately or to access business apps, using a public wi-fi network will also expose your VPN to cyber attacks and put your colleagues’ data at risk.
That being said, you should also disable auto-connect on your devices as it will keep them from connecting from unencrypted wi-fi networks that you encounter as you travel. It’s a nice feature if you’re at home or at your regular workplace, but never a good idea when you’re travelling. Always change this setting before you fly out.
Whenever you visit a tourist attraction or attend an event, it’s tempting to share your location. Everybody checks in somewhere, anyway. Even if you don’t mean to share your location, many social media apps attach it when you post an image or video.
However, sharing your location can alert criminals to the fact that you’re not home or in your hotel, which means that you’re leaving your loved ones, personal belongings, or property at risk. Turn this feature off for all your apps and disable your GPS whenever possible.
Whether you’re at a tourist trap or participating in an event, do not disclose your location to anyone except those who really need to know it, like your boss or your family.
Gone are the days when all a computer virus can do is go into your hard drive and play a creepy video while deleting everything in your hard drive. Now, viruses have adapted to mobile technology. They delete your data, mine your computer for sensitive personal information, then move on to the next device.
While not opening email and messages from suspicious senders is one way to avoid viruses, you can still unwittingly infect your devices when you download something or access a public network (another reason you should only connect to a network you trust!). Installing a trusted anti-virus solution will keep your devices and data secure while you travel.
Updating your devices’ operating systems is a time-consuming exercise, but it’s something that you should not put off doing for too long. OS updates usually contain patches that protect your device from security threats, such as gaps in the code that let cyber attackers sneak into your network.
In the same way, you should also update your apps, especially those you use to access personal and financial data. Not updating your apps can result in identity theft, blackmail, and fraud, especially if your apps have existing security gaps.
You should also remove apps that you no longer use and retain only those apps that you use frequently. Aside from making your phone run faster and saving battery life, cleaning up your phone can help you avoid cyber attacks that take advantage of connections opened by unneeded apps.
Mobile technology has evolved to a point where you cannot avoid using it. We are increasingly getting dependent on mobile devices for almost everything we need, from sharing photos with amusing captions to buying travel tickets to completing high-value transactions. Unfortunately, cybersecurity threats have also taken on new forms.
Cyber attacks can hit you any time, especially if you’re travelling in an unfamiliar location. Changing your personal habits and fixing a few settings in your devices will help you stave off these attacks and keep your data and devices safe.
Torchbox has been providing digital services to charities and nonprofits since the year 2000, we offer digital product development, digital marketing services and we’re the founders of an open source CMS called Wagtail, which is used by the likes of the NHS, Oxfam and Mozilla Foundation (to name but a few). And now, as we hurtle towards our 20th birthday, we are delighted to have been included on The Sunday Times 100 Best Small Companies to Work For list 2020.
This list is based on the open and honest feedback from our employees – providing them with a chance to have their say (anonymously) and to highlight areas we can improve on. We’re chuffed to have achieved a 3 star level of accreditation (the highest) which means we have “extraordinary” levels of engagement.
Everyone at Torchbox is driven to work for an organisation that stands for something beyond making money, which helps explain why we have such brilliant people and why they stay.
Olly Willans, Torchbox Founder and Creative Director said:
“Having become an employee-owned company last year – the first digital agency to become a 100% Employee Owned Trust – we’re on a journey to make Torchbox the best place to work that it can possibly be, whether you work remotely or in one of our Oxford, Bristol, and Cambridge offices. We don’t have everything right yet, and this survey provides us with valuable feedback on what is and isn’t working and highlights areas that we can focus on. Next year, we’re determined to do even better.”
When it comes to digital marketing services it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by how many are actually out there. Every digital marketing agency is selling several of them, and there are so many that overlap, seem to duplicate, or use so much jargon it’s impossible to actually tell what on earth they even do.
That’s the last thing we want at OggaDoon – and if you’re tired of going around in circles, just get in touch and get some real answers. After all, there’s nothing more frustrating than speaking to agencies who just want to sell, rather than add value.
The first thing to do is gain some clarity on exactly what digital marketing services are out there, and what all that lingo means. Here’s your short guide to digital marketing services and if you keep scrolling, our hot advice on how to best use them for your business’ advantage.
What are digital marketing services?
Although these can be broken down in a hundred different ways, there are essentially five core digital marketing services out there.
Website design and development
And yes, website design and development are different. A website designer or website design agency will want to sketch out the look and feel of your website, explore your customer journey, and ensure the messaging is absolutely on point. A website developer or website development agency, on the other hand, takes the designs and makes them into reality by using coding or template adjustments.
Sometimes a website design agency also offers development, and a website developer also offers design work. But make sure you ask the question before you get started, or you could find you end up with double the spend.
Social media management
This looks pretty simple: managing your social media. But what does a social media management package actually look like? The full breadth of the service starts with an audit on your social channels, with recommendations on how to improve your profiles, targeting, copy, and visuals. It then delivers content (copy, hashtags, links, images, videos, GIFs, etc) on a weekly or monthly basis, all designed to engage with your audience.
Next, a good digital marketing services for social media will engage with your followers and get involved in debates and trending topics on your behalf, creating monthly analytics with recommendations on further optimisation. It’s a huge task, so make sure you’re getting all of this impact if you’re paying for it.
Content creation
Content creation is an absolutely vital part of the digital marketing services package, because without content, you’ve literally got nothing to say online. ‘Content’ covers copy, web releases, blogs, news articles, images, GIFs, videos, infographics, banners…
If you can read it or see it online, then it’s content, and the best agencies are those creating a wide variety of content types to ensure your audiences never get bored.
SEO and PPC
The more technical end of the digital marketing services spectrum, SEO literally means Search Engine Optimisation: anything and everything you do online to make it easier for Google to push you to the top of search results when people search for your business, your services, or your industry. This can involve ‘backend’ changes to your website, alterations in copy and layout, and technical improvements to site speed, mobile optimisation, and more.
PPC is the twin sibling of SEO, and is essentially the paid for, ‘I can’t wait for my SEO changes to kick in’, version of SEO. You pay Google or another web channel a certain amount for clicks or impressions based on the target aspects you want to rank for.
Digital marketing
The worst culprit under the ‘digital marketing services’ banner, this really depends on the marketing agency that you’re talking to. That’s because it is typically used to cover all the other little bits of digital marketing that don’t naturally fit into one of the above boxes.
In our minds here at OggaDoon, we believe that digital marketing includes newsletters, mailers, pop ups and web forms, online surveys and interaction points, chatbots (with or without AI), webinars and video conferencing, and literally anything else that happens online that connects you to your audiences.
There are many digital marketing services
And not all of them are created equal. The best digital marketing services are those which have been expertly tailored to your company: your brand identity, your business lifecycle stage, your industry, what you’ve tried before – and what worked.
One easy way to find out just what your business needs is to talk to us directly, but if you are looking for more generalised advice, then here are the three things you should definitely be doing, and three things you should definitely not be doing when it comes to digital marketing services:
DO: test
One of the best things about digital marketing services is that you don’t just have to trust your agency that everything will work eventually – digital aspects of marketing have plenty of opportunities to test. Whether you’re A/B testing the use of emojis in tweets, videos on Instagram, different delivery days for newsletters, or different times for pop ups on your home page, there are always opportunities to test and find the best way to accelerate your brand’s growth.
DO: ask about metrics
Numbers, numbers, numbers. Digital marketing services will each have their own metrics and associated KPIs, so do be bold and ask your agency what KPIs they are working towards and how they compare to industry standards. If they don’t know, then perhaps it’s time to talk to another agency who understands the importance of tracking growth and success.
DO: work collaboratively
We want the absolute best results for our clients, and that means we need to work collaboratively. Have a new member of staff joining you? Tell us! We can create a short ‘Welcome to x’ campaign that will deliver insight and attraction to your company for future recruitment, across your website, social (particularly LinkedIn), and job sites. And that’s just for starters.
DON’T: compare prices like for like
There is no such thing as a like for like quote when working with agencies on digital marketing services. You need to take many other factors into account, such as their previous track record, recommendations from others, the metrics they have achieved most recently, what their contract length is, and more.
DON’T: just do what your competitors are doing
Your competitors are the best at doing what they do. Make sure you focus on doing the best at what you do. If your brand doesn’t naturally sit on YouTube, don’t pour time, money, and effort into creating a YouTube channel! If your competitors are killing it with chatbots, don’t just replicate it for your own website and hope it delivers the same results. The best digital marketing services are those curated for you and your audience.
DON’T: give up immediately
It’s easy to hope for instant results with digital marketing services but especially for specific niche audiences, you need to commit to at least 6 months to ensure market penetration. Simply stopping in one direction within days and trying a second doesn’t give you enough time to really test, so you could be missing real opportunities for growth.
Looking for more guidance? Choosing the best digital marketing services for you – and then delivering excellence – is exactly what we do. Get in touch now.
So, you want to know about SEO?
If you get difficult questions about SEO and you know you could do more for your clients but don’t know where to start (or who to trust), this workshop will be perfect for you. Alternatively, if you’re responsible for website SEO and are looking for ways to improve your website then this session is for you.
Jon Payne, Technical Director of Bristol agency – Noisy Little Monkey – will be sharing expert advice, strategies and actionable tips in this Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) workshop, where you’ll discover how to get the best chance of ranking highly in Google and Bing for your own or your clients’ website.
Jon will provide you with theory and show examples so that you can go and get started straight away!
Account planners, strategists, small business owners, or anyone responsible for website performance who is looking for a crash course in beginner’s SEO.
This workshop takes place at 3-5pm on Thursday 13th February at Origin Workspace, Berkeley Square, Bristol.
Tickets are £20 (+VAT) for Bristol Media members and Origin Workspace members, £30 (+VAT) otherwise.
Jon is technical director of Noisy Little Monkey, the digital marketing agency focused on HubSpot. For more than 10 years, Noisy Little Monkey has enabled businesses to generate more leads, drive sustainable growth and unleash anarchic creativity.
The Noisy Little Monkey team work hard to improve the bottom line of their clients through services like: Inbound Marketing, SEO and Social Media Marketing. Jon is a wizard with all things relating to technical SEO and has spoken at events including SMX London and SEMrush webinars. His talks will leave you feeling refreshed, motivated and you’ll (hopefully!) leave with a smile on your face.
In 2012, The Wow Company began its agency benchmarking report – BenchPress. The aim was simple; to take an accurate snapshot of agency life in the UK and to share insight and analysis with ambitious agency owners.
BenchPress has grown to become the largest survey of independent agency owners in the UK and is a great way to benchmark yourself against your peers. BenchPress 2020 is now open and we’re encouraging South-West agencies of all shapes, sizes, and sectors to participate. You can take part here.
This year, Bristol Media has partnered with BenchPress to provide a bespoke report for agency owners in Bristol, Bath and the South-West to compare agency performance with the rest of the UK. We need 100 or more agency owners, founders or directors to participate, so please help spread the word. Everyone that takes part receives a copy of the full benchmark results. Here’s 2019’s report.
Last year revealed that confidence remained high amongst agency owners, with their drive and determination to grow in 2019 overriding any doubts about wider market conditions. This was off the back of a strong 2018, which saw agencies grow fee income by the largest amount since BenchPress started. BenchPress 2020 will reveal whether agencies are still on the up and provide an outlook for the year ahead.
This year’s survey will focus on how agency owners can build a profitable and sustainable business, one that can thrive in uncertain times. Alongside this, there will be questions about selling and buying agencies, which will reveal what makes an agency really valuable to any purchaser.
Join us and BIMA as the Head of Immersive Tech Council, Nicola Rosa, delivers a masterclass on Immersive Tech. Nicola will help attendees understand the possibilities of immersive technologies in this 2 hour masterclass.
This event is free for Bristol Media or BIMA members.
Nicola Rosa, Product Strategist, Accenture. Chair, BIMA Immersive Tech Council
Nicola is a Product strategist, experience designer, and digital transformation expert, Nicola is currently part of the Accenture Digital UKI where he is the Go-To Market Lead for XR (AR,VR, and MR). With more than 15 years of experience in the media and entertainment industry, Nicola worked for companies like Atari, Google, Spotify, Yahoo!, Virgin Radio and IBM iX designing B2E, B2B and B2C digital products and numerous App Store hits.
The mastercalss takes place on Wednesday 12th February, 3-5pm in the auditorium at Prophecy Unlimited, Glass Wharf, Bristol.
Tickets are free if you are a Bristol Media member or BIMA member, or £15 + VAT for non-members. To get your Member discount code email [email protected]
If you’re not a member, please BOOK HERE
If you’re thinking of joining, or simply need a reminder on how to make the most of your membership, we’ve created this guide to highlight the benefits of joining our community of creative sector individuals and businesses in Bristol and the South West. So, read on for 9 reasons to join, or stay put…
Won a top award? Published a brilliant thought leadership piece about creativity or innovation? Launched a new showreel and want to get the news out there? We want to hear about it! Members can self-publish content on the Newsfeed as much and as often as they like, and if it’s really good, we might even share it with our 31.8k twitter followers, or publish it in our newsletter.
Our jobs board is the go-to platform for creative industry jobs in the region. Last year, over 750 creative sector jobs were advertised by our members, who can take advantage of unlimited advertising for absolutely no cost. If you need proof that it works, our member JonesMillbank recruited ALL of their team through adverts on the Jobs board!
You may have been to a Vision keynote event before where we invite a world-class speaker to Bristol to share knowledge and insight around current hot topics. Members receive preferential rates, saving anywhere between 30-60% of a non-member ticket. Plus, we’ve recently introduced an offer where freelancers can take advantage of Vision keynote tickets for £10. We provide a networking lunch before each talk, so it’s a great opportunity to get to know fellow creative industry professionals or catch up with old contacts over a buffet lunch. Visit the Events page for more.
Are you looking to promote your business? Partner with a local agency? Want to bag your next freelance gig? Our online member directory allows you to create an individual member profile with contact details and the ability to showcase your latest work. Make sure you keep your profile updated as we regularly point businesses to the directory who are looking for agencies and freelance resource.
If you’re hosting a local event, head over to the Events page, submit the form and we’ll publish your event in the calendar. Just make sure it’s relative to a creative sector audience and is within the South West and you’re good to go.
We work with local businesses to ensure members get the best deals possible for everything from free legal advice to restaurant discounts, coffee subscriptions to team away-days. Our mobile membership cards allow you to claim these exclusive deals and discounts, plus they are available for your whole team! Lunch at The Florist then? Check out the full list of member perks.
We’re firm believers in training and professional development. How else will you develop the skills of your team or attract and retain top talent? We bring the knowledge to our members through a series of intimate workshops and skills sessions, so you can benefit from high-quality training at a competitive price. Check out the latest workshops here.
If you remember the Bristol Media barometer – a valuable tool providing insight into the local creative sector – then good news. We’re teaming up with a partner to create a bespoke report to benchmark business performance, and explore the trends, insights, opportunities and threats facing creative agencies in Bristol & Bath. More info coming soon, so watch this space!
Last, but certainly not least. Collaboration is at the heart of what we do at Bristol Media. We believe that Bristol is one of the most creative and innovative cities out there and it’s achieved this status by organisations and individuals working together. We champion our members in the creative sector and encourage collaborations as much as possible, so keep us posted on your blossoming partnerships.
Collectively, we’re greater than the sum of our parts
Our mission is to put our region on the map as a world-leading centre of creativity and innovation, so that we inspire talented people to work here, attract customers and drive growth. Being localised to Bristol means we can be the eyes and ears on the ground, but we can’t do it without our members. So, if you’ve yet to become part of our community and would like to take advantage of the above, and more, join Bristol Creative Industries today.
When it comes to employee benefits packages, offering just a salary and standard holiday allowance simply won’t cut it any more. Enhanced packages to tempt new recruits and retain existing staff are now becoming more and more commonplace, so we’d love to hear from you about how you rate the various types of employee benefits available, and what you value the most.
Our survey is now open and available to take part in here. All responses to the survey will remain anonymous, won’t require any personal details to be entered and will only be used for the purposes of internal research. For more information, you can find our privacy policy here.
Take the survey HERE
You need to load content from reCAPTCHA to submit the form. Please note that doing so will share data with third-party providers.
More Information