Last Friday’s Business Growth Hub event, held at the excellent Pier Centre named after Wigan’s most iconic address just a couple of hundred yards away, focused on digital transformation. Wigan’s own Digital Growth Advisor, Jonathan Print, outlined the support provided by both the Growth Hub and Wigan Council for businesses looking to engage with digital. The benefits of this support were illustrated by Neil Ormesher from ASG Stage Products, who enthusiastically explained his personal journey into digital and how he’s used knowledge gained from workshops delivered by the Growth Hub within the business.
Formatted workshops can be a great way to consider and discuss issues. We favour the approach ourselves and use our own ‘Launchpad’ to deliver both digital exploration sessions, which are free, and specific project based consultancy exercises. The Launchpad is located within our studios and is an open environment allowing us to involve any of the professionals working at bd2 – designers, UI/UX specialists, .Net Developers, Project Managers, Art Directors, Marketers, Testers and Consultants. And, as a business nearing twenty years of trading, we’ve accumulated a great deal of knowledge and experience within the team which brings real depth to the discussion.
Key for us is the importance of developing and evolving a digital strategy, aligned with a business’s overall and marketing strategies. Without this, there is a significant risk of wasting effort by pursing the wrong activities – just because you could doesn’t always mean you should. Or of falling into the habit of plugging away at an activity that no longer bears fruit. We often hear from businesses who spend time on digital without a real rationale – ‘we are on Twitter, but I don’t really know why’. We start your digital journey by first looking at the digital landscape you operate within, then draw a map for the journey and follow it – it’s all common sense. Then, as you go along that journey, refer back to the map and don’t be afraid to try an alternative route if the road you’re on isn’t taking where you want to go. Plus, it’s a constantly evolving world so something new might come along that’s better – so take a positive attitude to learning and embracing change.
The strategy can then be delivered in-house, or tap into the expertise and additional resource we provide at bd2, or in conjunction with our network of partners, or with other agencies or resource already working with a business – we recognise that there are many specialist areas that need specialist skills. It’s all dependent on the specific requirements needed to deliver it.
If you want to find out more about our approach, or book onto one of our free Launchpad digital workshops, please contact stuart@bd2.co.uk.