Lloyd's of London website goes live

We've just launched the new website for Lloyd's, the three-hundred-year-old insurance institution.

The rejuvenated site will play a key part in Lloyd's drive to be the easily accessible, modern and efficient insurance platform of choice for industry professionals.

Lloyds.com contains more than 18,000 pages and is built to accommodate more than 8,000 visitors per working day. It is designed to provide services as well as in-depth information, primarily for an audience of brokers and agents who operate in or who have an interest in the specialist insurance market.

We made it easy to navigate and find the service or information users are looking for, whether they are a Lloyd's broker or a managing agent with specialist requirements, or a journalist or member of the public with a more general enquiry. We also created a customisable dashboard - My Lloyd's – to help regular visitors gain easy access to the information and services they use most often.

More specifically, the site provides:

• Directories for Lloyd’s-registered brokers
• Information for the investment community about Lloyd's financial performance, structure and important events
• In-depth comment pieces and latest market news
• An overview of Lloyd’s, its people, graduate careers and FAQs about working for Lloyd's
• Lloyd's business timetable provides information on the regulatory and Corporation deadlines that apply to the Lloyd's market

Jo Scott, Digital Communications Manager, at Lloyd’s said: "Our research showed that users of the previous site found it a fragmented experience. We wanted to offer a one stop shop for all our on-line services, and to make lloyds.com easier to use. We are delighted with the site Aqueduct has put together. They have tackled an enormously complex project that features a huge amount of information, and made it easily navigable and simple to use for busy industry professionals."

We're in the MoneyWeek

Britain’s best selling financial magazine has just signed a two year deal with us to maintain and enhance their digital presence.

MoneyWeek have big plans for its flagship publication and website. The Aqueduct team will be delivering the goods for the following websites;

MoneyWeek
Fleet Street Invest
Daily Reckoning
The Healthier Life
Shortcut Publications

We're helping to beat blood cancers

We've just signed up with Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research to create and launch a social media campaign that will raise awareness and donations to help beat blood cancers.

2010 is the national charity's 50th birthday, and there are plenty of achievements to celebrate. Back in 1960, a child diagnosed with leukaemia was pretty much handed a death sentence, but today, thanks to the charity's research, 9 out of 10 kids survive the most common form of leukaemia.

There's still a long way to go in beating blood cancers, however, and our campaign will help to highlight the personal stories of those affected and their loved ones to a wider audience.

There are 110,000 people living with blood cancer in the UK, and 28,700 diagnosed every year. Only a small percentage of cases are children, contrary to common perception.

The campaign will use Facebook, Twitter, blogs, email and a special section on the charity's website. It is expected to go live in June 2010.

We're Webby Award nominees for Manchester City FC!

Aqueduct's role in building the new Manchester City FC website has won us a nomination for the Sports category of the internationally acclaimed Webby Awards. These awards are really the top accolade for the best of the web, and we're proud to play our part with POKE on building the best football site in the world!

Help us win the People’s Voice award for each category which is based entirely on the number of public votes. Go to http://webby.aol.com/entertainment/sports to vote between now and April 29th. Come on, show us you're fans of our work.

Aqueduct helps M&S launch green campaign

Aqueduct launched a new site for Marks & Spencer today to mark the beginning of a major new campaign.

Your Green Idea is part of M&S's "Plan A" initiative, and the bid to become the world's most sustainable major retailer by 2015.

The Your Green Idea competition invites anyone to submit the ultimate green idea. The winner will get their idea seen by 21 million people every week at over 700 M&S stores, and awarded £100,000 for their chosen organisation to invest in the idea.

The competition opens on 15th March, remaining open for two months.

Aqueduct designed and developed the new site.

Right, let's get thinking on that ultimate green idea..

Food for thought

Is it just me, or are restaurants missing a trick? They come and they go, the décor changes, the food styles go through fusion and then separate out into rustic traditionalism. It’s like a great big game of okey-cokey, with everyone playing to the same rules, not wanting to break the circle and, at the end of the day, all about the metrics of menu and bums on seats. But, this is a restaurant. What about the experience?

With so many bars and restaurants copying one another on décor menu and logo design, why is that no one has realised that the one thing that can distinguish them is the way they behave. Brand behaviour, even in the twittering, social interactive world we now live in, has always been more important than what the brand’s logo looks like. I can’t remember what came first: Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Hamburger Union - they all have similar typefaces and neutral blonde wood interiors (bit like the burgers).

As with burgers, so with dim sum restaurants – out with the blonde wood and in with lots of glossy black décor and modernist fleuro typeface logos – different flavours, décor, but same blank behavioural landscape. Our work for Ping Pong sidestepped talking about the menu and sets up more of an expectation and promise of the lunch or dinner ahead. We featured the food in such a way that it ticks the quality/style boxes straight away. Once the food was sorted we were freed up to set up the brand behaviour – owning sociability and conversation, and creating a reason to come back to Ping Pong that’s as sticky as their traditional sticky rice parcels (No.37, in case you’re interested).

With a campaign like this you can both meet the metrics and put bums on seats, but start a buzz that will get people ping ponging till the cows come home…

Now where shall I go for a burger? GBK? BGK? Errr…

Written by Andy McLane, Aqueduct's Creative Director.

Our Tech Dir Guillaume wins prestigious Sitecore award

Sitecore announced this week their 2009 Most Valuable Professionals (MVPs) list, which included our very own Guillaume Buat-Ménard, Technical Director.

The programme recognises exceptional technical community leaders who encourage free and objective exchange of knowledge by actively sharing their real-world Web CMS expertise.

Individuals were nominated by Sitecore employees from around the world, and were reviewed by a board of Sitecore executives.

The program offers members a number of benefits including access to technical resources such as alpha versions of Sitecore software, first release modules and full access to the Sitecore Developer Network and download section and invitations to major events. The term for Sitecore MVPs is two years, after which time, individuals can be nominated again.

Well done Guillaume!

How agencies price a job

It’s the first thing clients look at when an agency proposal lands in their inbox – the price. We’re not expensive, we know this from our rates – compare us with other London agencies in Econsultancy’s latest rates survey – Aqueduct’s rates are on average 20% below other London agencies. Furthermore, we don’t charge for overheads. Many agencies add a percentage to their basic costs to cover for holidays, sickness, general disbursements, laziness and poor project management. We don’t. Despite these factors we sometimes find we lose out on price. Why is this?

There are a number of factors that go into putting together a price for a job. We believe that there are three types of agency when it comes to pricing:

1. “We’ll give you the best price” agencies – usually very small outfits, can afford to do a job for lower than average rates, attractive in price but often poor quality solution – takes longer, cuts corners, fails on business objectives, or ends up costing more to get what you want
2. “We’ll do what we have to to win this job” agencies – will offer a low price for initial piece of work, or sell in a low price at the start then rack up additional charges whenever the opportunity arises
3. “We will give you an honest price for quality work” agencies – like Aqueduct. You may not be presented with the cheapest price, but it’s an honest estimate based directly on scope and quality delivery

Prices often go up. We hear it from client side time and time again. Why? If you’re with agency type 1 or 2, then you can see why. If you’re with agency type 3, it’s most likely down to scope under estimating. Unstated, unrealised or (worse but most common) overlooked assumptions all contribute to rising prices.

What’s our recommendation to clients? Work with an agency or agencies to refine the scope of a job as much as possible. Take their advice on strategy and be honest about budgets and resources available. Invest in getting to accurate scope before committing to the full job with any agency. Accurate, clearly bounded scope results in an accurate, clearly bounded price. Otherwise it’s an “estimate” that may be closer to what you would like than what it will be. Trust honesty and quality, not just the price.

Predictions for 2010

We're looking forward to another year of fantastic achievements in 2010. Here are 10 predictions for the digital world next year:

1. There will be less software running on our computers, more on the web but with offline caching
2. More organisations (including governments, corporates, social networks) will open up their data for others to use in increasingly smart and valuable ways
3. Bing will make gains through default/forced integration but Google will remain the all powerful search engine of choice
4. Chrome OS will launch with partner manufacturers, gaining appeal with students, geeks, mobile workers and light users
5. Microsoft Silverlight fails to gain traction over Adobe Flash and Flex
6. Increasing mainstream market share of phones running Android, boosted by more apps as developers are attracted to the Android’s open app model vs iPhone’s - Apple still wins favour with a new generation of devices including iTablet though
7. Twitter will attract revenue from direct services to businesses and will trial advertising through the platform – consumer and API use will continue to be free
8. Media publishers will continue to seek revenue from consumers by offering more niche and premium content
9. By Christmas, e-book readers will be the must-have, but book publishers and traditional sellers will fail to take advantage of the rapid change in consumer behaviour
   
10. Google Wave will still be no-where big by the end of 2010 but will have its day in 2011

What do you think? Do comment..

Merry Christmas from Aqueduct

Once again Christmas is upon us and this year we've decided to do something different... something we may regret..

We introduce to you Aqueduct's Jukebox Purgatory - your chance to play the music in our office remotely.

Merry Christmas from Aqueduct.