Strategic marketing agency Purpose Media is helping the East Midlands’ newly elected mayor and the team she leads communicate with the two million people living in their region.
The South Normanton-based business was chosen by East Midlands Combined County Authority to design and build a website which will demonstrate how it is delivering the region’s strategic priorities after a historic devolution deal signed with central government.
The body came into being in the spring of this year, taking over responsibility from Westminster in areas such as transport, skills, regeneration and economic development across Derby, Derbyshire, Nottingham and Nottinghamshire.
It controls a £1.14 billion investment fund and is responsible for £1.5 billion of transport spending, under the leadership of Claire Ward, who was elected as East Midlands Mayor in May.
Devolution is viewed as a way of uniting the region, giving it a stronger voice nationally and internationally and bringing more local control of decision-making on key issues.
Instrumental to the new authority’s operations is a need to communicate with those it has been set up to represent, and with only a matter of weeks from the devolution deal being ratified to the mayor and her team beginning work, it turned to Purpose Media to design and build a website to explain its role, detail its priorities and encourage interaction.
Tim Lenton, Purpose Media’s digital innovation and strategy director, said the agency was delighted to be entrusted with delivering such an important project within the region where it is based.
“We are proud to be part of the East Midlands business community and to represent many clients who are also based locally, so it is a thrill to be selected to support the new combined county authority in its work attracting investment, encouraging prosperity and creating opportunity within the area,” he said.
“We were able to draw on our 15-year experience of building websites for hundreds of clients and working with government bodies such as the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Forestry Commission.”
The new site was constructed on a WordPress content management system, allowing the authority’s staff to easily add content, but with a bespoke ‘front end’ delivering enhanced user experience.
It is customisable, allowing for minutes of meetings and key documents to be displayed and indexed, and is optimised for performance and search.
“Timeframes were tight, but we used our technical expertise to deliver a flexible platform which blends the best tools available with our own creativity and which can be developed in line with the authority’s future needs,” added Tim.
“Once again it shows that clients can present us with pretty much any challenge and we are able to rise to meet it.”
Richard Dawson, the authority’s Interim Strategic Communications Manager, said: “We are really pleased with the look and feel of the new website, which was delivered on time and to our exact specifications. It has been a pleasure dealing with the Purpose Media team.”
