Digital Next in Winning Form
With half of the year having rapidly passed by, we’ve been busy winning awards, achieving record monthly growth and expanding our team, so it’s probably about time we started talking about it! After a successful start to the year, we’ve been building for a brighter future for both our clients and our team, so here’s a recap of the first 6 months of 2018 for Digital Next.
New team members
At Digital Next, we’re always on the lookout for unique talent that can add further value to our diverse team of multi-faceted internet marketers. With that in mind, we’d like to extend a very warm welcome to all our new recruits and hope they have an enjoyable time with us!
So without further ado, here’s a snapshot of our latest team acquisitions:
Gerson Monteiro
Back in January, Gerson Monteiro joined our PPC team that’s headed up by ex-Google Product Specialist, Sherline Kumanan, who was seemingly delighted to make the addition to his squad of paid search experts. After impressing early on by shaking up a number of campaigns that needed refining, Gerson’s skillset is complementary to the rest of his team so we’re really excited about what more is to come of the strategical maestro.
Beatrix Matyas
As our most recent addition, Beatrix Matyas came on board in June and joined our Content Marketing team under our newly-appointed Head of Content Marketing, Jess Jones. After being given a refresh, Beatrix enters the fray as a budding wordsmith who will be responsible for curating innovative content marketing campaigns for her clients. We’re delighted that she’s joined the company and are sure that she’ll prove to be an invaluable member of the team.
Chris Au
Chris Au joined our Web team in May and has made a whirlwind start to his career at Digital Next, having already won new client work from his conceptual designs and creative direction. With years of experience in design and development, we believe that there is a whole lot more to come from Chris where his versatile skillset and holistic approach to his work has enabled us to bolster our ranks in the Web team.
Northern Tech 100
In a joint venture between TechNation and GP Bullhound, the Northern Tech 100 is a compilation of the hottest tech companies in the North that are proliferating as part of the Northern Powerhouse initiative. This publication showcases the fastest-growing tech businesses in the region and was born from GP Bullhound’s Northern Tech Awards.
Digital Next proudly featured within the top 100 tech companies in the region for the second year running, where this year we moved up to 65th which is an increase of 18 places from the previous year. We’re absolutely delighted to feature in this list and we believe the increase in positions is owed to the continual hard work from our dedicated team!
FSB Awards
As previously discussed in one of our past blog posts, we were honoured to receive ‘Business of the Year’ for 10-50 staff at the FSB Awards, as this was the most prestigious award that we were nominated for.
Soon after this, we followed on from our previous recent success by also taking the regional ‘Digital Business of the Year’ award. After winning this prize at the regional awards ceremony for the North West, we were invited to attend the national finals in London where we were nominated for the ‘Digital Business of the Year’ award for the whole of the UK.
Overview of May
As we move into the final month of Q2 2018, the previous month of May was a superb month for all-round performance and growth. Following some internal shuffling and restructuring, we believe that May was only the start of a string of positive moves (made earlier in the year) coming to fruition. With a number of new client wins, the great performance throughout May has ideally set us up for June, in what we expect to be another great month for the business.
Digital Next Australia
In the latest news from our Australian branch based in Melbourne, after having won work for several new clients, our team have watched the business undergo a record month of generating revenue.
In addition to this, the team also played host to online search thought-leader, SEMrush, as they sought to assist us in getting most out of their incredibly insightful tool for our clients, since we work with some of the fastest growing business in Australia and support the marketing functions of some of the Top ASX 100 listed too. In other news, Senior strategist, Laurence Deer, came home for a much-needed break after a solid year of helping the business grow by attracting reputable names that are looking to improve their online performance.
Capstone Financial Golf Day
In May, our very own CEO, Justin Blackhurst, took part in the Capstone Financial Golf Day at Bramhall Golf Club to help raise money for St. James’ Place Charitable Foundation. The event was a roaring success and raised £790 for the charity, which was then matched by St. James’ Place to make a grand total of £1,580 raised that will be donated to the selected charity. Justin thoroughly enjoyed being a part of the day and we’re pleased to have contributed in raising awareness and money for such a great cause.
Other News
CEO, Justin Blackhurst, has also been selected to sit on a panel for an event where he will discuss how sport has been part of the DNA at Digital Next and how the health and wellbeing of his workforce has always been at the forefront of his mind. Following from the success of the cryptocurrency event where we flew in social media crypto influencer, Bitcoin Ben, we believe this event will be even better and want to give a special thanks to Chris Maguire from BusinessCloud for inviting Justin to be a part of the day.
Justin also featured on BBC2 on the Victoria Derbyshire show, where he discussed how employing young people whose skills we can develop has been of great benefit to the business across the years. This was part of a broader discussion on the positive benefits that young people can bring to business and the economy as they seek to start their professional careers.
Owing to our team’s hard work this year, we’ve arranged for a team day out to the TeamSport Go Karting centre in Manchester, which we’re sure will be a thrilling experience for all involved and serves as a well-deserved reward for month-on-month success this year!