Aqueduct latest projects
It’s all about the work. Take a look at some of our latest projects
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Manchester City FC
Website
The brief:
The club asked us to reflect a revolution that was beginning to take place on the pitch, in their online presence. We felt that a stronger bond between the club and its fan base could only be created if we could genuinely ‘do something’ for its passionate fans. Getting it ready for the transfer window gave us a passionate deadline to work to as well.
The insight:
In order to ‘do something’ for the fans we’d need to create unique and memorable assets that genuinely enriched their experience. And we’d need to be brutal about anything that didn’t.
The delivery:
The club had the courage to strip out advertising real estate in favour of genuinely fan-orientated features. ‘Seat view’ and ‘match day centre’ have become much talked about aspects of the club’s digital presence. The site's entire content was built on Sitecore and integrated with ticketing, online store, ECRM and bulletproof video streaming. And all within a 3 months period that delivered on the day that we agreed at the outset.
The result:
As well as winning numerous awards and giving the fans something to be proud of, our work has become the benchmark by which all club sites now seem to be judged. Which is nice. On it’s first day it recorded 90,000 visitors, and on the recent FA Cup winning day traffic levels were many times higher. This firm grounding has allowed us to build a strategy that has gone on to see the integration of iPhone, Ecademy and foreign language sites.
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Manchester City FC
iPhone app
The brief:
If the website deepened the relationship between club and fans, the app was about taking it closer. Our approach was less the ‘website on a phone’, and more Eastlands in your pocket.
The insight:
Nothing should be created that doesn’t make your audiences life significantly better. And for a City fan, nothing is more important than getting the news and video highlights – wherever and whenever you want them. Everything else revolved around that.
The solution:
If our solution was to be fan-centered, then it made sense to involve the fans at the earliest stages. From design to development - our entire creative process was thrown open to fans on a Tumblr blog site. Early sketches, IA thoughts and preliminary designs were posted up for comment, and fans were able to view interviews with key club personnel and gain an insight into the club’s thinking. Courtesy of Brightcove’s IOS media player, we can stream match highlights and other video content. And courtesy of the fans we’ve built something that not only looks great, but more importantly, works the way they want it to.
The result:
What has been described as ‘the best looking’ football app was truly a product of club and fan collaboration. Their delight and engagement is reward enough, but being the highest grossing app on iTunes for over a week speaks for itself. The clamour for digital touch points on android and mobile platform proves that if you give your audience something that actually makes their lives better, they’ll reward you with a deeper digital relationship.
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Lloyd’s of London
Website
The brief:
Over the years the Lloyd’s of London website had grown organically and become an inflexible, dated and difficult ship to steer. With many worldwide user all creating discreet content areas of their own, the navigation had become as tricky as Cape Horn. Nautical analogies aside, it was time to create a contemporary new digital presence with full web 2.0 capabilities and an ability to handle the rapidly changing complexion of risk and events. We gauged the site to be 18,000 pages in weight, and able to be used by an audience that are made up of brokers, managing agents, journalists and members of the public. And all of them needed to be able to gain access to the information relevant and discreet to their need. So how to create a digital presence for all of them?
The insight:
The key to being a central online resource for multiple users lay in giving various markets and departments clearly labeled sections and surfacing recently added content, but only when it was timely and most relevant.
The solution:
We built a site that seamlessly splices the heritage to the forward looking and confident values represented in the new brand values. Behind a modular dashboard interface users are allowed to subtly change templates and access content in a way that suits them. The new Lloyd’s site contains over 7,000 pages and offers a seamless user experience for more than 6,000 visitors every working day, across more than 200 countries and territories worldwide.
The result:
Visitors find the new intuitively structured navigation easy to use and customise; perhaps because much of our end user interaction was born of the polls and forums that we conducted at the outset of the project. As the new site reaches a wider pool of independent brokers and agents worldwide we’ve seen an increase in traffic by as much as 25%. The majority of managing agents who operate through Lloyd’s every day, now use the new My Lloyd’s dashboard.
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Network Rail
Campaign
The brief:
Our longest standing mission: Keep safe the 135,000 people who keep the UK’s 10,000 miles of track in tip-top condition.
The insight:
Getting the tone of the conversation right has been crucial to the success of our long running Safety 365 campaign. We recognised that the work force were deeply cynical, highly unionised and perhaps more loyal to the rail profession than to the corporate governing body. All too often safety communications from head office were seen as another bit of corporate wallpaper.
The solution:
We took the voice away from Euston towers and created a campaign that feels that it is ‘by the workers and for the workers’. Safety 365 credits them with intelligence and recognises that they are the experts in their field. In it’s 5th year the campaign is now more of ‘a reputation to live up to’, since its success is largely due to the workers who continue to engage with it.
The result:
Campaigns for issues such as ‘Slips, Trips & Falls’, drugs & alcohol abuse, electrocution and skin cancer have not only reduced incidents, but created a more engaged relationship with front line staff. Winning a DBA Effectiveness award for the work is great. Hearing that we’ve saved lives and got people safely home to their families is even better. Our internally focused work has been so successful that we’ve been asked to produce public facing campaigns. Our ‘Adult rail trespass’ won TV coverage and rare praise in Campaign’s Private View, by none other than Mr Beattie, no less.
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Ping Pong
Campaign
The brief:
Can you make dim sum as fashionable as sushi please? And, in what is a highly competitive and choice saturated market place, put extra ‘bums on seats’?
The insight:
Ping Pong restaurants look great. The staff and service are welcoming and the food and drinks are delicious. But strip all that away, avoid getting caught up in Chinese proverbs, and you discover that dim sum are essentially, in origin, like tapas – incidental to conversation and a social lubricant.
The solution:
By talking less about the menu and more about the experience you can look forward to at the restaurant, we created a campaign that drove footfall and the higher sales.
The delivery:
Using a jewellery photographer to photograph food our campaign featured on underground and escalator panels, supported by heavy placement in London-based daily newspapers and an oyster card based loyalty scheme. It even invented a new verb:
To Ping Pong – (sociable verb) meaning: to talk back and forth, in fluent conversation (e.g., ‘We Ping Ponged till the cows came home’)The result:
People certainly Ping Ponged. Over the course of the campaign restaurants saw an increase of up to 67% in covers.
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FA Mars Just Play
Website
The brief:
Get people who had lapsed out of the game off of the sofa and back behind the ball.
The insight:
Working with our friends at the FA and Mars we knew that getting people over their excuses would require a digital experience that was as simple and exciting as 4:4:2.
The solution:
Like the initiative itself, everything about the Just Play site had to feel simple, effortless, dynamic and fun.
The delivery:
Whether it’s 5 or 11 a side, or a kickabout, visitors are able to find a game near them, book a place and Just Play. The user experience and search facility exist within a stunning design that never makes you feel that you are more than a click away from finding a game, having a question asked, or being able to find what you’ve booked.
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British Red Cross
Website
The brief:
Our brief was to scope, design and build a contemporary, user friendly and accessible site that enable two-way communication between BRC and their donors, volunteers and the vulnerable.
The insight:
Did you know that The Red Cross are about a whole lot more than disasters and war torn landscapes? Or that they provide homecare and pet sitting for people in hospital? Or skin camouflage for people who’ve suffered scarring? Until we built this enormous and very useful site we didn’t either.
The solution:
An intuitive, user centred design and navigation uses Sitecore CMS to make the site as accessible and engaging to the over 50s as it is up to date for younger more social media savvy audiences. Animated components and image promo areas give BRC the ability to highlight and update current appeals, events and latest news for themselves.
The delivery:
Aqueduct scoped, designed and built the site with a wealth of bespoke functionality to meet immediate needs and provide a strong foundation upon which to build their future. Day one of its launch coincided with the Pakistan floods disaster. A steep challenge, but one that the site was more than able to rise to.
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The RFU
Campaign
The brief:
As the RFU’s lead digital partner we’re working with them to change the perceptions of Rugby, get more people playing and build more male and female teams across hitherto unexplored socio demographic backgrounds.
The insight:
Rugby has values and a persona, which transcend the tribalism and violence that has often blighted the other national sport. For young people it might just represent a more positive set of values.
The solution:
To be frank, there will be lots of solutions. And we’re going to be coming up with all sorts of assets, which amplify our insights and tackle the long standing brief. But even as we took over the running of the official RFU digital landscape we spotted an opportunity for the creation of a fun and perception changing idea.
The delivery
Conceived and delivered within a few days, we had a laugh with hundreds of die-hard fans on April Fools’ Day. News of Toby Flood’s fictitious near miss with Heathrow air traffic made its way around the web and onto radio and evening press. Gilbert, official manufacturer of the ball, got in on the gag too – providing the technical specs on ball pressure and sparking a petition against airline authorities who wanted that pressure lowered. And for anyone sporting enough to have the wool pulled firmly over their eyes, a consolation 20% discount on a RFU woolly hat awaited them in the official online shop.
The result:
Within the first few hours of April Fools day hundreds of die-hard fans rose to the bait and the story organically made its way into national press. The humour and goodwill generated a perception of the RFU that only says positive things about them.
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