Nick Annies checks in

2
Jan 23, 2015 / by
Nick Annies checks in

Nick has been with us now since October 2014, so we thought it was time to give him a formal introduction.

selfie-oil-1-colourIn his professional career Nick has worked in the education, leisure, commercial print and exhibition industries creating everything from business cards to websites, amongst many other things. In more recent years Nick’s roles have seen him become more web and internet centric and in particular he has become experienced in social media campaign management and strategy. Nick’s primary focus at Cambridge Web Marketing Co will be to help grow the company in 2015 with new clients, while also nurturing the relationships with existing clients. He will also bring his knowledge and experience of social media into the mix. So, here’s a little bit more about what makes Nick tick.

It’s strange how things work out. Nick is a former client of Cambridge Web Marketing, going back to his work as a web manager for the School Planner Company (SPC). Indeed, he has known Rob since 2006 and the two have kept in touch as a constant, across a varying career path.

His creative origins lie within graphic design for commercial print until, catching the pre-millennial wave of technology that swept through the industry; he went fully digital. The printed page was increasingly left behind as the internet became a thing and the potential of the web as a creative platform dawned upon him.

”My imagination was fired by the possibilities” he tells me, referring to the the cusp of the late 1990s’ tech transformation, when computers moved wholesale into the printing industry and the working landscape was redrawn. Whilst die-hard typesetters wrung their hands at the change in the air, Nick was drawn into creating web sites and exploring online print services as an emerging business model. The ‘Yearbook Creator Software’ he developed for SPC Yearbooks was the solidification of his early print-meets-tech ventures, and it proved successful; gaining 80% of the companies’ yearbook workflow in the first year of release.

After departing SPC, Nick moved into the freelance arena, running a gamut of contracts across exhibition display, commercial print, education and design agency commissions – though the fledgling link to Rob and ultimately The Cambridge Web Marketing Co remained.

Outside of the ‘day-job’, Nick has also DJ’d at semi-pro level in and around the Cambridge and Peterborough areas, whilst creating and releasing electronic music of his own. It’s good, beneficial even to have your own creative outlet, undefined by client expectations, though Nick frames this in conversation as something of a back-burner to his principal work. As needs must.

His work started with The Cambridge Web Marketing Co (CWM) at the natural conclusion of a design contract with a leisure company. Coincidentally, certain aspects of CWM required attention at the time and so Nick was able to step in officially, with several ongoing targets in mind.

Internally, a general, procedural tidy-up was in order, with improvements, product additions and some re-writing of the company Service Guide on the cards. Secondly, Nick is also becoming involved in the management of clients’ social media campaigns, with updates and posts relating to both CWM and client sites.

In some respects, Nick’s motivation is towards “the fundamentals of what we already have, rather than embracing the next big thing” he says, expressing no interest in gimmickry for the sake of it, or even technology for technology’s sake. “Give me a pencil and some paper and I’ll draw the damn thing!” he exclaims, over still extant issues with machine and tech-oriented weak-links in the design chain. It may be new but does it work?

His favoured, ‘organic’ approach transfers to client-relations as well it appears. Our conversation veers towards the complexities of human behaviour. Again, the fundamentals: “It’s all about reasoning, intent and behaviour, what we do and why we do it – human psychology I guess”.

Client psychology in fact, and filling in those gaps of good working relations, that the machines ignore. Just ‘checking in’ works better with a real human voice, surely?

So how’s it all going Nick? I ask. “We’re improving our Twitterfollowers, and the site is getting record amounts of traffic. We’re getting positive feedback from our clients too.” he reveals. “It’s already paying off in terms of promotional presence”. OK, fingers crossed then. Now that’s a real human response.

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