The membership organisation, which next year celebrates its tenth anniversary, has always been at the cutting edge in terms of introducing new technology, including developing a system in 2011 that enabled members to create their own microsite by using their company name as a subdomain within the Made in the Midlands portal.
The new platform incorporates all that was great about the old website but with some impressive upgrades.
Jason Pitt, CEO, Made In, said: "In my opinion Made in the Midlands and Yorkshire is currently the most important social media site for keeping up to date with whats going on in the regional manufacturing community.
From branding to creating content that the people who matter will read, to ultimately creating your own company profile online, there is no one else in the membership sector that comes close to what we are doing."
What has changed for users?
Made In is currently the fastest growing membership network for regional industrialists. Therefore its no surprise that to keep things running smoothly, we needed to make a few adjustments to improve the user experience.
The redesign of the website comes alongside a major upgrade of our app. The desktop tweaks are focused on making the site more intuitive and leave a lasting impression on the user. The platform receives more than 50k unique visitors per month.
The new interface (UI) boasts an upgraded colour scheme, with clean dashboard and cleaner modules. The menu navigation in the left hand side of the page separates out the key elements with a visually impressive animated microsite graphic that displays upon first logging onto the new system.
All the usual features are on the main page with extra including:
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The option to schedule publication of news content instead of only publishing live and adding tags to your news article for better search functionality.
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The addition of a network feature allows you to follow member news stories more closely and of course, other members can also follow you. News from members you follow is added to your dashboard as priority reading and your news digest will now prioritise those members above the wider network.
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Members of both Made in the Midlands and Made in Yorkshire can now publish news content from one platform instead of logging in twice; you can also follow members in other regions of the UK.
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The microsite has been completely rewritten. For many members this is one of the main benefits and rather than being a mini-page with a unique subdomain within the main Made in the Midlands portal, it is now a comprehensive mini-website. It includes many modules that can be switched on or off from the new microsite dashboard. Additionally, there are now 11 different editable sections within member microsites that allow the user to completely customise their content.
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The messaging system has also had a rewrite and we have changed the way this works to enable users to message individual users and multiple members. The messaging system will also send a copy of part of the message to the users designated email address.
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The resources section has not changed too much, with the exception that the Made In team will now be adding a comprehensive list of brand logos for members to use.
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Gold members of Made in the Midlands and Yorkshire now receive free adverts on fellow member microsites. The adverts section has also received a major overhaul with an animated graph that displays the adverts performance and a list of advert placements.
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The ability to add, edit and delete users has now been added to the member dashboard. Previously this feature was only accessible to the Made In team. This extra control and ability to give certain users different permissions means that members have more control over the admin functions of their profile and who can use it.