I am delighted to say that two great people have joined the Unco team.

Nicola Burns joins us as Project Director - she comes to us from Union Digital and is a thoroughly solid person to trust with our project management.

Ken Jackson is our new Senior Developer, leading our development team - he comes from Mimtech and has vast experience of enterprise content management systems and bespoke development in all things C#.

We are carrying out user research work for a university just now and the following quote was highlighted to me - I think it really sums up how brand aware and savvy audiences are - especially when they are the ‘choosers’.

” One of the off-putters would be the brand. I’ve looked at loads of universities over the past couple of weeks and I want the uni experience to be fun, exciting and a friendly place to be - the brand and website does that really well. However, thats where it ends and the biggest deciding factor for me is that its a professional, sophisticated, challenging, hard-working, well oiled establishment… The brand and website doesnt do that for me in the slightest.”

Take note.

With High Street growth slowing as a result of the current economic client, retailers are starting to take another look at other channels for growth. With 20% Year-on-year growth last month and customers offline purchases are being more influenced by the web, then outlook for retailers online looks more positive than elsewhere in the economy.

Mark Jennings, Unco’s Managing Director explains,” Ofcom figures reveal that while 58% of UK homes have broadband, Scotland is slightly lower at 53% overall, with higher penetrations in the more affluent cities such as Edinburgh and Aberdeen. Given this statistic, I am surprised that the Scottish eCommerce market is starting to fall behind, when it presents a significant opportunity for retailers to make their figures for 2009.”

“In Scotland there are some great online retailers – but for every good example there’s several doing it badly or not at all. There’s either a ‘build it and they will come’ complacency or inactivity based on the fear that a niche product will not have a market and will not therefore sell well online.

As the result of a deal announced today, digital agency Unco and Venda, the European market leader for eCommerce solutions are looking to change the eCommerce landscape in Scotland. Venda, a unique ‘Software as a Service’ model is used by many of the world’s leading retailers and brands, from Monsoon and De Beers, to Superdrug and the BBC.

The relationship began when Unco invited Venda to pair up on an as-yet undisclosed pitch in the summer, and the potential for a productive partnership became evident very quickly.

Mark Jennings, Unco’s Managing Director, explained that Venda was the obvious choice. ‘We wanted to offer the client an eCommerce platform which was worry-free and addresses all their customers’ concerns like security, ease of use and post-purchase service options. Often clients tell us that eCommerce can seem complicated and expensive, but with a regular fixed-price fee for the complete platform, on-going updates and support, the Venda reality really blows those perceptions out of the water.’

‘Venda also shares many of our business and ethical values,’ Jennings continued.

‘As well as offering extremely cost-effective and secure retailing solutions, Venda also recognises that user journeys through eCommerce sites must be intuitive and enjoyable. We have a great deal of experience in this area and together we shall build excellent sites offering our clients tangible return on investment. We are on a mission to ensure that clients demand no less than the best and refuse to settle for vagueness in this area.’

Steve Emecz, Channel Development Manager for EMEA at Venda, said he too had enjoyed the shared pitch experience and added, ‘We were extremely impressed by Unco’s ambitious, user-centred and entrepreneurial outlook, and they were the natural choice for our agency partnership in Scotland. I am looking forward to the work we will be doing together going forward.’

Come on, we can’t spend all day thinking up new ideas, sometimes we need a little pumpkin creativity ….