It’s a strange thing, but in this business (the software/web development business), one of the bizarre side effects is that you get to see the working details of a myriad of different business types. Sometimes this can be less than inspiring, sometimes it’s amazing… and sometimes it’s just, well… unexpected.

Recently, we were lucky enough to be invited to Young People’s Trust For the Environment’s official website launch in London at the Houses of Parliament. After developing the new site for YPTE they wanted to do an official launch of their new website and invited Tim and Sam along to the event. Other guests at the event included YPTE presidents such as Steve Backshall, Jessica Morden MP and Dan Byles MP.

We’ve zoomed our way to the end of 2014 and it’s that time again for us to step away from our keyboards and unwrap some presents. For emergency purposes emails to support@zion.co.uk will be monitored over the Christmas period.

Data has been transmitted over distances via non-electronic means since the beginning of communication, be it smoke signals, beacons, reflected light or flags. It wasn’t until 1791 that the first successful semaphore network was invented by Frenchman Claude Chappe, transmiting the message “si vous réussissez, vous serez bientôt couverts de gloire” (If you succeed, you will soon bask in glory) between Brulon and Parce, a distance of nearly 10 miles.

We have recently developed a new website and property management system for Woodstock Suites. Woodstock Suites wanted not just a website but also a system that customers can go onto, view properties, find available dates, book and pay for their stay.

We have just launched a new website for Young People’s Trust For The Environment (YPTE). YPTE are a charity that aim to encourage young people’s understanding of the environment and the need for sustainability. The YPTE website is a high traffic website used by thousands of people everyday. The site has hundreds of factsheets and learning resources for children, teenagers, teachers and parents, the resources cover everything from animals to environmental issues.

Here at Ziontech we are once again supporting pupils from local schools in completing their work experience with us. During their time with us they will first come up with an idea of a topic for their website. They will then come up with the site content and complete some HTML and CSS tutorials before going on to code their own website.

Today, June 10th 2014, sees the launch of a new domain for UK customers. The ‘.uk’ domain name is now available and will prove an additional benefit for people searching for online businesses or retailers specifically in the UK. Plus it leads to shorter domain names as a whole!

We are very pleased to announce that, as Google Partners Ziontech now have three certified individuals! After passing the Fundamentals Exam back in February, last week Steph went on to pass the Search Advanced Exam, with a score of 83%. She is now the third certified member of the Ziontech team, along with Rachel and Tim. To become a qualified individual you need to pass two of the Google Adwords exams, the fundamentals exam and one of two advanced exams. Steph, Rachel and Tim have all taken and passed the Fundamentals and Search Advanced Exam with Tim also having passed the Display Advertising Exam.

Here at Ziontech, we have recently been reviewing the traffic and performance of our client’s websites. The most interesting thing we noticed in doing this review was the massive increase we saw in mobile traffic to these websites. Over the past few years the percentage of people using mobile devices as opposed to desktop computers to browse the web has risen by a significant amount and is continuing to rise. This was also reflected in our review, every single website saw an increase in the amount people viewing it on a mobile device some with mobile traffic taking up a large percentage of the website’s overall traffic, with an enormous increase of more than 100% over the past year!