Member Blog

We hear about cyber attacks on the news every day. Some of us, unfortunately, have actually experienced them. These incidences are becoming a starker reality for organizations and businesses by the day irrespective of size or industry. The media, business leaders, and the government maintain that for every business out there, cyber attacks aren’t a question of ‘if’ anymore, but ‘when.’ The clamor is barely effective when it comes to minimizing devastating effects.

Seeing as email is one of the most popular forms of communication in the corporate world, virtually every business is at risk of a email hacking and phishing attacks, so here are 5 easy steps to help you ramp up your defenses.

Avoid Phishing Scams

Email is still the number 1 delivery vehicle for most malware. Phishing scams work by tricking you into opening an attachment or clicking a link. Once you do that, you either download malware into your computer or you are taken to a website that looks real but isn’t, and your login credentials are stolen. Do not click on links or load attachments on sketchy emails. Phishing scams have been around since the birth of the internet, and they are not going away any time soon. In fact, phishing scams are becoming more advanced.

Don’t Click on Tracking Links or Images

Sometimes, emails from marketers and certain brands have tracking links embedded in them to spy on you. They want to find out how many people opened the email or even clicked on the link. Change the settings on your email client to ensure that attachments don’t load automatically by default. Additionally, use antivirus software to protect against new technology workarounds and loopholes in tracking and email phishing scams. Make sure your antivirus software, as well as your browser, are always up to date. 

Use PGP Encryption

There are plenty of software options you can use to encrypt your emails to ensure that they are only read by the intended recipients. Pretty Good Privacy (PGP), also called GNU Privacy Guard (GPG), is one of them. PGP encryption helps you keep hackers from intercepting, snooping on, or altering your emails before they are delivered to the recipients. When using PGP, no information is left in the open. Both the sender and the recipient need to have this free software installed on their computers for it to work.

Use TLS

Always use Transport Layer Security, or TLS, on your browser. While software solutions such as PGP encrypt the contents of your email, your communication is still vulnerable if the connection itself is not encrypted. TLS encrypts the connection between your device and the browser as well as the email servers involved. To activate TLS, go to your browser settings and select ‘STARTTLS’ or ‘SSL/TLS’ in connection security. Always make sure that you are using an encrypted channel when using external email clients such as Thunderbird, Apple Mail, and Outlook.

Create Strong Passwords

Last but not least, create strong passwords for your email and other online accounts. A lot of people still don’t have strong, unique passwords for all their online accounts. The problem is that most people don’t know what a strong password is or how to create one. Well, ideally, a strong password combines letters (upper case and lower case), numbers, and special characters. It’s simple, the password should be long, random, and unique. When it comes to creating a password, the random part is usually the hardest for most people.

Our brains simply don’t function that way. But with a random password generator, you can create a long, random, and unique password in a matter of seconds. That way, it will be impossible for hackers to force their way into your email account using brute force (brute forcing involves the use of software to create possible password combinations). It doesn’t matter how many characters your password is. If it’s not random, your account can be easily breached. Use a password manager to store your passwords if you are worried that you’ll forget them.

Branding your business is worth the effort. The colours and images that you use regularly will reinforce your company and what you do in your customers’ minds. And if you’re lucky they will begin to associate your brand colours with your business. Think about brands that use specific shades of purple or the Royal Mail and their shade of red. When you’ve spent the time and money on sending out information or communications by post you need your envelopes to stand out and using coloured envelopes is a perfect way.

Make an Impact on the Doorstep

You’ll want your business’s communication to stand out from all of the other mail your potential customer has received. An envelope in an unusual colour with an unusual finish, like a pearl or shiny finish, will be different. If you use the same coloured envelopes, then your customer will know that it’s from you before they’ve looked any closer.

Brand Association with Coloured Envelopes

If you are consistent with your approach and use the same few colours for all of your advertisements and communications you will claim those colours in your customers’ minds. This is especially true if you are focusing on your local area as you can have a big impact with only a little effort by using a well-planned brand strategy. All of your communication with your customers needs to be in the same format with the same colours, the weight of paper and paper and envelope finish.

Think About a Brand Envelope Size

Your official branded envelopes need to be the same size as well as the same set of colours. Consider what you are sending out and ensure that the envelope is the correct size and think about keeping the same size as a standard across your business. An unusual shape of envelope, such as square rather than a rectangle, will add to the impact of your mail along with the colour.

Envelopes to Protect the Contents

Once you’ve put all that time and money into working out the perfect set of brand colours and writing an ideal mailshot you need to protect the contents. If you’re sending out something that is easily damaged, use a bubble wrap lined envelope or one with a cardboard backing to prevent bending. No matter what you’re sending have it all in the same coloured envelopes to unify your brand and keep your business at the forefront of your customers’ minds.

Identity Crisis

In amongst all the noise of the ongoing saga of Brexit, we are starting to see an interesting trend emerge from British brands.

The result of the Brexit referendum on 24 June 2016 may suggest we, as a nation, are suffering something of an identity crisis. This uncertainty has given British brands an opportunity to reaffirm who they are and what they stand for – a rebirth of Brand Britain. This move by British brands is likely no coincidence, but a strategic decision to seize an opportunity, as trust in non-UK goods looks set to take a hit following our separation from the European Union.

Brand Britain extends beyond the visual cues of the Union Jack flag, to deeper, shared values – According to the latest research, for American consumers, there’s one word which sums up their perception of UK goods: quality. It’s the most common positive trait associated with British products, followed by heritage.

In the UK, consumers value British brands along similar lines as the Americans. Three in five Britons associate British products with quality, and 60% of British women see Made in Britain as a stamp of heritage. (Source: 

Hatch Brenner Solicitors has announced a new production in their drama venue sponsorship at Norwich Theatre Royal. 

Caroline’s Kitchen, a comedy by Torben Betts and directed by Alastair Whatley, arrives in Norwich from Wednesday 6 – Saturday 9 March. 

Caroline Mortimer, played by Caroline Langrishe (Lovejoy, Judge John Deed), is the nation’s favourite TV cook. In the glow of the studio lights, she has it all – a sparkling career, a big house, a (golf) loving husband, smart kids and the best kitchen money can buy. But when the camera turns off the truth comes out and when an unexpected guest disrupts a night of celebration there is more to spill than the wine … Welcome to Caroline’s Kitchen…

‘The comedy simmers’ DAILY MAIL (CRITIC’S CHOICE) ★★★★

‘It is an acerbic, often laugh-out-loud take on marriage, privilege and class, and it is well worth a ticket to see the ending alone, because reader, I gasped.’ WESTEND WILMA ★★★★

‘Makes you laugh when you really think you shouldn’t…  it’s hilarious’ JENNI MURRAY, RADIO 4

Hatch Brenner’s drama venue sponsorship of Caroline’s Kitchen follows the sad news that the forthcoming tour of To Kill A Mockingbird has been cancelled by the producers.

Dawn Parkes, Hatch Brenner Managing Partner, commented: “I am very much looking forward to seeing Caroline’s Kitchen this March with a group of colleagues and business contacts. I understand the show arrives in Norwich direct from a hit London run, and ahead of a New York transfer so I imagine the quality of the production will be exceptional.”   

More details can be found at Norwich Theatre Royal. 

Image credit: Sam Taylor

Businesses of all sizes can benefit from using social media, but talking about their own company is not always the most thrilling thing to be talking about or posting. Sure, if you work in the food or fashion industry, there are a lot of interesting photos you can add and find different ways to engage with your customers. But for more financial stories and B2B customers, talking about car insurance or plastic machinery can be very uneventful. With this in mind, Tudor Lodge give some tips to jazz up your social media.

Talk about your staff

Staff love to be appreciated – its common sense. Posting work profiles or interesting stories about staff is likely to get engagement. Not just by existing followers who are keen to learn more about your brand, but also their own friends and family who want to show their support. Funny stories, likes and dislikes or even individual interviews can go down well and always be sure to use a strong image of the person.

Talk about your clients

No need to constantly boost about your success, but talk about how you are helping your clients, making their lives easier or what you are sharing together. This not only says who your clients are which can get competitors or new business engaged, but also shows the quality and potential of your work. Again, you must use a strong and engaging photo because people respond well to other people’s faces on social media.

Do charity work

Social media is a great reason to do charity work if there ever was one, because it gives you an opportunity to do good things and share those positive connotations of charity work. This includes being involved in fun runs, donating to children, developing countries or something related to animals. This is a great thing to do with Facebook stories or Instagram stories, as per this guide here on How businesses use Instagram stories.

Competitions and giveaways

In the b2c world, giveaways and competitions are always good ways to encourage new users and customers. Ideally, try get existing customers to invite new ones and reward them too, through points, referral systems or other discounts.

The benefits of having a hobby go far beyond personal happiness and well-being, and it’s crucial to recognise because it often goes unnoticed as we sharpen up our skill set without even realising it. These skills will not only serve you well in life but also, in business or your work. In my experience, having a multitude of hobbies has allowed me to develop some incredible skills that have helped me to flourish in the business space. In doing so, you too will hone skills that allow you to become a successful and award-winning business leader.

From making analytical predictions to communicating as a unit and learning how to manage your time and money better, as well as understanding how to rate your performance to achieve wider success, here are the business skills you could hone by taking part in certain pastimes.

Communication Skills

Hobbies exist due to a community gravitating around a shared interest, and while not all activities are especially social and instead, solitary, they do still all involve an extensive amount of communication, as evidenced by the amount of time spent either talking, writing, chatting and debating with like-minded individuals. When talking about hobbies, there is no pressure, but instead, fun and entertainment, which makes communication seem quite easy. It is also critical in some activities. Take football. It’s a team game that many boys and girls begin to play from a young age, but how successful can a team be if their communication is almost non-existent? The same is true of business.

These days, it is more and more commonplace for companies to operate on a remote basis, with a workforce spread out internationally. In this case, there are many instant messaging services that allow communication to carry on unimpacted by not having a shared workspace. That said, most operations are still office-based but are as reliant on communication, so pick a game that requires such a skill. Team games work as excellent communication games that also help develop colleague bonding.

Competition and Competitive Spirit

Most hobbies and pursuits require their participants to have a competitive spirit. Chess is one such complex game that will help to teach you a skill set that translates easily to the business world. Imagine setting up your first business and needing to predict and forecast certain outcomes. But it almost goes without saying that chess requires a serious and strong competitive edge. Because of this, it is vital that players nurture an urge to win and never-say-lose mentality as well as a self-belief that allows them to deliver results under pressure. Playing poker, a game of incomplete information, can also be a teaching tool for business.

After all, making calculated moves are often required despite the lack of knowing what comes next. Likewise, you face the same uncertainty in business where you don’t know the extent of your competitors’ plans or even what your customers will do next. Because of this, you must maximise what you can with the information available. You may even learn to read when your rivals bluff, and when it’s time for you to fold and come up with a new plan of action.

Coping with Losing

In life, as in business, coping with defeat is a much-needed ability. After all, mental toughness is vital and imperative for anyone chasing success. However, in all competitions, it is likely you will taste defeat at some point. In games like tennis and golf or even darts, the chances of correcting a bad result come quickly as the next set, hole or leg is only moments away, allowing for instant resolution so long as you keep your head. The same is almost true of poker, as another hand is usually only minutes from starting, and yet, because of the financial threats of the game, many people suffer from what is known in poker circles as ’tilt’ where they lose their cool and make incorrect and rash moves, which almost always leads to defeat.

As such, many view a game of Texas Hold ’em, a variant of poker in which your aim is to bankrupt your opponents and take their money by lying and being deceitful, as similar to the reading of stocks of shares and making correct predictions. Most hobbies do require some amount of financial management, so a game like Omaha Hi-Lo is better for teaching you how to guard your money, assess profits and generally, work with a budget, all of which will be excellent for your business.

Patience is Key

Let’s face it: learning a new skill takes time, and it is all too easy to get frustrated and give up if things don’t go well immediately. But a good sport is all about persistence, and it’s easy to pick one that you could play and improve your patience skills. Regarding sports, a game like cricket played out over a long time sometimes days even is a perfect patience builder. Or give bridge a try. It’s another strategical card game and an extreme, mental sport, even more in-depth than poker. After all, that is what patience is all about, preparing to invest time and resources for future benefit. Benefit that you should soon feel in the boardroom if you apply your new skills to your work.

Norwich solicitors firm Hatch Brenner is supporting local charity Norwich & Central Norfolk Cruse Bereavement Care as they hold an informal networking breakfast on Thursday 14 March.

The Business Breakfast, to be held at the Assembly House on Theatre Street, is a chance for representatives from local businesses to discover more about the work of the charity, how they help, and why bereavement support is so important for each individual the charity supports.

Becky Bushell, Norwich & Central Norfolk Cruse Bereavement Care fundraiser commented: “We are looking forward to holding our next Business Breakfast at the Assembly House in association with our long-term community partner Hatch Brenner Solicitors. It will be great to see familiar faces from the business community, as well as to introduce our work to new professionals. Support from the local community is vital in allowing us to operate and provide specialist support via our highly trained volunteers.”

Dawn Parkes, Hatch Brenner Managing Partner, added: “Through our partnership with Norwich & Central Norfolk Cruse Bereavement Care, we have seen first-hand how committed the team are in caring about and understanding the needs associated with bereavement. Cruse is often the only place people have to turn to when someone has died. The Business Breakfast is a good opportunity for the charity to showcase their work. It will be lovely to network with contacts and friends from the local community and to enjoy some delicious breakfast thanks to our neighbours at the Assembly House.”

For further information or to book your place at the Business Breakfast, please contact Becky Bushell at [email protected] or call 07392 080 994.

The Business Breakfast is on Thursday 14 March, 8am – 930am, with a suggested £10 per person donation to the charity.

Norwich & Central Norfolk Cruse Bereavement Care, 68 St Augustine’s Street, Norwich. NR3 3AD.

We were delighted to be approached by Eskenzi PR, a specialist PR agency that focuses on tech and cybersecurity across the UK and the globe. The role of tech PR is crucial to push out industry updates including changes in regulation, legal implications and other news stories such as hacking. Eskenzi PR have emerged as one of the leaders in this space and their work for the community and enterprise has been acknowledged with The Queen’s Award.

How We Approached Their Site

Carrying out an SEO campaign, we always start by confirming all the keywords that the client wishes to target. In this case, it included things like tech pr company, cybersecurity PR and PR agency London. Next, we have to incorporate all these keywords into the site, either through dedicated landing pages or putting the keywords onto prominent pages such as the homepage or services page. These words are incorporated in the content or better, the meta-title and main h1 heading, so this is weighted far more by Google.

Clean Up of The Site

We always insist on carrying out a clean up of the site in month 1. Using tools such as Screaming Frog and SEMrush, we are able to identify a number of things that need to be fixed, looking at the 189 pages on the website. This includes optimising every meta-title, meta-description, h1, images with alt-text, internal links, sitemap, robots txt and more. This achieves to make the site easily to index by Google and a much cleaner navigation for the user.

Link Building

Eskenzi PR have already generated natural links through their awards and working in the PR space. Our role was to take this up a level by getting links specifically from tech and marketing websites, including TechRound, Talk Business and more. The idea is make the site’s backlink profile to be very relevant to tech and PR and also have strong links and not just those on directories and blogs.

We have seen strong progress in the first month and are excited about taking the firm to the next level. 

As it has been well publicised in the press, times are tough. Well-established operators are taking the decision to close shops, leaving landlords in potentially tricky positions. In Norwich, high profile operators such as Toys R Us and Jamie’s Italian have taken decisions to close their doors.  With some tenants looking to leave, landlords need to know their rights.

If a tenant wants to vacate their property during their lease term, then this is normally done in one of three ways.  

• Insolvency. This is a big topic and one that I am able to advise on, but so much will depend on the specific details of any case. Unfortunately, the reality is that if a tenant has entered insolvency proceedings there is little a landlord can do.
• Break Clauses. Break Clauses are common in modern commercial leases and enable a tenant to terminate their lease early.  Notice requirements in Break Clauses are important and missing a deadline by even a day can render a Break notice unenforceable. Most Break Clauses are conditional; if these conditions are fulfilled then the tenant may vacate. Note that any ‘pre-break liabilities’ remain and a landlord will still have the right to pursue the tenant for these. The most common conditions are:
  • The tenant having complied with the terms of the lease (such as repairing covenants) 
  • Not less than 6 months’ notice must be given
  • Tenant must be up to date with their rent. 
• Assignment. Most leases contain the right for a tenant to assign (transfer) their lease to a new tenant, but in most cases the landlord’s consent is needed.  A landlord must act reasonably in considering a consent application, which involves carrying out due diligence on the proposed new tenant to make sure that they are of a financial position to comply with the terms of the lease. Leases often contain rights for a landlord to request rent deposits or further guarantees as a condition of the landlord’s consent to assign, albeit there are obligations on the landlords to behave reasonably in considering an application – and reasons must be given if consent is to be withheld.  

As re-letting property has become harder in recent months, it is important that a landlord knows their rights and takes appropriate action.  

Social Media can be an emotive subject for business owners. Getting new customers to your business from social media isn’t easy – it isn’t just a case of setting up your Facebook account and the cash pours in… so that isn’t the dream that we are going to sell! Some business owners we speak to are utterly frustrated by social, however, it really isn’t optional anymore. Your business needs social media. Whatever kind of business you are in, your potential customers are using social media. Social media has become a platform of recommendations and word of mouth. Social media content appears high in search results and it has become an expectation that a business will talk to its customers in some way on social media. My best advice to the SME with social media is work smart, pick the most relevant platform and apply all of your social effort there. Setting up an account on Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat is pointless if you don’t use half of them or all of the content you post is exactly the same. If you leave an account inactive and a potential customer finds it, you might look like you aren’t in business any more. No Instagram account is better than one that hasn’t had anything added for 10 months. Pick one, stick to it, fill it with things your customers will find interesting and enjoy. What is the right social media for you? I suppose this really starts with the question “What do your customers want?” Think about your customers’ interests, think about what they want to see, what do they watch, read and like? If you build a ‘profile’ of your typical customer then you can try to match it to the typical user for a social media platform. It will also help you to understand the sort of content to post. By way of an example a florist in a trendy part of town might reach more relevant people with beautiful photos and video on Instagram than they would with blog style posting on Facebook. If you want advice and help with social media, why not contact us today? Email [email protected] or call 03331 365390.

Following the success of our campaign with their sister company, Trovex, we were approached by Focus Washrooms to help them rank better organically online for a range of keywords relating to commercial washrooms and bathrooms in the UK. Whether it is a shopping centre, school, hospital, there is an opportunity for providing a number of hygienic basins, toilets and cubicles for the general public to use.

The result of ranking higher on Google for Focus Washrooms can achieve greater brand awareness, new client acquisition and significant growth for the company, especially for keywords such as commercial washrooms. 

How We Approached The Campaign

Keyword Research

We started by sitting down with the client with the head offices in both Hatfield and Norfolk. We selected around 30 key terms to target on Google, so we can optimise accordingly for when people type these words or phrases in. Some of the words were very technical, including cladding, encapsulated doors and panelling and not something that our team had exposure to previously. 

We took this list of keywords and then integrated them naturally into the website, with some on existing pages and creating specific new landing pages for others. Ideally, to rank a keyword on Google, it needs to be present somewhere, and if mentioned in the meta-title and URL, this is best practice.

Site Clean-Up

In the first month, we carried out a thorough site clean up of all pages on the website. This included meta-titles, meta descriptions, h1 headings, image alt text, internal linking, sitemap optimisation and removing crawl errors and broken links. We accessed this information using tools like Screaming Frog and SEMrush which are both paid for – and they give you analysis of every page on the website and suggestions accordingly.

Link-Building

Still key to the Google search algorithm is having good quality links pointing to your website. This strengthens your domain and shows that you are being recommended by other sources around the web. We have reached out to different news sites and websites relating to health and business to show that Focus Washrooms is relevant in the industry. Over time, we need to ramp this up with more interviews, press releases and useful guides on their site that will naturally acquire good links.

Whilst it is still early days, we are very excited about this campaign and look forward to seeing positive results!

A resolution is a decision to do something differently to bring about positive change. Usually they tend to take more of a personal nature, whether that’s to exercise more or eat healthier (you can view the swan’s own resolutions here), but it can also be important to think about it from a business perspective.

As we plan for the year ahead it’s a good time to reflect on progress, plan how we want to grow our businesses and set goals. Many of us focus on improving efficiency, reducing costs, increasing employee engagement or want to expand our knowledge and skillset (one on the list for Indigo Swan).

In order to help us achieve our targets it’s essential to review our development regularly. As we enter the second month of 2019 many of us will be wanting to make sure we are on track to reach our ‘business resolutions’ and find ways to ensure that by the end of the year we accomplish our objectives.

If improving efficiency or reducing costs feature on your plan, then an energy health check has the potential to benefit your business. Reviewing your utility usage has never been more convenient and there are many simple energy saving solutions which can help you to reduce your energy usage. Let us help you to identify those areas which would be of greatest value to your business.

Philippa Bindley, Head of Customer Experience at Norfolk Chamber:

“We hadn’t looked at our energy spends for some time and we’d heard great things about Indigo Swan, so we asked them to run an energy health check to help us get a better understanding of how rates are calculated. The whole process was very easy and straight forward. We were given a friendly, dedicated account manager who was able to answer our questions quickly and efficiently. Not only did the health check save us money but we were also given some useful insights into how the energy market works. We only rent part of our building so it’s excellent to be able to take control of our spending.”

Do you know if your energy contracts and spends are in good order? Are your contracts coming to an end and you want to make sure you are on the most competitive rates? Or are you fixed into your energy contract until later this year, but still want to make sure you are with the best supplier for your needs when they end?

It won’t cost you a penny and we only need a few details from you to get started. We can then benchmark your consumption against the typical and best in class consumption based on national data giving you an instant idea of potential energy and cost savings.

Our energy health check includes:

• An audit of your current contract terms
• A review your energy consumption
• A review your current energy spends
• Detailed checks to make sure all your relevant agreements are correct and contracted
• A discussion around your company’s long-term energy strategy

We offer lots of tools and knowhow at Indigo Swan to help people make better business decisions about their energy. Get in touch on 01603625522 or email [email protected] to find out more about how we could help benefit your business.

For more information on our free energy health check service here.

Exclusive offer for Chamber members

Indigo Swan have been a member of the Norfolk Chamber for years and appreciate the opportunities for networking and collaboration that the membership brings.

As a Chamber member, you can receive £500 of free products to help with your energy management. You can choose from a range of products to suit your business size, and your energy goals

You can find out more about Chamber Energy scheme here.

We can advise you on how to spend the £500, but the choice is yours! Give us a call on 01603625522 or email [email protected] if you want to discuss further.