News

The SDS blog

We provide support and guidance, external challenge, sharing good practice, industry knowledge and practical insights as well as being a valuable resource for councils on the next stage of their digital journey.

Training

Introduction to Agile

SDS have been delivering live and interactive training courses to Project Managers across Ashford Borough Council introducing them to agile ways of working.
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Service design

East Sussex Building Control Process Review

SDS have reviewed the East Sussex Building Control Partnership’s business processes, to explore ways to enhance customer experience and improve efficiency.
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Understanding your users Website redesign

The importance of user testing when redesigning your website

Waverley Borough Council approached Smarter Digital Services (SDS) to assist them with conducting user testing on their new website.
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Website redesign

Redesigning your website to get visitors to their goal

When Southern Building Control Partnership (SBCP) decided to build a new website, they took advantage of a variety of services offered by Smarter Digital Services, to create and build a website that would cater for their customers’ needs and allow...
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Website redesign

Development of the Kent Homechoice Homelessness Triage Tool

Kent Homechoice commissioned SDS to develop a new and updated version of the Kent Homechoice Homelessness Triage Tool.
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Accessibility Training

Accessible online documents e-learning course

SDS have developed an e-learning course on how to create accessible Word and PDF documents for online publication.
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Training Understanding your users

Customer Insight Training

SDS recently delivered two live and interactive courses on user research and customer journey mapping for Wealden District Council staff via MS Teams.
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Digital solutions Research

Sending effective text messages

SDS outline ways to tailor your text messages to make them more effective.
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Digital solutions Research

Voice in Local Government-Smart Speaker Uses

Our Voice Discovery Research explores the current uses of smart speakers and the potential benefits of using smart speakers to access council services.
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Digital solutions Research

Text Messaging in Local Government

SDS has compiled a list of useful applications for SMS notifications in local government.
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Service design

Learn how GDS is monitoring accessibility compliance

Website accessibility regulations came into force on 23 September 2018. This means that public sector bodies have a legal obligation to meet accessibility requirements for their websites.
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Training

Bitesize Training Videos Now Available

We have been busy converting our workshops and training sessions into bitesize videos. These videos are freely available to all our partners and can be tailored to meet your specific training needs.
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Digital solutions

Digital Led Recovery from COVID-19

Three local authorities share with us some of their digital responses to COVID-19 followed by a discussion of the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.
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Digital solutions Research

Top 5 Benefits of GOV.UK Pay

We have researched the key market leaders in payment solutions and found that GOV.UK pay meets many of the user needs we have identified.
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Research

Voice in local government – outlining the market

SDS are exploring the viability of voice technology within local government. The first phase of the project focused on discovery research, outlining current market trends, uses and demographics.
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Digital solutions Research Service design

Book and Pay Project – Facilitating Workshops Virtually

SDS have completed a book and pay project on behalf on the London Borough of Bexley. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, SDS used a new online tool to enable the team to facilitate process capture workshops virtually. Using this tool,...
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Digital solutions

Mastering Online Documents Webinar

Here is a quick summary of the recent public webinar we delivered on mastering online documents.
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Service design

Simplifying IVR routing and scripting

Ashford Borough Council commissioned SDS to work on their existing IVR system to ensure that users were getting the best experience from the service provided.
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Digital solutions

SDS supporting partners to meet accessibility regulations

We are working with lots of our partners to help them prepare for the accessibility deadline by carrying high-level audits, assessing current PDFs for accessibility and training staff.
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Digital solutions

Completely free COVID19 support bot

SDS recently caught up with Paul Shepherd, CEO of We Build Bots, to find out how they are supporting Local Authorities and the wider Public Sector with their COVID 19 bot.
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