Marketing Campaign Hoped to Deliver Generation of 70,000 New Jobs

The Milton Keynes Partnership (MKP) has take a significant step forward in the development of the area in launching launched Milton Keynes most enterprising marketing campaign to date.

Invest Milton Keynes, which is a part of MKP, will be implementing the £1.6 million campaign. This campaign will run in conjunction with other strategies such as Visit Milton Keynes and Live Milton Keynes to raise the profile of the city as a potential site for new investment to national and international investors and developers, whilst also promoting awareness of its unique lifestyle benefits.

The campaign will ““ it is hoped – generate a projected 70,000 jobs over the next 30 years to support the Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott’s specifications regarding urban development, which will see Milton Keynes undertake the largest urban expansion the UK has seen for 50 years. And the man directing the campaign, Grant Seeley, head of the Invest Milton Keynes division of MKP, said: “The key objective is to build pride of place, boosting awareness and understanding of the investment opportunities Milton Keynes has to offer.”

Targeting Growth

Grant Seeley continued, drawing attention to the investment already enjoyed by Milton Keynes saying: “The campaign will primarily target SME high growth, high value and knowledge based companies located in London and the South East by promoting the benefits of investing, working and living in the new city. A committed £1 billion of investment shows that investors and developers are already taking advantage of the opportunities available including excellent transport infrastructure, a skilled workforce and relatively low cost commercial space, however we will be working hard to sustain confidence and increase awareness to a wider audience.”

The campaign is aiming to highlight Milton Keynes’s qualities as a young and dynamic centre, and this youthful investment approach is highlighted by the recent achievement of the skillcentre:mk in winning a South East Training Award at the National Training Awards regional ceremony. Their achievements in this year have been recognised, with the awards presented by TV presenter Fred Dinenage, and sponsored by the Learning and Skills Council (LSC), Investors in People (IIP) UK and Henley Management College.

Nationally Recognised Skills Achievements

thecentre:mk, in partnership with Milton Keynes College, brought about a considerable success in training when it launched an initiative for the staff of its retailers. It established a dedicated training centre and recruited more than 1,000 shop workers and local people to courses leading to formal qualifications. And thus the skillcentre:mk was launched with funding from the LSC in 2003. The centre has since achieved the delivery of a range of accredited courses including computer literacy at levels one and two, basic and intermediate food hygiene, health and safety, selling, customer service and handling conflict.

The centre’s HR Manager, Fiona Essam, said: “We have far exceeded our original targets for enrolments and continue to develop our training offer to match the needs of our retailers. The project is an excellent example of what can be achieved through a partnership approach and through this partnership we plan to increase our offer by linking retail apprenticeship and management training programmes to the skillcentre:mk.” This seems to tie in with MKP’s Grant Seeley, who spoke of “The theme for the campaign focuses on qualities MK emulates a premier location, quality, modern, growing, a can do approach, youthful and dynamic.”

Jethro Marsh