Helping the Theatre Royal Put on a Great Show

iT4C provide IT support whatever the geographical location!

The Theatre Royal Stratford East originally opened in 1884 and has undergone a number of changes and refurbishments since then. It is now able to seat up to 460 people in the beautiful Victorian era auditorium. Thanks to lottery funding the theatre has been brought into the 21st century with a fully equipped kitchen, lifts to all areas, a larger open-plan box office and foyer, improved stage systems and backstage facilities.

However there was one aspect that had not been updated - the theatre's website. Silvia Pilotto, senior marketing officer for the Theatre Royal Stratford East takes up the story. "As a theatre we don't have a lot of budget for things such as website maintenance, so I was looking for a way that we could get the help we needed without having to pay consultancy fees that the theatre could ill afford."

Silvia found exactly what she was looking for in the form of iT4C. "I found the organisation while searching on the internet," explains Silvia, "As soon as I saw the site I realised it was offering exactly what we needed." Silvia contacted iT4C who crafted an advert detailing her specific requirements and posted it on the website.

"They were able to find a volunteer quickly, who then contacted me personally," explains Silvia. Proving that geographical constraints are not a problem for iT4C, volunteer Jason King, was located in Australia and carried out an online health check of the Theatre Royal's website.

"Jason carried out a health check for us in order to give us some advice on where we could improve the website to make it more accessible. He produced a report detailing where I could improve certain areas, which has enabled me to improve the website as a whole," explains Silvia.

Jason's main recommendation was to reduce the number of HTML coding errors on the website, something the theatre's web designers are currently working through. He also recommended improving the title pages, in order to get a better profile on Google, giving them some simple examples of changes they could make. His final recommendation was to get a proper accessibility study from a company such as AbilityNet.

"This sort of practical advice was invaluable to us, and although it has not been possible to carry out an accessibility check yet, it is definitely something I plan to undertake in the future," explains Silvia. Jason also recommended that the theatre take advantage of Google Analytics, "Although we already had a statistical tool, we have found this much more reliable," explains Silvia.

Despite being on the other side of the world, Silvia says that she had a good relationship with Jason. "We didn't have a lot of exchanges as our correspondence was all email based. However, we found Jason very responsive and he was able to do everything that we asked of him. For example, at one point I needed a report emailed to me over the weekend and he was even able to do that!"

Volunteer Jason added "Virtual volunteering worked well for me. It was a short, simple and well-defined volunteering project and suited me better to give advice rather than offer practical assistance and it made a nice change to do a website health check for a theatre".

Silvia says that as the work only took place less than two months ago the company is yet to feel the full effects, but is expecting to obtain more reliable data from the Google Analytics statistics and a far more accessible site. "It may have all been basic stuff," says Silvia, "But it was vital that these aspects are addressed, so it was great advice."

Silvia also says that she wouldn't hesitate to recommend iT4C to other organisations in a similar position to the Theatre Royal Stratford East, "I would absolutely recommend that other organisations contact iT4C, I was very impressed with the work they carried out for us, which has allowed us to focus on what we do best - putting on a great show!"

You can catch up on the latest events at the theatre on their website.

12th March 2008