The past year has made us all realise how important technology is and one business that has turned this challenge into an opportunity is Harrison and Hetherington, which has upgraded its digital platform.

A new website is now live, which has significantly enhanced and sped up the platform’s offering. For farmers, the urgent need for online auctions caused many to move onto mobile digital platforms as the way to trade their livestock – a pivot which remains vital to keeping the essential agri-industry markets going.

H and H Reeds was approached by Harrison and Hetherington to design and develop a fresh new approach to their busy website.

“With farmers in mind, when bidding online, speed is of the essence. We wanted to offer a more speedy, functional and accessible platform that primarily understood how farmers attended digital auctions – largely from their mobile phones. So we had no choice but to build a platform that could respond to this reality,” said Scott Donaldson, managing director of H and H.

Steven Hart, creative designer for H and H Reeds, added: “With extensive research, we established the importance of a mobile-first approach that gives people easy and fast navigation around the site. Keeping in mind optimal viewing on all screens, the design also reflects the recently introduced new branding, using rich colours and bold imagery.”

So many farmers are based in rural locations with weaker broadband coverage, so it is essential to create a web design that can overcome this gap in Britain’s internet infrastructure.

“Following a rebranding exercise, this new modern, website reflects the importance that the Internet and new technology now plays in running their farmstock business.

“As one of the largest and leading livestock sales centres in the UK, fast delivery of content with intuitive design is deemed essential for providing a better user experience for their website visitors.” added Allan Bewley, the specialist web and digital services director for H and H Reeds.