EVALUATE

Power to the people. Powerful website for our community.

Happy National Public Power Week. While it's not likely that this national holiday is on your calendar, at Miranda Creative we have a sincere reason to celebrate. This week not only recognizes the important role locally owned utilities have in their communities, this week marks the official roll out of norwichpublicutilities.com. This complex website, created in support of the locally-owned utility of our native City, has been under thoughtful and considered development for the past few months. Working with our partners, Mike Hughes, Communications and Community Outreach Manager, and Jeanne Kurasz, Programs Coordinator, a development team that included Geoff Hasson, Nicole Anllo and Maria Miranda from Miranda Creative, the resulting site provides what the client defined as "an online experience that echoes the friendly, helpful nature of a real-time visit to our customer service center."

From easy-to-navigate "How do I" tools, to the ability to securely pay a utility bill online, this new site integrates many resources into one consumer portal.

During an on-air interview with Stu Breyer from WICH radio, Mike and Maria shared their three favorite aspects of the site. "Two features I'm excited to see engaged includes the bill-presentment function, and our social media toggles," explained Mike. "Customers may now access up to 13 months of bill history to compare month to month or year to year energy patterns. And, for those who are active on social media, it is now possible to connect with your local utility via Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or Flickr. Without a doubt, last fall we learned the value of Twitter when during the heart of a hurricane, shortly followed by a blizzard, we were able to stay in timely communication with our customers, sharing moment by moment updates regarding power restoration. We'll never be without that tool in the future."

For Maria, norwichpublicutilties.com represented an opportunity to address a vital issue regarding community connectivity. "I cannot thank NPU gracefully enough for embracing the idea of creating ONE community calendar for our town. By supporting the introduction of a universal calendar tool on the NPU site, ALL other local organizations can access the same program for their websites, integrating calendars and avoiding overlapping events. More importantly, working together, we can save countless hours of sharing events on multiple calendars (Municipal, Chamber, Newspaper). NPU took the first step, and they have opened the doors for others as well. I strongly encourage any organization — arts, healthcare, the City itself, to reach out to NPU to learn more about using the same tool universally."

Miranda Creative thanks Norwich Public Utilities for entrusting our firm with your new site. We truly appreciate that you selected a local vendor, who provides local jobs and in doing so, you assured that resources were placed back into our local economy. It was a great experience, every step of the way.

— M2/Crew