Matmi (located 20 minutes outside of Manchester, UK) are looking for a back-end web developer. Interested? Read on…

Back-end web developer job requirements:

Good PHP, .NET are the core elements in this role, with knowledge of MYSQL /SQL Server working on websites and branded game releases for clients including EMI Music, Vimto Soft Drinks, Mars, Comic Relief and Cancer Research.

If you can also bring C, Objective C and/or C# into the mix, that would be great. If not and you’re prepared to learn them en route, that suits us just fine too.  The nature of our work means that skills with Facebook and other social network APIs are always needed – but we’d expect to train people up in-house for that (not least because they keep changing so fast…).

If you’re familiar with Scrum/Sprint or other agile methodologies – great – but it’s not an essential skill. You will be trained in-house.

Finally – where d’you want to be in 10 years time?!  We’re planning to be in the same place: well ahead of the pack with cutting edge techniques and show-stopping results for clients.  That means we all live and breathe what we do, and work best in a fast paced, team focussed environment.

What’s it like working at Matmi?

Fast, sometimes frenetic and always fun.

Take a look at our website at www.matmi.com, find us on Tumblr,Twitter and Facebook too – and you’ll quickly get an idea of what we’re about.  Coverage on The Drum and How Do could be useful background too.

A typical Matmian is….. there’s no such thing.  We do have some common traits though.

• Work is a passion and a pleasure (which means it’s not much like work).
• Matmians are an open-minded bunch who thrive in places that other digital marketing agencies don’t even know exist.
• We’re curious, questioning and quite intelligent on all matters of digital marketing, gaming, platforms, apps and code.
• We’re geeks with business brains.
• If someone says “It’s never been done before”, we’re not usually far away.

What are we offering?

• Salary range up to £25K per annum, depending on skills and experience.
• 24 days holiday per year, plus Bank Holidays.
• Stakeholder pension scheme.
• In-house learning environment in whatever business related subject you’d like to develop your skills in­!

Have you got what it takes to be a Matmian?  Contact us at michelle@matmi.com or on 01625 575661 and let’s talk.  Soon.  We’d like to see some of your work too, so if you have an online portfolio, please include a link when you contact us.

Matmi (located 20 minutes outside of Manchester, UK) are looking for a front-end developer. Read on if you are interested.

Front-end Flash web developer

Good Flash & AS3 skills are the core elements in this role, working on websites and branded game releases for clients including EMI Music, Vimto Soft Drinks, Mars, Comic Relief and Cancer Research.

If you can also bring HTML and HTML5, CSS and JQUERY into the mix, that would be great.  If you’re prepared to learn them while you are here, that suits us fine. We also work heavily with PHP but its not an essential requirement for the job.

The nature of our work means that skills with Facebook and other social network APIs are always needed – but we train people up in-house for that.

If you’re familiar with Scrum/Sprint or other agile methodologies – great – but it’s not an essential skill.

What’s it like working at Matmi?

Fast, sometimes frenetic and always fun.

Take a look at our website at www.matmi.com, find us on Tumblr,Twitter, and Facebook too – and you’ll quickly get an idea of what we’re about.  Coverage on The Drum and How Do could be useful background too.

What are we offering?

• Salary range up to £25k per annum, depending on skills and experience.
• 24 days holiday per year, plus Bank Holidays.
• Stakeholder pension scheme.
• In-house learning environment in whatever business related subject you’d like to develop your skills in!

Have you got what it takes to be a Matmian?  Contact us at michelle@matmi.com or on 01625 575661

Please send links to a blog/online portfolio if possible.

As you may have read, our HUGELY (yes caps are warranted) successful App, Monster Pinball, has taken a trip over to the Symbian platform.

Now, we know it’s a great game, even 2 years down the line…but to receive a glowing review is always a nice surprise.

The jolly pleasant peeps over at Allaboutsymbian.com took the game in hand, played it and then posted their thoughts.

Steve Litchfield is the man we have to thank for this particular review. Here is just a snippet:

It’s not often you find the perfect game. Great concept, great implementation, great price. But Monster Pinball delivers on every level and is truly impressive. iPhone owners got to play this almost two years ago, but the Symbian version, working on the new Symbian^3 phones with the graphics acceleration, is here at last and it’s almost a must-buy for just about everyone.

We must say a BIG (yes, caps again!) thank you again to Mr Litchfield for posting such a positive review – which you can read here.

We may mouth off a lot about client releases – but here’s one of our best kept secrets, part II! In fact, it made our jaws drop – along with over 11 million other unique visitors age 4 – 11.

The secret in question is an advergame release for Philips Sonicare, a best-selling electric toothbrush range since the late 80’s. Launching its first Sonicare brush for kids in 2010 prompted the brand to rethink its promotion in a child/parent-friendly way. What better than a fun (and educational) game to spread the word online?

With Matmi’s child-friendly track record (Mr Ray, Bob the Builder) it wasn’t long before Philips arrived at our door. Creating the super hero, Sonic Simon, and a dinky 3-level dental cleaning game, we released “Brilliant Brushers” in November 2010 and it took our breath away.

Over 11 million unique visitors to date. Over a million plays in a single week and quarter-of-a-million in one day. A dwell time of almost 7 minutes (7 minutes!!) and return rates of over 25%. Even by our standards, that’s a sparkling performance – and even more so because the game’s reach is almost 100% viral through its child/parent audience.

Of course, knowing the 4 – 11 year old audience well, we did make sure that Brilliant Brushers had everything going for it! It’s easy-to-use with bright, colourful, appealing graphics, a highly accessible game concept – but most importantly, it’s a fun, interactive way to help kids find out how cool it is to brush your teeth well.

The parent perspective is important too – kids won’t get to play the game unless their parents approve, so the educational elements exist on two levels; the dental hygiene message, the practical advice in the game and the built-in IT literacy practice.

Did I mention these cost effective advergames are also great at product promotion and brand awareness? Philips Sonicare gets to be the good guy – and because there’s a completely new audience every 7 years, we reckon this campaign will be lively for a few (light) years to come.

And you just never know – Sonic Simon may get the sister he’s always wished for soon too. Find us on Twitter for an update.

“The [Optathlon] programme has been a resounding success and has generated millions in revenue for United Airlines.”
Extract from United’s campaign video, February 2011

Matmi is proud to have some very happy clients – but this was a first. Not the quote so much as the fact that our client (via our American partner, Barrie D’Rozario Murphy) was sooooo happy with the results of this campaign, they made a video about it! To see what we can do in a nutshell, take a 2 minute peek at this clip showcasing the Optathlon campaign.

In May, this campaign carried off the gong for Best Commercial Game or App at the How Do Awards and this month we have everything crossed (including Jeff’s eyes – which means he’s seeing straight…) for a result at the international Cannes Festival, no less!

Spinning off from the film festival, Cannes Lions has been the advertising industry’s annual Mecca since 1954 and regularly attracts 8,000+ delegates worldwide. Optathlon and our campaign for The Gorillaz with EMI Music are our first ever entries and the results are out at the end of June. Find us on Twitter for an update.

But getting back to flying high for United Airlines – what’s all the fuss about? Back in October last year, we credited United for their boldness in putting a 5-game suite (the Optathlon) at the heart of a virtuous cyber-circle to promote its flight upgrade options – and the results at the time were stunning!

During the three month campaign last autumn, over 1 million unique visitors played the games, 85,000 passengers claimed on-the-spot flight upgrades via the games (oh yes!) and United Airlines almost got an excess baggage charge for the campaign’s positive PR coverage.

But what’s intrigued us is that the Optathlon games suite is still flying high – even without the incentives of free flight upgrades and a $20K sweepstake on offer. The stats are now at over 5 million plays, which means that millions more customers (and potential customers) are learning about United Airlines’ range of flight upgrade options almost a year after the campaign was launched.

The original objective was to break a vicious circle: that passengers didn’t book flight upgrades until they had tried them out – but they didn’t try them out because they didn’t understand them.

I think it’s safe to say Matmi has played a hugely influential part in that ‘learning process’ – all because we know that people love be entertained. OK – we were a bit mean targeting them as they’re bored stiff waiting for a plane – but thanks to sterling work by our partner agency, Barrie D’Rozario Murphy in Chicago, the advertising and promotion work for the games was just too tempting!

That comes down to knowing your audience – so how well does your brand know its audience? And more importantly – how well do they know you? I can feel a brief coming on…….

You know who to call.