Industry partnership drives opportunity for digital apprentices

SocialNorth, the networking and speaker event community for the social media and digital marketing industries in the North, has joined forces with The Juice Academy, the not-for-profit digital content apprenticeship programme based in Manchester.

The partnership creates opportunities for The Juice Academy apprentices to gain first-hand experience of creating content and managing social media during large, live industry events across the North of England.

The Juice apprentices have so far travelled to SocialNorth events in Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle, and Manchester in 2022, and will be capturing the next SocialNorth event in Manchester at Stoller Hall on 24^th August.

The Juice Academy apprentices work closely with SocialNorth founders, Justin Clark and Lee Benecke, to capture and publish event content across multiple social media platforms including Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and LinkedIn during the events.

SocialNorth events bring together the digital communities of the North. Their monthly events are attended  by hundreds of people from the social media, digital marketing, and associated industries. SocialNorth events bring some of the biggest names from the industry to speak at the free events.

So far in 2022, over 1,000 attendees to SocialNorth events have heard from senior industry leaders from brands and organisations including: British Red Cross (Nana Crawford), Yorkshire Tea (Ollie Ratcliffe), and ITV (Claire Hoang), and some of the North’s best digital agencies, including Kyma Media (Hannah Anderson), Journey Further (Thierry Ngutegure), and Great Influence (Ash Jones).

Apprentices will support SocialNorth again at their next event at Stoller Hall in Manchester on 24^th August. The event will feature senior industry speakers from The United Nations Refugee Agency, Vogue, LADBible Group, Rise at Seven, and Meltwater. Free tickets are still available to book here.

Megan Preece is just one success story out of hundreds from the apprenticeship programme. A former apprentice, now employed by The Academy as its Digital Marketing Executive, she heads up the SocialNorth Academy Content team and said:

“The SocialNorth and The Juice Academy partnership is such a positive one due to the collaboration between apprentices, who are just getting their toes into the industry and professionals who have been working in the social media and digital world for years.

“The Juice Academy apprentices are given the opportunity to create a wide range of content across the social media channels, learning how to work in a fast paced, exciting environment and in return, helping SocialNorth build up its social media presence throughout the live events.”

Speaking about the partnership, SocialNorth founder, Justin Clark, said:

“As the UK’s first and best digital apprenticeship programme, The Juice Academy is the obvious choice for us to partner with. I’m so happy we’re working together. The apprentice content team has an incredible job putting the training into practice in a live event environment.

“From our side, it’s a proud moment to be able to give these talented apprentices an opportunity to get some real-world experience – we’d be lost without them! As SocialNorth grows and holds more events across the North of England, we want our partnership with Juice to grow with it.”

Georgia Fitzgerald, Associate Director at The Juice Academy, said:

“We are so grateful to have this partnership with SocialNorth and for the opportunity it provides for our apprentices to learn, be inspired and network with like-minded creative individuals in the industry.

“SocialNorth events are fantastic, with brilliant speakers and a great mix of attendees; they’re educational and fun! I can’t wait for the next one and to continue this partnership for many more events to come.”

The Juice Academy works with businesses from different sectors, predominantly around Greater Manchester, to recruit and train apprentices for them. Their next boot camp recruitment day is the 21^st September and businesses interested to learn more can enquire here.