Award

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Services

TRANSPORT FOR WALES

This public procurement record has 2 releases in its history.

Award

07 May 2025 at 11:03

Tender

27 Dec 2023 at 08:51

Summary of the contracting process

The procurement process detailed involves Transport for Wales, which is seeking SEO services to enhance its digital estate and establish its position as a leading travel organisation in Wales and the borders. This process falls under the IT services category, with focus areas including strategic SEO direction, technical, onsite, and offsite SEO activities. Transport for Wales, located in Pontypridd, is the buying organisation. The contract, valued at £600,000, has been awarded to N21 Group Limited. Initially launched as a tender on 27th December 2023, it was geared towards a long-term relationship with a focus on enhancing SEO strategies for the main website and supporting the consolidation of multiple subsites. The award of the contract was announced on 7th May 2025 after a bidding process that included 22 bids.

This tender provides a significant opportunity for businesses specialising in IT services, particularly those with expertise in SEO strategy and technical optimisation. Organisations capable of assisting Transport for Wales in improving revenue, customer experience, and supporting a modal shift could greatly benefit. Firms that can demonstrate experience in implementing strategic SEO direction, on-brand user experience recommendations, and building authoritative online presences would be well-suited to compete. The open procurement method ensures that a wide range of businesses, including SMEs, can participate, offering potential growth through collaboration with a prominent public law body involved in transportation.

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Notice Title

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Services

Notice Description

2.1 This contract will help us develop and build our SEO strategy and deliver key SEO activities over a long-term relationship to cement our position as the go to organisation for travel in Wales and the borders. 2.2 Our key objectives are to Increase revenue, Enhance customer experience and Drive modal shift. As our SEO partner this may take the form of: - Building a solid Technical SEO platform. To ensure that the tfw.wales website is functioning as fast and as smooth as possible to be able to support demand of traffic levels and use of different devices. - Assessing on site SEO. To ensure we are found by users, important content is visible and the information is available and clear. - Identifying off site SEO opportunities and helping us leverage them. 2.3 As an organization we have a portfolio of 30+ websites/apps that are under our control. We're currently in the middle of our '1 domain' project which involves us closing down our subsites and absorbing them into our main website (tfw.wales) to create a 'one stop shop' website and app for users in Wales and the borders. Throughout this strategy we'll need support to boost our main site's SEO performance as well as optimizing the integration process as subsites are absorbed. 2.4 We're responsible for ensuring all of our digital estate is available completely in Welsh, accessible, on brand and user friendly. The appointed SEO agency would be expected to take these criteria into account for any strategy, tactics or actions recommended or undertaken. 2.5 Main sites: - Tfw.wales | trc.cymru - This is our main website that we wish to maintain and build authority for. - tickets.trc.cymru/ | tocynnau.trc.cymru/ Our booking engine site that will also need to be maintained, however we wish to funnel users in via tfw.wales. 2.6 Subsites: Here is a selection of our smaller sites that will be absorbed, there may be others as our strategy progresses. - https://www.journeycheck.com/tfwrail/ - https://www.traveline.cymru/ - https://traws.cymru/ - https://www.pullmanrail.co.uk/ - https://news.tfw.wales/ - https://portal.tfw.wales/ 2.7 We're looking to appoint a partner to help us build our SEO strategy and deliver the requirements of this contract with the following key areas of focus: 1. Strategic SEO direction and specialist expertise 2. Technical SEO activities 3. Onsite SEO activities 4. Offsite SEO activities 5. General activities

Lot Information

Lot 1

2.7 We're looking to appoint a partner to help us build our SEO strategy and deliver the requirements of this contract with the following key areas of focus: 1. Strategic SEO direction and specialist expertise 2. Technical SEO activities 3. Onsite SEO activities 4. Offsite SEO activities 5. General activities 1. Strategic SEO direction and specialist expertise Collaborating with us to define the long-term vision of TfW's online SEO presence. Collaborating with us to develop the long-term direction of our SEO strategy to help us achieve that vision. Develop a robust set of Key Performance Indicators for SEO performance and report on this performance regularly. Developing impactful SEO activity that helps to achieve our 3 key objectives outlined above and build our distinctive brand to help us own our digital space. Define our current keyword position and future positioning for different topics that we wish to be an authority on. Including but not limited to rail, bus, walking/wheeling and cycling in Wales. Providing expert advice and guidance on strategic SEO development. Including industry developments i.e. algorithm changes and how we should adapt our strategy/tactics. Collaborating with stakeholders and our network of experts / specialists across other brand and marketing activities to ensure campaign work is maximized for SEO impact. For example collaborating with our campaigns agency Golley Slater to ensure marketing campaigns are optimized for SEO. Drawing on best-in-class knowledge and expertise by working with specialist advisers, agencies, consultants, and suppliers when needed. For example coordinating with third party UI/UX experts to help us undertake audits of areas on our website. 2. Technical SEO activities | Including but limited to Audit and technical assessment of our websites and provide steps to improve performance. For example, image resizing. Providing a list of images on the website that would benefit from being optimized and providing instructions for a developer or content publisher to achieve this. Collaborate with our development teams, both in house and third party, to fix technical SEO issues. Manage search consoles, submitting optimised site maps and other associated activities. 3. Onsite SEO activities | Including but limited to Audit on-site content from an SEO point of view and make recommendations to improve performance and measure impact. Make User Experience (UX) / User Interface (UI) recommendations that will improve performance and measuring impact. Assessing a user journey or webpage for Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) making recommendations for improving performance and measuring the impact. Making recommendations/implementing internal linking that increases performance and measuring the impact. Making recommendations/implementing changes to metadata that increases performance and measuring the impact. Making recommendations/implementing on-brand tone of voice changes to written content to increase performance and measure the impact. 4. Offsite SEO | Including but limited to Ability to effectively audit our offsite SEO performance and make recommendations to improve. Demonstrable experience of building backlinks with relevant and high-ranking domains. Demonstrable experience of digital PR with relevant and high-ranking domains increasing an aspect of authority for a given subject. 5. General activity | Included but limited to - Agreement of a preferred way of working. We often work in agile sprints for website releases. - Agreement to a standard set of Management Information and reporting. We have Google Analytics 4 and a comprehensive dashboard set up that can provide information on the relevant KPI's. We would ask that any supplier also uses this source of information. Additional information: Procurement documentation available via the eTender Wales platform with project code project_55250 - Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Services and ITT reference itt_107880

Renewal: Option to extend for up to two periods of 12 months each.

Publication & Lifecycle

Open Contracting ID
ocds-h6vhtk-0429c3
Publication Source
Find A Tender Service
Latest Notice
https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/019330-2025
Current Stage
Award
All Stages
Tender, Award

Procurement Classification

Notice Type
Tender Notice
Procurement Type
Standard
Procurement Category
Services
Procurement Method
Open
Procurement Method Details
Open procedure
Tender Suitability
Not specified
Awardee Scale
SME

Common Procurement Vocabulary (CPV)

CPV Divisions

72 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support


CPV Codes

72000000 - IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support

72222000 - Information systems or technology strategic review and planning services

Notice Value(s)

Tender Value
£360,000 £100K-£500K
Lots Value
Not specified
Awards Value
Not specified
Contracts Value
£600,000 £500K-£1M

Notice Dates

Publication Date
7 May 20259 months ago
Submission Deadline
26 Jan 2024Expired
Future Notice Date
Not specified
Award Date
11 Sep 20241 years ago
Contract Period
Not specified - Not specified
Recurrence
The earliest of date procurement will be in three years following contract award.

Notice Status

Tender Status
Complete
Lots Status
Cancelled
Awards Status
Active
Contracts Status
Active

Contracting Authority (Buyer)

Main Buyer
TRANSPORT FOR WALES
Contact Name
Not specified
Contact Email
procurement@tfw.wales
Contact Phone
+44 2921673434

Buyer Location

Locality
PONTYPRIDD
Postcode
CF37 4TH
Post Town
Cardiff
Country
Wales

Major Region (ITL 1)
TLL Wales
Basic Region (ITL 2)
TLL5 South East Wales
Small Region (ITL 3)
TLL51 Central Valleys and Bridgend
Delivery Location
TLL Wales

Local Authority
Rhondda Cynon Taf
Electoral Ward
Pontypridd Town
Westminster Constituency
Pontypridd

Supplier Information

Number of Suppliers
1
Supplier Name

N21 GROUP

Open Contracting Data Standard (OCDS)

View full OCDS Record for this contracting process

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The Open Contracting Data Standard (OCDS) is a framework designed to increase transparency and access to public procurement data in the public sector. It is widely used by governments and organisations worldwide to report on procurement processes and contracts.

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