Once more, Small Business Saturday UK is looking for 100 businesses from around the UK to celebrate, shout about and promote in the run-up to Small Business Saturday UK 2020 on the 5th December.
Each year the campaign celebrates one business a day in the 100 days running up to Small Business Saturday UK. As well as this, the businesses are promoted on social media, in local and national press and are invited to special exclusive events. Entry is free, and it is a money can’t buy opportunity!
To apply, you will need to complete an online application explaining why your small business should be one of the #SmallBiz100 and how you help your community. As part of this, we recommend that you include a video to bring your #smallbiz story to life. The video could be a tour of your office or shop.
If you’d like more information about this year’s campaign, get in touch with our very own Print Evangelist, Yvonne Gorman.
Any small business can apply, and the winners will represent all sectors and regions of the UK. Applications open on the 1st of June, and they close on 30th June 2019 so don’t delay.
Click on Yvonne’s photo below to watch her launch video for SmallBiz100 2020:
Essential Print Services was selected in 2013, and since then, the opportunities have never ended as Yvonne explains:
I first discovered Small Business Saturday UK in November 2013 when I was looking through Twitter on a cold, rainy Sunday evening. I had a tough week at work but when their tweet said, “email us your profile for a chance to become one of the first #smallbiz100” I begrudgingly opened my laptop and started typing.
What will I get from this? I asked myself; a few more followers online at the most.
How wrong was I?
A few weeks later I received an email to say I had been chosen. Great! What now?
An invitation to Downing Street followed. WOW! I met the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Shadow Business Secretary amongst others.
How on earth did lil’ olde me from Derby find herself beyond those hallowed London gates?
Soon after, I was invited to be a panellist at the prestigious Marketing Derby Annual Business Event with an audience of over 450 of Derby’s business community. After I received a round of applause for a comment I made, I believed this chance encounter catapulted my local profile. I am now a Non-Exec Board member of Marketing Derby; the City’s inward investment agency.
Many events followed; House of Lords and the PRS Headquarters to name but a few and a second invitation to Downing Street followed a few years later to recognise the voluntary work that ‘Small Business Saturday Heroes’ do in their community and I was one of them.
Being a part of #smallbiz100 provides you with the advertising and the exposure that most small businesses cannot afford. I have been asked several times to be interviewed on live TV and Radio; something that thrusts me out of my comfort zone. Shaking like a ‘Leafe’ I do it anyway because that’s what you have to do as a business owner – right?
I am a firm believer that the more you get involved with something, the more you will get out of it. The benefits may not appear immediately but sure enough, when I am trying to figure out where opportunities originate, more often than not, I can track it back to applying to be #SmallBiz100.
The #SmallBiz100 community and alumni are fantastic; they’re a group of fellow small business owners who know what the daily rollercoaster of entrepreneurial emotions feels like. I need not feel alone. I have won a handful of new customers from the community but I gain so much more than sales from them. Their tenaciousness and honest approach are truly inspiring.
And should you ever need advice, the team at Small Business Saturday UK and the team of Small Business Saturday Heroes are only too happy to help. The relentless work behind the scenes is astonishing.
Oh, and did I mention that all this is for free? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this initiative is completely free of charge you simply have to put in a little time and effort.
Taking part in Small Business Saturday UK changed my outlook on being a small business owner.
If you’re running a small business, apply today. I did and I cannot recommend it highly enough. Click the link below and begin your experience.
P.S. Thank you to Michelle Ovens MBE and the team for all that you do.
