Wed 15th Feb

FREE Event

Presented by Kesh Morjaria

This is an invitation to a FREE seminar about Who has got Social Media Wrong and Who Gets it Right – and WHY?

Let me firstly thank you for reading this message and secondly congratulate you for being interested in growing your own business.

• Are you one of the vast majority of businesses using Social Media but NOT making anywhere near the money that they were expecting?

• Are you one of the many businesses that are NOT using Social Media but realise that it is where your prospects are, however you just don’t know where to begin?

• Are you one of the business owners embarrassed by all the money you have already spent “SELLING” your product or service until now?

How does this make you feel?

In the last few years I have interviewed hundreds of business owners and while the vast majority have been struggling, a small percentage have been very successful in marketing to both B2C and B2B prospects . (One of those businesses has experienced at least 20% growth since last year, yet its industry category, as a whole, has shrunk by 40%).

Having had the privilege of working together with a number of them but studied all, I have learnt their winning strategy using Social Media as an “accelerated word-of-mouth” tool to bring (or create) the market to desire their products or services. Equally, I have learnt what does not work from businesses who have spent vast amounts of money “selling” but without the desired return to be proud of.

Come and Find Out Who has got Social Media Wrong and Who Gets it Right – and WHY?

WHEN

Wednesday, February 15th 2012, 09:30 – 11:30

WHERE

Venue: SERVICE INNOVATION GROUP (SIG), DENMARK HOUSE, STAPLES CORNER, THE BROADWAY, WEST HENDON, NW9 7BR, LONDON.

(Between Elite Tiles and the Vauxhall Showroom)

Free Parking is available – here are the directions

To register e-mail david@keshmorjaria.co.uk Subject: I would like to attend the seminar on Jan 25th, thank you Content: Please reserve me place(s) for the seminar.

A street market is being held in the north Harrow shopping centre is the answer!

Date: Friday 9th – Sunday 11th March 2012 Venue: Station and Pinner Road North Harrow

Traders

This is a taster event for a regular market in the area. The taster will mean you get a FREE stall for the three days The stalls will be put up for you and will be taken down at the end of the day; each stall will have a table and be covered. All you need to do is bring your products, pricing and dress your stall.

Stall information Each stall will be approximately 7x3m

Marketing

The event will be heavily promoted and will give you access to a vast selection of new Customers.

• We are starting to market this now • In local papers • Harrow Website • Facebook • Twitter • Radio • Newspapers • Through Residents association • Universities • Schools • Banners in Streets • Advertising boards • Through word of mouth • Harrow in Business • Local Chambers • Federation of small businesses.

As over 17,000 residents live within a one-kilometre radius and 6,000 people use North Harrow tube station every weekday. Almost 30,000 people live in the three wards around North Harrow.

We are looking for a wide variety of traders please contact Rachel or Louise for further information and to book a stall.

A briefing will be organised before the event

This assessment will look at product and go through the look of each stall and we will need to have clear pricing from each stall to coincide with trading standards policy.

We are currently looking at arranging courses post the event to help businesses progress in areas such as:

• Marketing • Finance • Business Planning

The event will a create vibrancy in the area, support existing traders and will increase the footfall by creating more reasons to shop here and increase your customer base and customer awareness of your brands.

Contact Points

Rachel Jenman North Harrow Town Centre Manager 020 8736 6083 07887 938 341 Rachel.jenman@harow.gov.uk

Louise Baxter Project Officer 020 8416 8959 Louise.baxter@harrow.gov.uk

Date: Tuesday 7th February 2012 15.30 – 19.30, Venue: RBS Head Office, 3rd Floor Atrium, 250 Bishopsgate, EC2M 4AA London, United Kingdom; Contact: NatWest Business banking The Host: Nick Howe, Regional Enterprise Manager, NatWest Business Banking on 07826 902235

NatWest Business Banking have teamed up with Business Link to bring a large number of organisations together in one room who will all have useful information for you to help you, whether you are starting your business or looking to improve your existing business.

The organisations who have confirmed attendence at the event include ; The British Library – Business & IP Centre, Companies House, HMRC, City Business Library, Companies House, Intellectual Property Office, GLE Group, Federation of Small Business, Capital Enterprises, TWC 1230, HBV and Laurie Bernard – Business Services Partnership with more still to confirm.

In addition there will be limited spaces on smaller workshops focussing on business plan essentials and effective networking which can be registered for upon entrance into the venue.

All of this is for free and we will also be able to offer teas and coffees – sorry no buffet !! – so if you are seeking face to face business information there has never been a better opportunity to grab it.

NatWest Business Banking is proud to be able to work as part of the business community to bring all of these organsiations together to support business.

Date: 5th January 2012 – 6pm -9pm Venue: Hub Westminster Richmond House 80 Haymarket SW1Y 4TE London

The New Year’s Resolution bootcamp is for individuals looking to find out whether running a business is for them and if so how they go about making it happen (ably assisted by the support available on the day and in the future). The purpose of the bootcamp is to give you a taste of what it is like to start a business and then if you take to it fast track you to the resources, support and funding that can turn an idea into a business.

So in three intensive hours attendees will:

· Find out whether being an “Entrepreneur” is right for you (We will run a test to see if your personality profile to see if it matches those of successful entrepreneurs and then help you assess whether you have the know-how, skills, partnerships and resources to make it as a new entrepreneur).

· Get you to develop a route map and “pitch” that will help you work out how to turn an idea into a product or service that can successfully launched on to the market ( Working with fellow attendees in small teams and supported by a team of real work entrepreneur mentors, we will get delegates to try out some tried and tested techniques used by the award winning “Launch 48” programme, on how to bring a new business to market).

· Receive a run through of the essential steps to getting a business started including information on tax, company registration, licences, setting-up a simple website, getting free banking and raising money.

· Get fast-tracked to 100+ offers of support and discounts that will make setting up a business both easier and cheaper.Get an opportunity (over drinks and pizza) to network and perhaps make friends with people just like yourself who are seeing if starting a business is for them.

So enrol on the New Resolution programme and we can guarantee you will have fun, work hard, meet interesting people and maybe find out if being an entrepreneur is for you.

Harrow Council is offering temporary shop space to local community organizations, social enterprise and local business entrepreneurs for eight weeks. The shop space can be used for temporary retail offers and exhibitions. The tenant will not be responsible for rates and utility charges for the period of occupation. The tenant must take out Public Liability Insurance and pay the required fee.

Period of Occupation

8 weeks (from the 15th of January 2012 till the 15th of March 2012).

How do I apply to become a Pop-Up Shop Tenant?

Submission can be by email to dayo.ogunmuyiwa@harrow.gov.uk but a hardcopy must also be sent by post, in an envelope marked ‘Pop-up shop, to:

Dayo Ogunmuyiwa, Economic Development & Enterprise, Harrow Council, PO Box 37 Civic Centre, Station Road, Harrow, HA1 2UY, London

The submission must include:

• Who you are. Details of your business/organisation. Contacts details.

• Details of any other groups/organizations’ involved.

• Description of the planned use of pop-up shop. Including possible retail element and exhibition (e.g. sale of goods/art/postcards/gallery etc.)

• Experience of delivering similar projects. Examples of previous work (include links to any relevant websites if applicable).

• Target audience for planned use.

• Planned opening times.

As the owner, MD or senior director in a successful small business you know that the day-to-day direction you provide is crucial to your organisation’s success. But what impact do your personal leadership skills have on your business? By improving your leadership skills, could your business do even better?

If so, Harrow in Business is working with Exemplas to enable you to access a business mentor with up to £1000 worth of funding available to support senior decision makers like you to develop your business building and leadership skills. If you would be interested to find out more about this, please do give us a call on 020 8427 6188.

The Event is a dance, music, demonstration activities, refreshments and late night shopping.

Time: 18.30 – 20.30

Price: Free Event

Venue: Station Road and Pinner Road, North Harrow

The Traders of North Harrow have organised a dance and music event in the streets of Station and Pinner Road to celebrate the local talent in the area, and make the public aware of the great variety of shops in North Harrow .

The shops will be open until 20.30 and inviting the public in for demonstrations and refreshments.

This event has been organised by the North Harrow Business Association themselves to promote businesses and to introduce the new businesses.

For further information contact:

Rachel Jenman North Harrow Town Centre Manager

Email: Rachel.Jenman@harrow.gov.uk Tel: 020 8736 6083

Local businesses are invited to a FREE seminar organised by Harrow Council to find out about the wider business opportunities relating to the 2012 Games.

Mon 17th October 2011, Committee Rooms 1 & 2,Civic Centre, Station Road, Harrow, HA1 2AY

Agenda

9.15 Registration & Refreshments

9.30 Welcome and Introductions

9.40 Games Preparation Opportunities

10.10 Harrow Council Update

10.40 Open Forum & Q&A Session

11.00 Event Close and Networking

The main speaker will be Kevin Ma from London Business Network. Find out how your business can benefit from the Games

Refreshments will be provided

Places are limited so advance booking is essential for this FREE event – reserve your place now!

bali.rai@harrow.gov.uk or on 020 8736 6539

Enterprise Nation has announced the launch of a new fund to support new business start ups. Known as Fund 101, micro grants of between £50 and £500 are available for would be entrepreneurs to set up their own businesses.

Supported by Intuit and Paypal an initial £50,000 is available through this scheme. This will be topped up by £5,000 each month.

To apply, entrepreneurs must complete an online application, explaining how much money they require and for what purpose. They must then raise an equivalent number of votes to the grant they are seeking – if they need £100, they must engage 100 people to vote for them.

http://enterprisenation.com/fund101/

More than 100 thousand UK businesses could save in excess of £600 million in accountancy and administration costs every year under proposals to reduce financial reporting requirements.

The consultation on Audit Exemptions and Change of Accounting Framework sets out plans to allow more small companies and subsidiaries to decide whether or not to have an audit.

It covers the whole of the UK and will close on 29 December 2011.

Current EU rules mean a company must comply with two out of three criteria in order to be classified as ‘small’ for accounting purposes:

* No more than 50 employees. * A balance sheet total no more than £3.26 million. * No more than £6.5 million in turnover.

However, to obtain an audit exemption in the UK, small companies must fulfil both the balance sheet and turnover criteria.

Under the new proposals, UK SMEs would be eligible for audit exemption by meeting any two of the three criteria, saving them an estimated £206m per year.

The Minister responsible for Corporate Governance, Edward Davey, said:

“Audit is very valuable for many companies. But the proposals we’ve published today are aimed at removing EU gold plating and freeing up enterprise, which ultimately benefits the whole UK economy and will help put us on the path to long-term, sustainable growth. So I encourage businesses to read the consultation document and share their views with us.”