Connecting Cheshire has awarded Blue Orchid a £75,000 contract to deliver specialist support and events for female entrepreneurs in Cheshire to help them boost their businesses by using the latest digital technologies.
The ‘Connecting Cheshire: Women in Business’ programme will give women-led businesses the comprehensive and practical advice they need to maximise the potential that faster broadband and digital technology can bring to business.
Blue Orchid Area Manager, Kerry Hall, explains: “The Internet has made connecting with a global market much easier and faster; but knowing where to start and how to build a solid infrastructure to expand and enhance your business can be quite a daunting challenge.
“Over the next five months we will be delivering a series of free workshops and awareness sessions providing practical tips and advice to women-led businesses and female entrepreneurs in Cheshire to give them the knowledge and skills that will benefit their business.”
Sessions will include mentors, business clubs, awareness and training. The programme is open to businesses owned or led by women; budding female entrepreneurs; and women returning to work and is available in the Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Warrington and Halton council areas.
One Cheshire based female entrepreneur who has already signed up to take advantage of the Connecting Cheshire: Women in Business programme is Emma Cornes, who recently won the Bentley Motors Young Business Person of the Year Award at the Cheshire Business Awards.
Emma produces luxury handbags made of British tweed and first worked with Blue Orchid in March 2013 when she needed advice on business planning. Her business has gone from strength to strength and she is now selling on-line to markets as far a field as New Zealand. Emma explains: “I’m keen to get to grips with the opportunities that new technology can bring. It isn’t just about working smarter – though that really helps – but it’s about being able to sell all round the world. We only sell online, so we’re completely dependent on the technology to build a profitable, sustainable business.”
Connecting Cheshire is a partnership between BT and Cheshire West and Chester, Cheshire East, Halton and Warrington councils, which is bringing Superfast fibre broadband to 96 per cent of homes and businesses by the end of 2015.
Funding for the programme has been provided by the Government’s Equalities Office Women and Broadband Challenge Fund.
Minister for Women and Equalities, Nicky Morgan, said: “This fund will give women the practical help needed to get their businesses on-line and take advantage of superfast broadband. This will include online mentors, business clubs and training courses so that women all over the country can benefit.”
A key aim of the programme is to help female entrepreneurs in Cheshire take advantage of digital technologies to transform the way they do business or set up a new business from home. It will focus on women living in rural or semi-rural areas and those working in retail, creative industries and the visitor economy sectors.
Kerry continued: “We want to encourage all female entrepreneurs to take advantage of this programme whether they have experience and knowledge of digital technology and how it works or whether looking to use the technology for the first time. Our practical sessions will be designed for all levels of skill and it is our intention to grow the number of successful women-led businesses in Cheshire through this programme.”
The free sessions will take place across the region until March 2015. Find out more by visiting www.blueorchid.co.uk/connecting-cheshire
