We are a Delivery Partner within the Enterprise Support in the North East project. This is a business start up project being delivered across Northumberland, Tyne and Wear and County Durham to assist potential entrepreneurs to become enterprise ready and ultimately self-employed. This is part funded by European Regional Development Fund.

Enterprise Support Northumberland

Starting a business can be as thrilling as it frightening! Most people will experience both emotions making the start-up phase a roller coaster of feeling exhilarated one minute and in a bit of a panic the next!

The solution in reducing the ‘fear of the unknown’ is to be as prepared as possible before you take the decision to start your business.

Our workshops are designed to do just that, by exploring whether you should start a business in our Self-employment – Is it for Me? workshop, and then building up your business acumen through our Finding and Keeping Customers and Managing Money & Making a Profit workshops.

Our workshops are free to attend and are frequently fully subscribed. So if your plans change after you have booked onto a workshop, please let us know so we can make the place available to someone else .

What you'll learn on the workshops

This workshop is an ideal way to start your enterprise journey if you are thinking about self-employment and need more information before going any further. The workshop is suited to those beginning to explore self-employment and are -

  • Currently unemployed and have a business idea.
  • Recently been made redundant and are interested in working for themselves.
  • Employed and are interested in starting a business.

The workshop covers the following areas –

  • What you need your business to deliver
  • Benefits of setting personal goals
  • Advantages & disadvantages of starting a business
  • Entrepreneurial qualities & skills Identifying start- up costs
  • Can you afford to do it?
  • How to maintain personal motivation & confidence.
  • Market Research Business Planning

In the Finding & Keeping Customers workshop we explore how to position your business so that it creates a great first impression with customers and what you need to do keep them buying from you time & time again and recommending you to others. The workshop will cover

  • Identifying your target market & creating a customer profile.
  • How to undertake effective market research.
  • Who are your competitors?
  • The marketing mix.
  • Winning sales and the sales process.
  • Branding, advertising & promotion.
  • Choosing the right business name.
  • Creating a Marketing Plan.
  • Social networking & Internet marketing.
  • Customer care

In the Managing Money and Making a Profit workshop we look at what it takes to ensure that your products are priced appropriately so that you sell in sufficient volume and that you trade profitably. The workshop will cover -

  • The costs of starting/running a business
  • Determining your own personal financial position
  • How to finance your start-up costs
  • How to project your sales forecast
  • Review different bookkeeping systems
  • Understand Profit & Loss Accounts
  • Understand Balance Sheets
  • How to calculate gross profit margins
  • How to calculate your own breakeven point
  • Preparing a cashflow forecast
  • Understanding Tax, National Insurance & VAT
  • What records you need to maintain
  • How to get paid and having suitable terms of trade

Workshop dates and locations

We are currently planning more workshops for later in the year, if you'd like to be kept informed, please use the button below to send us an email with your contact details.

If you'd like to attend one of our start-up workshops, just click below to send us an email.

Just let us know the title, date and location of the course you'd like to attend and we'll get back to you with the details

Register for a place

Providers

Does your business provide services to North East companies?

If you provide business support services like marketing, business planning, human resources or financial planning find out how you could register with us to offer a grant of up to £2800 to your clients for work that you do for them.

Find out more

Our Programmes

We support businesses from start up to growth.

Our unique support programmes can provide help no matter what stage your business is at.

North East Business Support FundNew Enterprise AllowanceEnterprise Support Northumberland

Business Bullets

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