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How to Add a PayPal Cart to Your Website

24/5/2017

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Henry returns for Season 2 of Website Wednesday answering your questions and giving you tips and tutorials. Today he shows you how to add a PayPal Cart to your website so you can sell multiple products at once.
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DO WHAT YOU LOVE DOING

13/4/2017

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Business is about making money.
But that shouldn't be the only reason, you've got to love what you're doing.
Business takes time, if you're not enjoying what you're doing then the Business is not going to be successful.
That's our most important principle: Make Money Doing What You Love.
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should you get a start-up loan?

13/4/2017

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Where do you get the cash to get going?
Maybe, that's not the question to ask..
There are so many more interesting, exciting and creative ways to start your business than borrowing money.
You don't want to start your Business in debt, you want to start in profit.​
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Business plans are a waste of time

13/4/2017

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Traditional Business Support will tell you to begin with a Business Plan.
We at The PopUp Business School think that is a massive waste of time.

Business Plans are traditionally used to get funding. But what if you start your Business with no money? Go out, make sales and find what your customers want before you even consider a Business Plan.
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Holidays are Coming

17/11/2016

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Alan is back! Almost.. Alan is on location at Bury St Edmunds with advice and a challenge for you as your business faces the upcoming festive period.
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Sell Outside The Box

1/11/2016

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We are in Simon's Homeland of Southampton for Today's #ChallengeTuesday. He discusses how where you sell, affects who you sell to. And why this could be great for finding new customers.
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Who You Gonna Call?

25/10/2016

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Simon gives you his #ChallengeTuesday. Get on the phone and make sales, talk to your customers, make stuff happen.

​Who You Gonna Call?..
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Find New Customers in 60 Seconds

11/10/2016

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​Alan is at #PopUpCroydon and has a Challenge for you...

This is #ChallengeTuesday
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The one thing new businesses forget to do

20/8/2014

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PictureYou get funky new business cards
So you start a new business.  You make a decision to get going.

You work on the website, you work on the branding, you work on the product, you have funky new business cards printed, you beaver away tirelessly.

But there is one thing that all new businesses forget to do enough of...........

And it tends to be the bit that most of us are scared of............

And yet it is the single most important activity as a start up business.......

Have you guessed what it is yet?

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Sales

The one thing small businesses don't do enough of when they launch is sales.  They think that by opening their door, printing a business card and telling their friends business is going to magically come to them!

I am here to tell you that it doesn't.  If you build it they won't come!

You have to sell it to them!

The key is to take action every day to sell your business.

What are you doing everyday to sell your product or service?

I speak to small businesses every day and when I ask them what they are doing each day to sell their service or product the answer is almost universally a blank look.

Ask yourself the question what I am doing every single day to sell my product or services?

Here are some ideas to get you started, that you can do every day:
  1. Phone 3 potential customers
  2. Send 5 tweets to potential customers
  3. Write and post one letter a day to a potential customer
  4. call one existing customer a day and ask them what are they working on
  5. Ask one friend a day if they know anyone you should be talking to
  6. Go to one networking event a week where your customers might be going

The important thing is that you do something every single day that moves you in the direction of new business and customers. If you do this every single day then you will build up momentum and amazing things will start to happen!

Just don't get impatient, it won't always happen overnight. it might take time but persevere, keep going, keep taking action every single day and I promise you that the next sale will come.

I would love to know what is working for you at the moment.  What sales methods are working for you to get customers at the moment?  Leave a comment below.


Or for help with your sales and building your business come along to one of our up coming events.
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Leeds - August
We are going to be in Leeds on the 24th and 25th of August 2014.  Click the picture for details

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Telford - September
We will be in Telford from Monday the 29th of September for one week.  Click on the picture for more details.  See you there.

Leave a comment below and tell us what sales methods are working for you

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Need Premises For Your Business But Don’t Want To Throw Away Your Profit? What To Do BeforeSigning a Lease 

19/5/2014

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At Pop Up Business School we show people how to grow a business with no money - however, for some businesses they will need a property. 
Maybe you started your business from home and it has grown and you now need a property - What do you do?
Check out our latest blog from Kirsty Harvey (www.ktdsurveying.co.uk)

You have had the idea, now you need premises to start the business. Signing a lease is a big 
commitment, so you need to be sure you have the best deal you can. Before you sign on the dotted 
line, just think about this:

1. The key to everything is NEGOTIATION – you can do this yourself but like anything if you have 
expert advice you will reap the benefits.

2. Make sure you know whether or not the lease has SECURITY OF TENURE. If it hasn’t, (and is 
CONTRACTED OUT) you need to factor this into the rent. Also be aware that at the end of the 
lease if the landlord wants you out, you have no right to stay. Your negotiating position at the 
end of a contracted out lease is much less than one that isn’t.

3. Ask for a RENT FREE PERIOD before signing a lease. This is common practice, and the longer the 
lease, usually the longer the rent free period granted.

4. NEGOTIATE THE RENT. Rent that you pay will be used as evidence against other businesses 
when they have a rent review or lease renewal, and vice versa. The more that tenants negotiate
the better it is for all businesses in keeping rents down. 

5. BUSINESS RATES: Make sure you factor in this cost. Look at the possibility of appealing the 
rateable value. Be careful though as rates can be revised upwards as well as downwards. Can 
you get any small business rates relief? 

6. SERVICE CHARGE: Before completing a lease, check if there is a service charge. What does 
it cover, and will you benefit from those services? If not don’t agree to that part of it. Is 
the building already in a poor condition? If so you should agree a cap on the service charge 
provision. This way you know your service charge will be a fixed maximum amount.

7. BUILDINGS INSURANCE: Is buildings insurance the landlord’s responsibility, and if so check how
that will be charged under the lease. If you are part of a bigger property, you don’t want to be 
paying extra because another tenant is a high risk user.

8. REPAIR COSTS: Have you factored in costs for repairing the building? You may be taking on 
responsibility for putting the property into good repair and this could include major works, such 
as repairing the roof. Agree a Schedule of Condition with the lease as this limits your liability. A 
small initial outlay could save you thousands of pounds at the end of the lease.

9. RENT REVIEW: If the lease is going to have a rent review, make sure the rent review clause is a
fair one. You don’t want to find assumptions in it that will artificially inflate your rent at the rent 
review.
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4 tips to maintain your energy

2/12/2013

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It's the morning after the week before - what do you do now?

We had great fun working with you guys and helping you start your new businesses; here are our top 4 tips to help you keep inspired and motivated:

1. Focus on your big goal.
Keep in mind what your long term goal is. This will keep you motivated to keep going.

2. Be accountable to someone.
Find other people that are likely to keep you motivated, let them ask you questions about how your business is developing and what your goals are. This will help you keep focused and will encourage you to keep progressing every day.

3. Sell. Sell.Sell
There is nothing like your first sale! Get out there and sell something to someone. Make money, make it happen.

4. Do something every day
Take baby steps every day. Each small step is a step closer to your big goal

Remember you are not on your own! We are here to support you so get in touch with us and ask us questions, we had great fun working with you and we are looking forward to seeing you develop and progress.

Have fun and make it happen!

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The Only 2 ways to make more money in Retail: Part 1

15/10/2013

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Get more customers

At the Poplar HARCA Pop Up Business School we looked at how we attract more customers to our ‘stores’. We saw stores as either a physical location or a virtual location.

1.       Produce related content – videos about how to use your product, articles, guides and information that would be useful for your customers

2.       Keywords – SEO – what words do you want to show up under.  Then use these words as tags for your YouTube videos, Twitter, Facebook, Meta-Tags on your website and in everything you do!

3.       Talk to groups – get out there and talk to groups.  The best place to start on this one is Toastmasters

4.       Competitions - RT/Like to enter – Run a competition for people to enter that if they like your page, give you there details or use a specific hash tag!  Get people involved

5.       Promotions – run a promotion for a special event, for a big deal, for something about your business

6.       Local media – think about what the local media readers or listeners would be interested in and then speak to the local media about writing articles for them.

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If you are selling photography equipment then build a community of enthusiastic photographers and bring them together adding value to their lives
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Doesn't matter if your store is a physical retail store or an online shop
 7.     Events / New business start-up event – The Poplar HARCA Pop-Up Business School start-ups are planning a big event where all 25+ of them will display their businesses!

8.        Interview experts – Find someone famous within your industry or area and then ask them if you can interview them for your blog, for your website or at your shop

9.       Twitter / Direct tweets – write directly to people and talk to them

10.      Loss leaders – retail shops will sometimes offer something at cost or below cost to attract people into their store

11.      Give-aways/offer free advice – run a come into the store on this day to get……………… free massage, free tasters, how to cook class. 

12.      Build a community – Look to build a community of people.  If you are selling cameras build a community of amateur photographers and create value for them.  If you run a comic book store then build a community of people that love to read them and run events for them.  Build a community of the people you want to work with

The key thing is that you have to bring people to your store.  They won't just happen upon you anymore!  Work to bring people to your store using these 12 ways

Big thank you to the Poplar HARCA Pop-up business school participants and Tony Pass of the Retail Operation for helping us to come up with this list!  Loving working with you.  For more tips on Retail then visit Tony's Blog at The Retail Operation
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The start of a new business - sell something to somebody

14/10/2013

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As you know we travel around the country helping people to start up businesses and occasionally we share with you brand new start up businesses that are getting going.............

Alan has just bought a handmade card for his wife (don't tell her she hasn't got it yet!)

Check out RazorCandy for incredible hand made cards for any occasion

This is the card Alan bought for his wife

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Handmade cards............

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Sell something to somebody

As you know our mantra is sell something to somebody and Razor Candy has done that.  They have designed fabulous hand made cards and sold them to other Pop-Up Business School participants as a starting point. 

What are you going to sell?

Who are you going to sell it to??

Have a look at Zayneea's website and her business here!

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5 ways to make money - business start-up ideas

3/9/2013

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1. Create a tour of your city - Boston Pizza Tour Company

PictureThe Boston Skyline
In March 2013 I travelled to Boston, Massachusetts to visit Harvard Business school and to have a few days break in Boston and travelling up the coastline to Maine, Portland and around.  We had a fabulous time.  Whilst we were there we heard about theBoston Pizza Tour. 

                                                                                                                                                                                                        Now Katie and I love Pizza, we love touring, exploring and learning about the local area so it seemed like the perfect thing for us to do!

Our tour guide was  we toured around the north end of the city or little Italy as it is know and tasted Pizza

He launched the tour in the second half of 2011 and it took off.  2012 he said was a very good year and he was flat out and in 2013 he is taking on four tour guides to work with him delivering the tours around Boston's north end.

He has used social media and local advertising with tourist agencies to grow his business and this year is experimenting with Groupon to sell more ticket to increase his online presence.

Idea #1 is start a tour of your local city and sell it to the locals and the tourists.  I have been thinking of doing one for Basingstoke for some time now!


2. Create a social media training company

PictureNicky Kriel at the launch of her book
I have a fabulous friend Nicky Kriel.  If you have read our blog you will have seen her and heard her tips on social media.  Back in December 2010 she decided to master Twitter and went on a journey learning everything she could over the next few months, reading blogs, books and putting everything into action.  She soon had over a thousand followers and was starting to teach other small businesses how to use Twitter for their business.

Over the years since she has worked for major multinational companies on their twitter strategy, she has sold her courses online via twitter and most recently she has launched her book.  I have been so impressed with how Nicky has built a business from nothing.

Idea #2 is to build a social media training business in your local area, become a LinkedIn or Facebook expert

3. Sell your skills online

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Recently I have been buying a lot of services through www.peopleperhour.com

It is amazing what you can find on there.  I have bought logo design services, press release writing and even cartoon designing.  Yes I commissioned my own cartoon.

We all have our own skills, we all have something that we find easy that everyone else find difficult.  Thing about what you could sell and then have a go selling it on www.peopleperhour.com

Idea #3 is to work out what skills you have and what you love doing and sell it online!


4. Sell food out of a trailer

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Alan one of the co-founders of the Pop-Up Business School is getting married this summer and he has been organising caterers!  He found Chris Matthews and his company http://www.rollingstonepizza.co.uk/

Chris build a pizza oven out of clay and mounted it in a trailer.  He now drives around the country service wood smoked pizza for his customers and they are so delicious!

Do you like to cook?  What is your favourite type of food?

Chris was inspired to start after hearing a radio show talking about starting a food business and not hearing anything about Pizza which is a food he loves. He did some research and didn't find many mobile vendors and set up his business which is really taking off this year!

Think about what type of food you would sell and how you would do it!

Idea #4 if you love food, create a mobile kitchen and start selling it to people

5. Training other people

PictureAlan Donegan delivering a presentation for Pop-Up Business School
We had someone come on our first ever Pop-Up Business School who had a wealth of experience in retail.  He had worked in retail for years.  He decided to set up a retail consultancy and train other people and had an incredible first 6 months working for some of the biggest names in UK retail

Our very own co-founder Alan Donegan set up his business called Enjoy Presenting and runs courses for Microsoft, Pepsi and Allianz now. 




  • What skills do you have that other people find difficult?
  • What do you love to do?
  • What excites you?
  • What would you enjoy learning about?

Five simple ways to make money and start a business doing something you love!

We will be doing some more articles like this over the coming months to inspire you with ideas! Setting up your own business is simpler than you imagine but also more work than you imagine!

You don't start your own business to have more time.  But the rewards are huge.  Please do tweet us about the businesses you are setting up and let us know of any ideas you have.

The Pop-Up Business School Team

Follow @popUPbusiness
Next events:

Poplar London 7th October onwards

Weston-Super-Mare 18th November
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Another nail in the High Street's coffin? Model Zone

4/7/2013

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PictureModel Zone Basingstoke has gone in administration
Today I noticed Model Zone in Basingstoke was having a sale, being the geek I am I called in and found out that they had gone into Administration and were selling everything off!

Is this another nail in the high street's coffin?  The high street is already littered with empty shops, however it always seems busy.  There are always people their.  So why are businesses failing and shops being left open if the people are still walking past the doors?

There are so many questions surrounding the future of the high street and whether or not it will survive.  I thought I would ask you want you think about the future of the high street and give you some thoughts about setting up a shop

We would love to know your thoughts on the future of the high street

  1. Why should customers buy things in a shop when it is generally cheaper online?
  2. What makes you want to buy something in store?
  3. What would make you visit the high streets or shopping centers more often?

Is now the time to set up shop?

With so much change on the high street and so many shops laying empty, now might just be the time for you to take the retail world by storm!  Come up with your idea and there are opportunities abound to get retail space for free.

What type of shop or service would you open up?

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Should I sell on twitter?

1/7/2013

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Sales is a word that has a lot of baggage.  In our courses when we say the word sales to people they say things like

  • Used car sales men
  • Untrustworthy
  • Double Glazing
No wonder people don't like selling, but if you want to own your own business then you have to get comfortable with it.  Nothing happens in business until you make a sale!

Prompted by you our followers and people on our courses we thought we would ask Twitter Expert Nicky Kriel your question "Should I sell on Twitter?"


For the answer watch the video to the right!


The thing to remember is treat people as you would like to be treated

Want to know more?

Then we have a huge amount of blogs on the site about Twitter and business.  Related posts:

  • How to increase your Google rankings
  • Twitter for Housing Associations
  • How to find customers on social media

Of use the links to the right to buy Nicky Kriel's fabulous new book called "how to twitter for business succes"

Paperback version

Kindle version

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Top 11 ways to get traffic

16/5/2013

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Top 11 ways to get traffic to your website

  1. Blogging - create a blog and write some content that will be valuable to your audience
  2. Twitter - create a twitter account and talk to people interested in your subject - include links to your website
  3. Facebook - Post with pictures and slogans and links to your website
  4. YouTube - create short "how to videos" and put them on your website as well.  YouTube is the 2nd biggest search engine in the world!
  5. Back-links - swap links to your website with people who own websites in the same industry
  6. Flyers - put your website address on your flyer and give it to people.  Old School we know!
  7. Interview experts - find someone in your field that is an expert and interview them.  Put this on your blog and tweet about it
  8. Guest Blogging - find blogs within your field that have a large follower-ship and offer to write them a guest blog
  9. Email lists - build an email ist of people interested in your subject and send them something valuable every other month
  10. PPC - this is expensive but can drive good traffic.  Use Google PPC service. Pay Per Click
  11. Free Press - get to know your local paper and ask them to do a feature on your business.
Thanks to the Pop-Up Team that helped me write this post

Tony - The Retail Operation

Jackie - JHTS Transcription Service

Michael  - Future Clean car cleaning



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How do you make your customers buy today?

19/2/2013

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After an interesting experience in Sainsbury's last night I wanted to share with you these top tips on how you can get your customer to take action today and buy your products. 

We would love to know what you think so add comments below and please share and re-tweet if you think it is valuable
Just to prove it here are the 3 bags of shopping that I ended up purchasing just because of the special offer in Sainsbury's.  I will end up eating the nuts and using the toothpaste but I didn't need to buy it yesterday.

Take some time to answer these two questions for your business:

Why should my customers buy today?

What else could they buy as well to increase the value of the transaction?

Have fun.  Stay in touch and most of all have fun in everything you do!
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3 bags of shopping I had no intention of buying
The full text from the video:

  1. Do promotions change the way you shop?
  2. Have you ever walked into a supermarket and bought something you weren’t expecting to buy?
  3. Have you been manipulated?

Well I thought I would share with you some things we can learn from some of Britain’s biggest institutions the supermarkets and how they do business.

Last night I went to Sainsbury’s for a coffee with a friend in the Starbucks.  I planned to buy nothing.   I had the coffee and as I was leaving there was a big display stand in front of me with the new James Bond Blu-ray and DVDs on sale.

They were on offer.  Spend £30 in store today and you can get the Blu-ray for £12 only.  That seemed pretty good.  I paced around the display stand wondering if I should do it.

You probably know that I am a James Bond fan and I loved the most recent Daniel Craig movie so I did it. This simple promotion of: if you spend £30 in store today you can get £6.99 off got me.

I spend the next 30 minutes buying stuff around the store that I am not sure I needed to by.  I picked up three packs of cereal (we will always use that) then some kitchen towel and toothpaste.  6 Packs of Toothpaste!

Then two large packs of nuts.  Some aftershave balm (got to look after my complexion and then finally this is the last straw I bought hand cream.  I thought I don’t want to have dry skin I will by hand cream.

I wasn’t going to buy anything and now I am wondering round the shop buying hand cream trying to tot up the figures in my head to see if I have spent £30 or not! I don’t want to go to the till and have nearly spent £30 so I over spend and when I get to the till and go through the self-checkout do you know what my total bill was?

£52!

I wasn’t going to buy anything.  Nothing at all.

My behaviour completely changed and all because an offer.

So what can we learn from Sainsbury’s?  For me it comes down to two things.

1.       Give people a reason to buy NOW.  Sainsbury’s brilliant said if I do this now then I can get something I want cheaper.  I was sucked in and I bought now.

2.       Up sell.  Sainsbury’s not only gave me a reason to buy NOW, they also asked me to purchase more for me to get what I wanted cheaper! And I like the lemming that I am followed instructions and spend £40 more!

So the questions you need to ask yourself if you want to increase your sales are:

1.       What reason is there for my customer to buy today?

2.       Why should they spend more money with me today?

To give you an example, say you ran a Yoga class weekly.  If you had a new person turn up for your course why should they sign up today to come back again next week and not only why should they sign up now, why should they sign up now for the twelve week package?

If you want to increase your sales you need to give your customers reasons to buy and reasons to buy NOW!

Love to hear about your experience of how offers have changed your buying patterns and your experiences of using them for your business.

Make some comments below and please share this if you think it is useful.

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I want to start a business but don't know how!

6/8/2012

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This workshop will guide you step by step through running your own business, what type of company to start, how to deal with tax, how to start selling and the nuts and bolts of small business start-ups.  We have started a few companies in our time and have some of the magic shortcuts and tips we can share with you

Coming to Weston Super Mare on the 1st of October

On the 1st of October we will be coming to Weston Super Mare to run a two week pop-up business school which is FREE for anyone to attend.  Come along to the opening event on the 1st at 10am at the Motex Centre.  Find out more about the Weston event here or download the full event schedule

Click here to be taken to the Weston Page to book your place

Follow us here:

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Confused about how to start??

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We'll help you get it going and make it a success!

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How to turn ideas into a business

3/8/2012

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This workshop is perfect if you have been thinking about starting a business but just didn’t know what the practical first steps are!   If you have been dreaming of opening a barber shop, a tattoo shop, a café or restaurant or a small internet business then this is the workshop for you.  Come along and we will help you get started.  Together we can make these dreams come true

Coming to Weston Super Mare on the 1st of October

On the 1st of October we will be coming to Weston Super Mare to run a two week pop-up business school which is FREE for anyone to attend.  Come along to the opening event on the 1st at 10am at the Motex Centre.  Find out more about the Weston event here or download the full event schedule

To sign up to come along go here

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