NEWS! NEWS! NEWS!
BEGINNERS GUIDE TO FACEBOOK FOR MUMS
(A step-by-step guide to using Facebook for your business)
SIGN UP NOW FOR ONLY £35 (normally £45)
This is a practical 2 hour, step-by-step course to help you use one of the most profitable ways to find new customers for your business. We will show you the basics, from how to sign up and set up an account to how you can start connecting to lots of potential customers. In the short session:
You will gain confidence and understanding of how social media works
You will have access to lots of articles, tips to help you make the most of Facebook
You will receive links to other useful websites to help you promote your business
You will be up and running by the end of the course
You will also receive a step-by-step workbook to take with you
To reserve your place and book the BEGINNERS GUIDE TO FACEBOOK COURSE, email olivia@excelsya.co.uk.
Date: 13 July
Time: 9.30am-11.30am
Venue: TBC
LIMITED PLACES SO BOOK NOW!
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LADIES,
Join us, come to our monthly
BUSINESS IDEAS FAIR & NETWORKING EVENT
on the 15th September 2010
(there are no events for July and August)
This a FREE, friendly and informal networking event to help women, especially mums explore business ideas, meet and greet other like-minded women and collect information on business resources. There will be a wide selection of books about particular businesses and light refreshments will be available. Plenty of parking space and lots of shops around.
IT IS FREE!
Time & Venue
10am-12pm Wednesday 14th July 2010
The Wealdstone Centre, 38-40 High Street, Wealdstone, HA3 7AE
For more information contact: olivia@excelsya.co.uk
Future Dates:
15th September 2010
6th October 2010
(don't miss this one it's National Business Mum Week 2-9 Oct )
Mums in Business- The Quiet Revolution?
“There is a revolution going on in the world and it’s coming from the grass roots. It’s the revolution of the sustainable entrepreneurs, mainly women, and it’s about personal growth as well as an economic tool. It’s the feminine way to create business.”
Quote by Lynne Franks (Founder of SEED- Sustainable Enterprise and Empowerment Dynamics)
A new global phenomenon is emerging, there is has been a dramatic rise in the number of women starting their own business. In the revolution of women entrepreneurs, the fastest growing segment are mothers, also known as ‘mumpreneurs’. 27% of self-employed people in the UK are women (A Strategic Framework for Women’s Enterprise, Small Business Service, 2003) Of all the new women business owners, 50% are mothers. These are a new generation of women who have conquered the task of managing the raising of a family and building successful businesses. Some define a ‘mumpreneur’ as a woman who seeks and recognises business opportunities, raises the necessary capital, launches the business and runs the business successfully while bringing up children, managing the household chores. This need-driven phenomenon is taking the multi-dimensional and multi-tasking abilities of women to new heights. For single women, the option of starting their own business means they are longer having to decide between work and having a family but the freedom to do both.
Characteristics of the New ‘Mumpreneurs’
• 80% of women compared with 17% of men are responsible for looking after the children or arranging childcare facilities. (‘The Barriers Start to Fall’ – Barclays 2000)
• Internet savvy & social network experts
• Biggest online consumers
• Women are more likely to seek business support before starting a business. (by 6% more than other businesses, SBS Promoting Female Entrepreneurship, March 2005)
Multi-tasking and management lessons learnt while managing the rearing of children, running the household and complex situation over a long period of time, makes them well equipped to be able to run a business. However, there is a difference between this and the superwoman syndrome, clever mumpreneurs recognised that to achieve all this success requires a lot of assistance and actively seeks help.
Why is it a woman thing? Why is gender an issue in business?
Government research indicates that although some women experience difficulties staying in long term employment or starting their own businesses, it’s really during motherhood that most experience difficulties. As you become mum, all of a sudden your priorities have changed, along with the free time you can devote to things you want to achieve, due to caring duties.
Prowess, is the UK leading association organisation that promotes and lobbies on behalf of women’s enterprise groups. Its research also shows that women don’t necessarily indentify themselves as entrepreneurs, many dislike business terms like ‘entrepreneur’ and ‘networking’. Dr Lois Frankel, author of ‘Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office’ and ‘Nice Girls Don’t Get Rich’ says women don’t feel bold enough to call themselves leaders.
For the UK as a whole, women are more likely than men to be involved with a socially orientated start-up 5.8% of women compared to 4.9% of men. (Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Focus on Social Entrepreneurs, GEM 2004)
Clearly, all this talk of ‘having-it-all’ doesn’t necessarily mean these women have the all the answers, especially for those on lower income, having-it-all means doing-it-all. The debate on whether a woman can have-it-all is still ongoing. The challenges are even more so about having enough quality time and maintaining a work/life balance at least in the early stages of the business, but at least this time women have more control of their options. Some women are content and deliberately restrict the growth of their businesses in order to keep the balance they worked so hard to achieve.
Why is the revolution quiet one?
This is far from it being a new wave of feminism, this movement is actually quite simply about women wanting to define a new way of making a living that works for them and their families. It is a way to bring in the extra income needed, using qualifications and skills that they have acquired and still being able to be best parent they can be - the answer to the work/life balance. Its more than a need for more childcare facilities, it’s an opportunity to stop and reassess what we believe we should do against the way we really want live.
The ideology is so common among women and mothers that they themselves don’t recognised they are part of global movement. The need for change is family orientated and so individual that women are surprised to look up from their local confines to find other likeminded women in the same boat going the same direction. That’s why the revolution is not waving its collective fists at men, but instead making a quiet withdrawl from the system in search of alternatives.
Do all women encounter the similar obstacles?
Government research shows that women on low income with at least one child and, women from certain cultures are most likely to experience longer periods of unemployment. It is important to note that a woman with middle income and very young children who goes through a divorce can sometimes suddenly become a lone parent on low income and even living on benefits, simply because her sole income may not have been enough to pay the mortgage, or her caring responsibilities prevent her holding down a full time job.
Ironically, research has shown that in developing countries, it is more common for women to be involved in entrepreneurial activities (sometimes referred to as petty trading) simply as a way of helping to feed her family and not a lifestyle choice. This may also be because of the lack of major employers in their locality and there is also much less red tape and bureaucracy than that of developed countries.
Some could argue that women have long being more entrepreneurial than they have been given credited for. Women have always in some form or another been involved in some sort of trading activity especially on a small scale via the likes of companies such as Avon, Tuperware, Kleeneze etc. The only issue here is, women involved in these activities in the past have yield very small income and sometimes below thresholds that were not recorded in important economic statistics. However, women are no longer confined to starting stereotypical businesses but have branched into traditionally male dominated sectors of industry.
So now what?
As a result women of becoming aware of this global trend, some have spotted lucrative opportunities and are creating products and services that cater to other mums because they understand their specific needs. Women such as, Jill Hopkins who founded MumsClub (an online forum for business mums) and The Business Mums Journal. Sue Botterill, started My Mag- a franchised local directory publishing business. Other companies who have capitalised on this trend include the leading American business publisher, Entrepreneur Magazine. They have added another website to their empire dedicated to women entrepreneurs. Total Franchise has created Female Franchise- a site to cater for the female market alongside their main site. Other companies target marketing strategies to the children of these more affluent group of parents, recognising that these women have greater independent buying power.
The topical nature of emerging mumpreneurs and their businesses means they are benefiting from rising media interest. What is also clear from research is that women entrepreneurs just like their male counterparts are as just diverse, some choosing to run lifestyle business and others multinational business empires. The building of business empires is not only the prevail of men.
The first UK purpose built women’s business centre was created as a women friendly environment in which to foster female enterprises. It was first a local community project started in Newham, and has become so successful that it has now become accessible to any aspiring business women in the UK. Along with other initiatives, the government after consultation with other women enterprise organisations like Prowess, has agreed to trial a pilot scheme of women business centres across the UK similar to those in America. There are approximately 130 government funded women business centres in the US.
So whatever you want to call it, you can’t ignore the tide of potential opportunities around. This may prove to be the best time to put that dream idea to the test.
Recommended Resources:
• Prowess - www.prowess.org.uk
• The Women’s Business Centre – www.herbusiness.co.uk
• Business Link - www.buisnesslink.gov.uk
Probably the best place to start for general information. It is also the best place to find information about grants and business regulations.
Books:
• The Ultimate Women’s Business Information Directory
Author: Olivia King-Boateng
Publisher: Excelsya
• Make it Your Business: The Ultimate Business Start-up Guide for Women
Authors: Lucy Martin, Bella Mehta
Publisher: Spring Hill/ How to Books
• Secrets of Successful Women Entrepreneurs
Author: Sue Stockdale
Publisher: Bookshaker
• Supermummy: The Ultimate Mumpreneur’s Guide to Online Business Success
Author: Mel Mcgee
Publisher: Bookshaker
• Women On Top: How Women Entrepreneurs are Rewriting the Rules of Business Success
Author: Margaret Heffernan
Publisher: Penguin Books
• Having it all? : Choices for today’s superwoman
Author: Paula Nicholson
Publisher: Wiley & Sons