ICAEW Business Advice Service (BAS)
Activity Update 2013
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BAS has been in operation for two years, having been
launched in September 2011 with the following objectives:

Promote ICAEW Chartered Accountants as the first source of financial and business
advice to small and medium-sized businesses;

Highlight the benefit of qualified versus unqualified accountants;

Support practitioners on the High Street, help them attract potential new clients and
build their practices;

Help develop local economies and the growth of SMEs;

Build ICAEW’s reputation and influence with key stakeholders for supporting
enterprise and economic growth

Demonstrate to the Government our public interest role in supporting a private-sector
led recovery;

Enhance the ICAEW brand and highlight the role our members play in the Big Society.
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Key Facts
• Minimum number of BAS inquiries per week: 143
• Average number of times per week a BAS firm appears in a search within the
directory: 646
• Average number of BAS-related events per week: 3.8
• Average number of BAS blog visits per week: 1,864
• Weekly Advertising Value Equivalent of media coverage: £8,720
• Total number of participating firms: Over 3,200
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BAS Social Media
• Over 6,000 Twitter followers
• Twitter impressions often exceed 1 million impressions per month
• Over 50 firms provide blogs at businessadviceserviceblog.com
• Short testimonial-based videos, showcasing the successful use of BAS by a real businesses.
Video 1 and Video 2
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BAS Partners
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BAS Sponsorship
LBA - We are offering a prize of £2,000 worth of advice from a
BAS firm as part of the Newspaper Society’s Local Business
Accelerator competition
Enterprise Nation - We are sponsoring a series of StartUp
Saturday events around the regions
The Pitch - For the second year, we are supporting The Pitch,
the UK’s biggest small business competition
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ICAEW sponsors The Pitch 2013
•
One of the UK’s longest running small business competitions
•
Sponsoring for second year running
•
ICAEW representatives on regional judging panels and lead judging panel at live event
on 25 September
•
£1,000 worth of BAS firm fees as part of prize package
•
Perfect opportunity to promote how ICAEW BAS supports SMEs and start-ups through
the qualified expertise of ICAEW Chartered Accountants
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BAS Advertising
• Our Spring 2013 online campaign clearly boosted visits to the directory of firms, with
searches rising by about 50 per cent in May.
• Total unique visitors during campaign period via advertising: 12,829
• Top performing channels include ads on Yahoo, google adwords and RSS media feeds
• Advertorial in Realbusiness about managing cashflow received over 800 page views
•
Content-led advertising such as the HTMLs, premium text ads, and
editorial on emedia and Realbusiness have generated the best
engagement proving that providing relevant, valuable content, and
serving content/ads to subscriber lists really works.
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BAS Month – June 2013
• 56 events held across the UK
• 5,000 entrepreneurs
• Over 1.5 million Twitter impressions
• 7,000 Facebook reach
• #BASmonth – this hashtag occupied the top tweets
during the month
• Links with local chambers, LEPs, FSB, StartUp Britain
• 7,458 BAS blog views
• Promoting #BASshowcase helped to generate
Facebook reach of over 69,000
• 766 online brand mentions
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Business Advice Month – Quotes
Growing your business is challenging. But, help is available and, despite the gloom,
there are businesses which are performing well.
Keith Proudfoot, Northern Regional Director
Many got involved with the ICAEW’s Business Advice Month to provide help and
support to local SMEs. It’s good to see.
Neil Lancaster, President of the Lichfield and Tamworth Chamber of Commerce
The panel of experts was inspiring and it was very motivational to hear from Dr Allam,
who started with almost nothing. I have come away with some good ideas to drive
things forward.
Attendee at Business StartUp Advice event at University of Hull
Our local business advice sessions allow us to reach out to the business community
and address many of the key issues that face businesses today.
Clive Lewis, Head of Enterprise
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Business Advice Month – Speakers
Oliver Letwin MP
The Lord Mayor of
Liverpool, Gary Millar
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Eric Ollerenshaw MP
Professor Mark Jenkins,
Cranfield School of
Business
Zarin Patel, Chief
Financial Officer, BBC
Dr. Assem Allam, owner of
Allam Marine and Premier
league football team, Hull
City
Michael Fallon MP, Minister
of State for Business and
Enterprise
Greame Leach IoD Chief
Economist
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There’s a tendency to
glamorise starting your
own business, says Clive.
‘In fact doing so can often
be lonely and frightening.
Clive Lewis – Head of
Enterprise, ICAEW
I like working with SMEs, says
Nicola. I couldn’t care less what size
a business is, but I do value working
with businesses that have an
entrepreneurial founder – someone
who’s put their heart and soul into
the business.
Nicola Horton - Crowe Clark Whitehill
LLP
Malcolm enjoys working with
SMEs. It’s easier to have an
impact than in big business, he
says. You can talk to
management, you can be
management. You can make
more of a difference.
Malcolm Bacchus – Baccma
Consulting
Our obsession with growth
and profitability is giving way
to an understanding that it’s
about growing a business to
the right size and then
running it well.”
Christopher Barnatt - Academic,
author & futurist
The faculty exists to make things easier for everyone involved in the process of
corporate finance – in its broadest sense,’ he says. ‘hat’s not straightforward, as this
involves a wide range of complex and easily misunderstood activities.’
David Petrie - Head of Corporate Finance Faculty, ICAEW
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As a Midlander myself, I am
personally excited by the
prospect of using the skills I
have developed as MD of
John Lewis for the benefit of
the citizens of the region.
There’s a real need to test and learn in
digital, he says. “In many ways, it’s
much harder for big companies to do
that – and that may make or break
them. A small business with the right
focus has great agility on its side.
Andy Street - Managing
Director, John Lewis’’
Daniel Rowles - Managing Director,
Target Internet
I like working with people who genuinely
care about their businesses. We focus
very much on individual cases. For
people running their own SMEs, their life
and business needs are very entwined.
You can’t separate these things out.’
Marcus Bambridge - Head of Business
Advisory Services, Haines Watts
I like working with SMEs, you can see the results of your
input. The feedback loop’s much shorter. It’s that classic thing
of being a large fish in a small pond.
There is always
opportunity. My general
rule of thumb is most
people are usually at least
2 years behind leading
edge. You don’t need
wildly radical ideas. You
just need to find a niche
and then exploit it.
Tom Cheesewright Founder, Book of the
Future
Russell Copley - Regional Manager, Angels Den
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businessadviceservice.com
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