To mark the start of the Christmas countdown, Small Business Saturday is back for its fifth year in the UK on the 2^nd of December.

Small Business Saturday is a campaign that highlights the success of small businesses and encourages buyers to shop local in small businesses to support their communities.

To mark the occasion they have been promoting one business per day via social media channels in the run up to the event to try and increase awareness before the 2^nd.

A chance for SMEs post-Black Friday

In some ways, this event is the opposite of Black Friday which mostly saw big business offering discounts on products for the week running up to Black Friday. While this can be great for big businesses, smaller ones tend to miss out and struggle to be heard over the noise.

Last year’s Small Business Saturday was estimated to have brought in an additional £717m of sales, or a 15% increase from 2015.

Get involved

If you’re interested in getting involved and supporting Small Business Saturday, you can register your business here. In doing so, you’ll be promoted via the app through the Business Finder feature and will be able to access downloads including social media and marketing packs to help you get the most out of your business this weekend.

You can also get logos and digital banners to use on websites or on business premises to show your support for the small business community.

 Run a promotion

Small businesses can get involved by offering discounts or hosting special events or campaigns. This will help new customers find (and hopefully remember) you.

Partner with another business

Know someone else with a business? Why not do something together and run a promotion across both businesses? If you sell things that could complement each other, you can help each other out. People will appreciate the double offer because of its added value. It will also help you stand out among everyone running promotions at the same time.

Download the app

A new app was released in October that can be downloaded from both the Apple and Android stores. It offers small businesses the chance to be seen by thousands of people nationwide.

The app features a small business finder and information about any deals and discounts offered by them so that customers can take a look at the best deals in their community and businesses can get noticed.

Will you be getting involved in Small Business Saturday? Have you had success with it in the past? Please let us know your thoughts.

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About The Author

Kara Copple

An experienced business and finance writer, sometimes moonlighting as a fiction writer and blogger.

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