A Yorkshire entrepreneur has launched a new business to tackle one of the biggest frustrations facing agency owners, after spending 15 years battling the problem himself. Steve Pritchard, former owner of a successful SEO and digital PR agency, has developed a new B2B referral platform to help agencies grow through trusted recommendations, rather than having to rely on expensive and ineffective lead-generating methods. During his agency career, Steve worked with brands including GoCompare, giffgaff and BrewDog, but also experienced first-hand the challenge of building a consistent pipeline of quality opportunities. “Like most agency owners, we tried just about everything,” he…

As digital commerce becomes increasingly shaped by AI, automation and anonymous online interactions, knowing who you are dealing with has never been more important. Josh Rathour, founder of UNiDAYS, explains why verified identity is evolving from a compliance requirement into a competitive advantage for brands. Trust has always been the foundation of commerce, but in today’s digital world, trust is often assumed rather than proven. I first became aware of this when, years ago, my daughter was using a popular entertainment platform, and it became clear that multiple unverified people could access services intended for a younger audience. As a parent,…

Late payments are one of the biggest pressures facing small business owners, including tradespeople. While some customers will be open about delays, others stop responding altogether, leaving businesses unsure whether they are dealing with a communication breakdown, a dispute or payment avoidance. For many sole traders and small businesses, waiting on payment is more than just frustrating. A recent study, which explored tradespeople’s experience of working with homeowners, found that prompt payment was valued the most by 47% of the 500 UK tradespeople surveyed. With fuel, materials and other overheads continuing to rise, delayed invoices can quickly put pressure on cash…

In this interview with SME Today magazine, Simon Shaw, CEO of London-based audience tech and media services company Fifty, explores how the high-stakes world of international sailing shaped his approach to leadership and recounts Fifty’s evolution from a garage experiment into a leading audience intelligence platform.  What does Fifty do? Fifty is an audience technology and media and marketing solutions company. For the past decade, it has used open-source, non-PII data from the web, social media and the wider digital ecosystem to understand the real audiences behind brands and organisations. The company combines human insight with AI-powered simulation to help…

Three frequent-flying business leaders have shared their tried-and-tested hacks for a smooth business trip experience.  Harvard Business Review data shows that CEOs spend more than half (53%) of their time travelling for work, often navigating fatigue and high stress alongside work demands. To help CEOs optimise their travel schedules and limit the negative side effects of frequent travel, the corporate travel experts at Booking.com for Business have gathered practical tips from experienced C-suites and business travel experts. Natália Honold, Co-founder of Lola Advisory Inc., who travels regularly for work between Brazil, the U.S., and other markets, comments: Build your itinerary geographically, not just…

By Minami Kanesawa, Co-founder of  WFH Jobs A recent Employment Tribunal ruling found that mandating that employees keep their cameras on during meetings may amount to disability discrimination – and leave employers liable for damages. In that case, a travel consultant with anxiety was told to keep her camera on during a remote training session, felt “overwhelmed” and had to log off. The tribunal found her employer should have allowed the camera-off adjustment straight away. Remote work is now firmly established, but many employers are tightening the rules around how it’s done, from camera-on mandates to pushback on home working itself. Recently, reports that Members of the Scottish Parliament were told to avoid regular remote working except…

Small businesses rushing to advertise on ChatGPT could end up making expensive marketing decisions unless they understand one major difference between AI search and Google, according to ecommerce SEO expert Thomas Phillips, Founder of DTC SEO. OpenAI has rolled out conversion-optimised advertising inside ChatGPT, allowing advertisers to optimise campaigns towards purchases, sign-ups and leads rather than simply paying for clicks. The platform has also introduced flexible campaign budgets, allowing spending to increase on days when its AI predicts stronger conversion opportunities. While the update has been widely viewed as ChatGPT’s biggest challenge yet to Google Ads, Phillips believes many businesses risk…

OpenAI has confirmed something that sounds like science fiction: one of its own AI agents “escaped” a secure test environment by exploiting an unknown vulnerability to reach the open internet, and autonomously hacked AI platform Hugging Face. OpenAI itself has called it “unprecedented.” Hugging Face’s CEO called it “mind-blowing.” This poses a question for small businesses: if the world’s best-resourced AI company can’t fully contain its own AI agents, what chance does a 20-50 person SME have? Why This Matters For SMEs SMEs don’t have OpenAI’s resources, red-teaming or incident response capability, yet they’re adopting the same category of autonomous AI tools, often without any of the guardrails. This…

Innerva is delighted to announce that it has transitioned to employee ownership through the creation of an Employee Ownership Trust. The move marks an exciting new chapter for the British designer and manufacturer of power-assisted exercise equipment. The transition will preserve Innerva’s values and culture, protect the long-term future of the business and the brand, and reward those who have played such an important role in its success. An Employee Ownership Trust (EOT) is a statutory trust that holds a controlling interest in a company on behalf of all employees, enabling businesses to remain independent while ensuring employees share in…

With the UK’s biggest reform to electricity settlement in decades now underway, energy experts are urging businesses to familiarise themselves with Market-wide Half-Hourly Settlement (MHHS) and understand what it could mean for their future energy bills. While the changes won’t directly increase bills overnight, MHHS is expected to fundamentally change how business electricity is measured, billed and managed, rewarding organisations that better understand and optimise their energy usage. To help businesses prepare, the business energy experts at Utility Bidder have explained what MHHS is, how it could impact organisations, and the practical steps businesses should be taking now. Madeleine Porter, Head of Marketing at Utility Bidder,…