Each month we hold a FREE Network event for business in the local area, and our group is highly talked of (so we are told!!)

This month we had Laura Evans from Fathom IT presenting to the group about getting the best from your website, and getting honest opinions from others on what they think of others websites; it proved an interested session.

Feedback from the group this month was excellent and many new contacts have been made.

To register for the next session which is Tuesday 16th July, email susan.renshaw@cbpl.co.ukLaura from Fathom IT presenting to the group

Carrington Business Park (www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk) can help. A non-profit organisation based on the outskirts of Manchester, Carrington Business Park have been renting offices to Manchester-based small and medium businesses for 25 years.

Here are their top “dos” and “don’ts” of finding offices to rent in Manchester…

Don’t… rent an office in Manchester city centre

Sure, Manchester’s city centre is a vibrant, exciting place to be. But it’s also expensive to rent offices here – not to mention difficult to get to by car.

Do… find somewhere that’s easy to access

Consider Manchester’s outskirts – easy to access and less expensive. What’s more, staff and clients travelling to you by car won’t have to navigate central Manchester’s confusing labyrinth of roads. And best of all, at a business park such as Carrington there’s even free parking.

Don’t… assume bigger is better

Small business? Rent a small office. Bigger offices can have a cold, impersonal atmosphere, and incur unnecessarily expensive heating and lighting costs.

Do... rent an office that’s the right size for you

When choosing your office to rent, consider the space you need for equipment and your team, and rent an office that’s the right size for it all. You can always move to bigger (or smaller) premises as and when you need to – which brings us to our next don’t…

Don’t... tie yourself into a long contract

In six months’ time your business could have transformed beyond all recognition, meaning you may need a much larger – or smaller – office. Not ideal if you’re tied into a 12-month contract.

Do… rent an office with a flexible agreement

So don’t be tied into a 12-month contract! Ensure you rent an office with a short-term agreement that you can leave with no more than one month’s notice.

Don’t… rent the first office you see

It can be tempting to jump right into the first office you see. But think carefully before signing that deal. Make sure you’ve visited a few offices before picking your office to rent.

Do… look for an office to rent with great added extras

One of the differentiators between a good office and a great office is the range of facilities offered. Do you have access to conference and training rooms? On-site catering? Free parking? Carrington Business Park has all this and more.

Find out more at www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk.

Based five minutes from the M60, on the outskirts of Manchester, Carrington Business Park (www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk) provide offices to rent of small to medium businesses – and they also offer superb workshop and training facilities on short-term leases. Here’s how taking advantages of their flexible training services can help you…

Isolation from distractions

When training, you’ll want everyone to give their undivided attention. Hold training sessions on-site and it’s all too easy for fellow colleagues to interrupt. It’s also far too easy for trainees to slip away to check calls or emails. Hold training off-site and you’ll keep such distractions to a minimum.

New environment – new ideas

Training often requires participants to “think outside the box” – so if you’re surrounded by the same old “box” of your office, the same old ideas may persist. A change of scenery can help focus the mind, open everyone up to new ideas, and help your trainees to bring their own new ideas to the table.

Bigger rooms for larger groups

Your office may not have a room that’s suitable for training. If you run a small or medium-sized business, you probably don’t have a bespoke training room – and if you’re bringing together staff from various different locations, you might not have a room large enough to accommodate everyone. Carrington Business Park have training rooms that can accommodate up to 60 people – or as few as eight.

Training rooms that can be accessed by all

Also of importance if people are travelling from far and wide is accessibility. Business parks tend to be easy to access – for example, Carrington Business Park is near the M6 and M60 motorways, is accessible by public transport from Manchester city centre, and Manchester Airport is also close by. What’s more, any attendees travelling by car can take advantage of free parking.

Flexibility – configured just for you

Bespoke training rooms such as the room offered by Carrington can easily be tailored to suit the format of your training sessions. The rooms can be laid out in several configurations, and the main conference room can even be split into two separate rooms. This means when training larger groups you could run two sessions at once – saving you time and money.

Practical workshop training

Carrington Business Park also offer a wide range of flexible workshop facilities – ideal if your training involves practical elements that require laboratory conditions or manufacturing processes. Workshops can be rented on flexible monthly agreements.

So whatever your training needs, Carrington Business Park can help you provide the perfect environment. Find out more about Carrington’s training facilities, workshops and offices to lease at www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk.

Located on the outskirts of Manchester, Carrington Business Park (www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk) offers a wide range of facilities for small and medium-sized businesses – including impressive workshop and training facilities. Here are just some of the ways they could help you…

Workshop space – as and when you need it

All of Carrington’s workshop spaces are offered on short-term agreements, so they’re ideal whether you’re working on a quick, short project or a long-term development.  And if what seemed like a short project develops into something bigger, their flexible agreements mean you can keep your workshop for as long as you need it.

Your own personal laboratory

Need to carry out research and development on new products in a safe, secure environment? Or maybe the products you manufacture require laboratory conditions due to their sensitive nature? Carrington Business Park can provide you with bespoke laboratory space tailored to you and your needs.

Room to manufacture

Whatever you’re producing, Carrington Business Park can provide you with the space to do it. And if you’re working in computer hardware, you can take advantage of specially-designed workshops with the perfect conditions to manufacture your equipment.

Professional photography studio

Whether you’re taking intricate close-up photos of diamond jewellery or dynamic, powerful images of cars, Carrington can provide the ideal studio set-up. Their clean, modern studios will help you get the best possible images.

More than just workshop rental…

With Carrington Business Park, you get more than just workshop space with your monthly rental. A phone line, reception service, mail services and even security are all included in the price – not to mention free parking. And remember, with Carrington’s flexible agreements, you can cancel at any time.

Need training before getting into the workshop?

Maybe you need to train up new team members before they get their hands dirty in the workshop. Or maybe your existing team needs a quick refresher before getting to work. Either way, it’s worth knowing that Carrington also offer impressive on-site training facilities.

Easy to find, easy to access

Being located on the outskirts of Manchester, Carrington Business Park is highly accessible whether travelling by car, public transport, or even by plane – Manchester Airport is just ten minutes away.

Find out more about Carrington Business Park’s workshop and training facilities – and their great value office rental services – at http://www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk/.

Alex presented to the group on how to blog successfully for business, and he certainly is the man in the know, as Alex has been blogging since 1999 (long before most of us probably even knew what blogging was!) and some of his blogs have been read by over half a million people!

Here’s some TIPS from Alex:-

• Who is your audience? Judge the level of information they have prior to reading the blog
• Remember what you learnt in school about a story having a beginning, a middle and an end – this applies to blogs as well. Make sure you include the meaty bit in the middle
• Draft, re-draft and draft again – always ask the question – What fluff is in there that doesn’t been to be? What have I missed out?
• A blog needs to convey a level of importance and offer value to the reader. By the end of the blog have they learnt something?
• Always end with a call to action – Do you want readers to contact you, comment on the blog or share the blog

To read more from Alex’s blogs see this link

http://altrinchamhq.co.uk/blog/are-you-blogging-for-business-or-blogging-for-justin-bieber-fans/

The Partington Pledge, spearheaded by Trafford Council, the Department of Work and Pensions and the Partington Neighbourhood Partnership, invites businesses to offer their support to young people in a number of ways, whether it be offering a job or work experience, recruiting an apprentice or providing practical help with CV writing or preparing for interviews.

There are 85 young people aged between 18-24 who are out of work and actively seeking employment in the area and 240 businesses located in the immediate vicinity of Partington and Carrington. The Pledge aims to match the two together in a mutually beneficial way.

Leader of Trafford Council, Cllr Matt Colledge, said: “This is a fantastic opportunity for businesses to make a real difference to the future of young people in Partington whilst enhancing their own profile and reputation at the same time. Trafford Council is committed to supporting young people in the borough and we are delighted to be working with partner organisations and local businesses to enable schemes like this to come to fruition.”

Colin Billingsley, of the Department for Work and Pensions, added: “This is a terrific opportunity for local businesses, no matter how big or small, to kick-start the career of a young person from Partington.”

The first businesses to get involved in the initiative gathered here at the Business Park this week to sign the pledge. Those who have signed include ourselves, Harcon Services Ltd, Duro Felguera, Alstom, Premier Inn, Blue Arrow, SAICA, Trafford College, British Army – 103 Regiment Royal Artillery and 207 Field Hospital and Your Housing Group.

Wolfgang Puschitz, Alstom project director said: “We’re delighted to be involved with this admirable initiative. Getting young people into work is key to the future success of this area. Alstom and our consortium partners Duro Felguera will be in the area for the next three years, during the construction of Carrington Power Station and we want to work closely with the community to maximise benefits to local people.”

If your business is interested in signing up or requires any more information about the Partington Pledge, please email your contact details to Partingtonpledge@outlook.com or call 0161 912 4176.

If you’ve never looked for an office to rent before, it’s hard to know where to start. But help is at hand.

Carrington Business Park (www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk) is conveniently located on the outskirts of Manchester, and has offices to rent to small and medium-sized businesses in Manchester. They’ve identified three pitfalls you must avoid when renting your first office…

1. Don’t stretch yourself

Business is booming, money’s flooding in and you’re ready to take the plunge into your first rented office. But don’t just jump into the first swanky office you see.

You don’t need to be in the city centre, and offices on the outskirts will have lower rents. And if you’re currently only a one or two-person operation, you should rent an office that’s designed for one or two people – it’ll be cheaper than a huge office with unnecessary, unwanted space.

2. Be afraid of commitment

If your business continues to grow, who knows how big you’ll be in six months’ time? Alternatively – and nobody likes to hear this, but it must be considered – if things don’t go as well as expected, you may need to leave your office behind.

Ensure you rent an office on a short-term agreement. A flexible agreement on a rolling monthly basis gives you the opportunity to leave when it’s right for you – so you won’t be tied into an expensive contract when it’s time to move on.

3. Don’t isolate yourself – no business is an island

Networking with other small business owners can be a great way to get new contacts and new business, but if you’ve isolated yourself in a rented office hidden away from everyone else, networking opportunities may be few and far between.

Consider looking for an office to rent in a business park. You’ll be part of a thriving business community, and who knows where a chance meeting in the work cafe or on the car park might lead? (And speaking of car parks, many business parks offer free parking – you certainly wouldn’t get that in Manchester city centre.)

If you’re looking for an office to rent that’s easily accessible, on Manchester’s outskirts, at a size to suit your fledgling business, on a flexible short-term agreement, and that offers fantastic networking opportunities and plenty of free parking, try Carrington Business Park.

Find out more at www.carringtonbusinesspark.co.uk.

The Partington Pledge is a local initiative to help young Partington residents gain employment with the support of local businesses. There are currently 85 young people between 18-24 years that are out of work and need help to move in to employment.

By signing up to the Partington Pledge, local businesses can offer help and support to local young people, making  a real difference to their lives by offering opportunities to help them get in to work more quickly. Financial incentives will be in place for those businesses able to offer jobs or apprenticeships to the young people.

Examples of things that local Businesess can do to help;

• Offer a job
• Recruit an apprentice
• Offer work experience
• Provide mentoring support to a young person
• Give practical help, for example help with CV writing, preparing for interview

In return for signing up to the Partington Pledge, local Businesses will  receive dedicated help and support from a named contact who will help match your business to a local young person and be invited you to a launch event for the signing of the Partington Pledge on 30^th April 2013.

If you are interested in signing up or require any more information about the Partington Pledge, please email us at

partingtonpledge@outlook.com or

telephone 0161 912 4176.

This however didnt cause too much confusion and as usual we had an excellent turn out.

Our Guest Speaker this month was Dave Chapman from the Utility Warehouse.  Dave spoke of how the UW guarantees you the UK’s cheapest Utilities.

‘Many people think that what the Utility Warehouse offers is simply TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE’, but what we offer is just absolutely fanstasic and money is saved by everyone who joins us’

For more details on the Utility Warehouse of if you would like to speak with David himself:-

www.utilitywarehouse.org.uk/davidchapman

or call

07940 895811

We have to hold it on a Wednesday this month as our usual room is booked on the Tuesday, so it is to be held Wednesday 17th April, arrive for registration and refreshments at 9.30 am and we aim to start at 9.45am

This months Guest Speaker slot is David Chapman from the Utility Warehouse who will be discussing the Utility Warehouse and the latest improvements and changes.

To register contact susan.renshaw@cbpl.co.ukIf you arent 100% sure of your availability until the last minute, registering is not essential, it just helps slightly to know rough numbers in advance

Remember this is a FREE Event and all parking on site is also FREE