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Sunday 21 February 2010

Google offers UK SMEs free website & setup






If you run a UK business that doesn't already have a website, here's a tip: Google London are offering to give you a free business website, including a free .co.uk domain name for 2 years, and "on the spot" help from Googlers to set up your customised site, if you're able to go to their Victoria offices on Thursday 25 Feb 2010 (this is happening between 10 am to 3 pm). Also, you'll get that all important Google goodie bag!

The free site will be set up using a "Getting British Business Online website wizard" (would like to know more about that tool) and no doubt the site will be using Google Apps since Google are involved and they feature Google Docs. It seems there will be help with online marketing too, or at least registering with Google to be indexed: "All sites created will automatically be registered in Google's search engine and so will be listed for relevant queries".

Registration closes at 5 pm London time Monday 22 Feb, that's tomorrow, so if you're interested register now for a spot, and make sure you bring all the business info with you that you'll need on your site.

This is part of the Getting British Business Online campaign launch event - currently it seems that over 1.5 million British SMEs are still without a website and "During 2010 we aim to get 100,000 small businesses online with their first website, for free."

I've not heard much about that campaign to date, though, apart from a Business Link page of 26 Jan 2010; the GBBO site seems more geared towards "partners" than SMEs seeking help, but if you have a non-London business and want help as part of this campaign, try this page and pre-register with GBBO. A small irony is that they're trying to get businesses online who aren't already, but as part of the form for pre-registering, they require an email address as compulsory!!

(Saw the Google link on ECCA).

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