Events

This workshop aims to equip you with the knowledge and skills necessary to manage your finances and comply with regulatory and legal requirements through a relevant bookkeeping system.

This workshop will explain:

• What financial records are needed.
• The broad principles and procedures of accounting systems.
• How to choose accounting systems – both manual and computerised.
• Which financial statements and statutory returns are relevant to your business.
• Different accounting periods and financial years.
• How to use financial records for monitoring the financial state of your business.
• Cash flow forecasting, profit and loss statements as well as what they should contain.
• What financial measures and forecasts are needed by your business.
• What information on financial record keeping is available and from whom.

By the end of the workshop you will be able to introduce or improve your financial record keeping system and improve how you manage your finances.

To book a place, click here.

Is your business struggling to engage via social media? Many businesses continue to broadcast and not socialise on social media. The obvious answer sounds simple, be social?

Join us for a fun session looking at how social media is meant to be used, learn about social media algorithms and specific tactics that will positively impact your brand’s organic reach and improve engagement.

To book a place, click here.

Want to boost your business with LinkedIn? We’ll take you beyond networking by showing you how it can market your products and promote your brand.

No longer just an online CV, LinkedIn can be an incredibly powerful – and profitable – business tool. Like any tool, you must learn how to use it, and this webinar gives you expert guidance.

You will:

• Create a LinkedIn strategy to boost your business reputation via marketing and brand promotion initiatives.
• Learn the difference between personal and company profiles and how to optimise them for both maximum visibility and brand awareness.
• Content is king on LinkedIn, and we’ll show you how to plan and produce captivating content that enriches your brand.

To book a place, click here.

This course is designed for beginners and will guide you through the essential skills needed to use and navigate worksheets, enter data accurately, create basic formulas and use simple functions.

This session is interactive (you will need to bring a laptop with Excel installed), giving you the opportunity to practice new skills and gain practical experience alongside the instructor. You’ll leave the course with a solid foundation in Excel, able to tackle everyday tasks efficiently.

The Excel for Beginners course will teach you how to:

• Understand and navigate the Excel interface.
• Enter and manage data within worksheets.
• Use basic formulas.
• Apply simple functions like SUM and AVERAGE.
• Develop basic charts to visualize data and identify trends.
• Organize data for ease of use.

This course is practical and engaging, designed to build your confidence in using Excel for a variety of basic tasks.

The outcome – proficiency in the essential functions of Excel, enabling you to handle day-to-day spreadsheet tasks with ease.

To book a place, click here.

Going beyond the basics, we explore Canva’s paid “Pro” tools for creating engaging content and managing your marketing. We’ll use Canva Magic for AI-powered editing, writing and creating marketing.

Canva Pro is a paid set of tools that opens up infinite opportunities for creativity and efficiency in creating marketing content for your business.

In this webinar, you’ll learn how to master Canva’s Pro tools and we’ll explore how to:

• Streamline social media management with Canva’s scheduling and quick creation tools.
• Use AI-powered features to create and edit graphics, photos and written content.
• Create video content at half the speed with powerful video generation tools.
• Explore apps for expanding Canva and integrating it with your other business tools.

This webinar expands on basic knowledge of Canva and is perfect for anyone who already has experience using Canva. if you’re new to Canva, we recommend attending the Business Gateway “Introduction to Canva” national webinar first to practice the basics.

Before you sign up for this webinar, please make sure you are signed into a Canva Pro account. We will be exploring the paid features of Canva in this webinar. Note that if you’re a “not for profit” organisation (a charity or social enterprise) you may be eligible for Canva’s Nonprofit Program, where you get Canva Pro for free!

To book a place, click here.

In 2025, search is more visual than ever. Discover how to optimise video and images content for search in, leveraging Google’s product grids, visual search, and business profiles to boost visibility.

In 2025, search is more visual than ever. With Google showcasing product grids and advancing its visual search capabilities, users are increasingly searching with images and snapshots rather than text. This evolution opens new opportunities for businesses, particularly ecommerce brands, to get their products in front of the right audience.

This webinar will guide you through:

• The rising importance of video and image content in search rankings.
• Techniques to optimise product images for Google’s product grids and visual search.
• How to showcase your products in Google Business Profiles for maximum exposure.
• Practical tips for using alt text, structured data, and metadata to improve visibility. Whether you’re creating engaging videos or curating eye-catching product images, this session provides actionable strategies to elevate your visual content game.

Outcome of Attending

Participants will:

• Learn how to optimise both video and image content to align with search trends.
• Understand how Google’s product grids work and how to feature products effectively.
• Master the use of Google Business Profiles for showcasing products.
• Gain actionable insights to increase visibility, clicks, and conversions for their visual content.

Who it’s For

This is ideal for:

• Ecommerce site owners looking to enhance product discoverability.
• Business owners wanting to utilise Google Business Profiles for product promotion.
• Anyone eager to harness the power of images and videos to stay ahead in search.

To book a place. click here.

Taking time to plan your new business and seek advice before you start trading is time well spent. This webinar will help you to understand how to develop your own Business Plan for success.

A written Business Plan is an important tool to help you get your business started. It helps you clarify the resources and finance required. It also helps you visualise how the business could develop and provides you with a management tool going forwards.

We will cover:

We’ll discuss the varies formats of businesses, e.g. sole trader, private limited company etc and also consider some of the other decisions you’ll be making.

Includes an overview of key elements of your Business Plan including:

Marketing:

• The role of marketing in your business.
• Identifying your target customers.
• Identifying the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors.
• The importance of market research.

Finance:

• Preparing a sales plan.
• Producing a cashflow forecast.
• Understanding working capital.
• Different sources of finance.

Workshop outcomes:

After this training session you will understand the central part that your Business Plan will play in your business, the key elements of the plan, and how to develop your own plan.

There will also be information on additional services from Business Gateway and details of other workshops which may be appropriate for you.

To book a place, click here.