Business representatives from the West Midlands SME community and industry experts from Barclays recently joined forces for a series of high profile seminars to promote business growth. The Barclays "Boosting your Business" seminar took place at The Metropole and was attended by local businesses from across the region.

Across the UK seminar attendees were confident of growth within the next 12 months with customer relations clearly identified as the biggest growth opportunity. In the West Midlands, 67% of local businesses identified customer relations as the biggest growth opportunity followed by 

M commerce/mobile retailing (28%) with 5% viewing exports as an opportunity to expand.

The events, which are aimed at established businesses, are designed to help business owners network and gain practical help on attracting new customers by showing them how new media and foreign trade can grow their business. 87% of attendees obtained new ideas from the seminar which will help boost their business. 

Our seminars follow research *that shows many small business owners are optimistic and looking towards innovation to help boost their business in 2012. *Over a third (37 per cent) of UK small businesses looking to grow next year see innovation as the key driver, while 25 per cent of businesses are doing more with less.

Neil Fewtrell, Regional Business Director from Barclays Business said: "The current economic climate continues to have an impact on many small businesses. But it is encouraging to see there is still optimism, with businesses introducing new products and services to help them prepare for the recovery.  

"Our seminars are there to help anyone who has an existing business and wants to find  ways to reach new markets and use new media and technology to grow."

Fewtrell added: "This year over 10,000 business owners have attended one of 500 free Barclays seminars so far and we have had interest from many more. We are committed to helping revitalise the UK economy, which is dependent on small businesses having the confidence to invest and grow."