The most recent spherical of funding from Verizon’s Small Enterprise Digital Prepared grant program is coming to a detailed.
Totaling $1 million on this spherical alone, the $10,000 grant program is without doubt one of the hottest options of Verizon Small Enterprise Digital Prepared. However the grants are just one advantage of a program designed particularly to assist small companies by offering digital abilities coaching, from programs, to reside teaching classes, to customized studying plans.
This system is free to join. However the final day to use is Dec. 20.
To be eligible to use for a Verizon Small Enterprise Digital Prepared Grant, companies should have an account on Verizon Small Enterprise Digital Prepared and fulfill different necessities comparable to finishing any mixture of two programs, teaching occasions, or digital group occasions on the platform.
Register here to get began.
To be taught extra about this system, go here or learn the beneath interview with Brianna Ellison, director of group engagement for Verizon. Ellison elaborates on the work Verizon is doing to assist entrepreneurs and on the advantages of the Small Enterprise Digital Prepared program, together with:
- Entry to free digital abilities coaching and sources
- Monetary help to help digital transformation initiatives
- Alternatives to community with different small enterprise house owners and consultants
- Entry to help from Verizon and its companions
As Ellison explains, Verizon is actively partnering with Michigan small companies to assist them succeed within the digital economic system, together with:
- Verizon has partnered with Grand Valley State College’s Veterans Entrepreneurship Lab to supply grants and help to veteran entrepreneurs.
- Verizon has partnered with the Metro Detroit Black Enterprise Alliance’s Capital Join Program to assist Black-owned companies entry funding and sources.
Under is the complete Q&A with Ellison, which StartupNation performed in September 2022.
- What work is Verizon doing within the Detroit/Michigan group to assist small companies?
Verizon has actively partnered with Michigan small companies. We’re members of quite a few chambers of commerce and associations from throughout the state that work with small companies (such because the Detroit Regional Chamber, Grand Rapids Chamber, Dearborn Chamber, The Proper Place, MI Chamber, Automation Alley, Metro Detroit Black Enterprise Alliance, MI Enterprise Incubator Assoc.). Verizon participates in a variety of thought management occasions with these organizations to share experience and sources with their membership.
In 2021, we prolonged a grant to Grand Valley State College’s Veterans Entrepreneurship Lab. Veterans and/or army spouses work on their business launch over a three-month interval. MVE-Lab equips individuals to determine their goal prospects, community with others, and discover the sources they should launch profitably and efficiently. It concludes with a Pitch Showcase awarding a minimum of $25,000 in prize cash. Visitors embody different veteran entrepreneurs, mentors, and consultants like attorneys and advertising and marketing specialists, together with the chief of Verizon’s veteran worker useful resource group who shared details about Verizon help for small enterprise house owners alongside along with his personal private expertise as an entrepreneur.
In 2021, we additionally established a partnership between Verizon’s Professional Bono Program and the Metro Detroit Black Business Alliance’s Capital Join Program. This program is getting ready and connecting Metro Detroit Black-owned companies to numerous funding resources to make sure their sustained success. If any of those companies want additional authorized help or one-on-one help, the Verizon Professional Bono Program staff has agreed to work straight with these companies to determine extra authorized providers.
Lastly, in September, Verizon launched Small Business Digital Ready. This on-line curriculum is designed to present small companies the customized instruments to achieve as we speak’s digital world. This system contains studying modules, knowledgeable teaching, peer networking and a market of instruments and options. The free on-line useful resource is out there to any small enterprise throughout Michigan (and nationwide) and will probably be utilized by Verizon companions such because the Black Enterprise Alliance’s Capital Join Program.
- What do you imply by “Digital Prepared” and why is digital readiness necessary for small enterprise house owners as we speak?
Digital readiness is about ensuring companies have all of the instruments and sources they should thrive in as we speak’s economic system. The COVID-19 pandemic has imposed unexpected challenges on entrepreneurs and additional accelerated a shift to digital methods of working. Greater than 75% of small companies pivoted their operations as a result of disaster and greater than 50% of SMBs say their on-line interactions with prospects have elevated. To remain aggressive within the new financial surroundings, small companies should be agile and adapt to shifting client preferences.
Small enterprise entrepreneurs perceive the significance of using digital instruments of their day-to-day operations, however discover it difficult to implement significant digital transformation. In response to information revealed from Morning Seek the advice of and Verizon of their September 2020 report, “greater than two in 5 determination makers say it’s possible that their enterprise will broaden by digital applied sciences and rely extra closely on communications.” On the similar time, greater than two-thirds of respondents acknowledged that including or transitioning to digital/on-line operations has been difficult for his or her enterprise to deal with. How will we bridge this hole? Entrepreneurs want easy accessibility—wherever they’re—to customized studying and training sources as a way to efficiently implement digital methods into their companies and have the boldness to achieve the post-pandemic future.
- Why is the Verizon Small Enterprise Digital Prepared program a very good useful resource for enterprise house owners in metro Detroit and Michigan?
House to numerous analysis organizations and anchor establishments, together with a vibrant and multicultural entrepreneurial ecosystem, Detroit’s wealthy roots embody the hardworking and modern ethos of its various small enterprise house owners. Detroit has roughly 50k small businesses owned by entrepreneurs of color and town is dedicated to making sure residents are gaining equal entry to instructional and financial alternatives of the rising high-growth economic system. In response to a 2021 Detroit Ecosystem Assessment, Detroit has 23% of all startup corporations in Michigan and has the entire crucial sources to launch and develop companies which can be digital prepared. As Verizon seeks to attach BIPOC enterprise house owners throughout the nation with this invaluable useful resource and create extra equitable pathways for entrepreneurs to thrive within the digital economic system, we view the small enterprise house owners within the better metro Detroit space—and Michigan—as a important consumer base within the effort.
Verizon’s Small Enterprise Digital Prepared program was constructed by (principally BIPOC) small companies for small companies. Jamiel Robinson, the manager director of Michigan-based enterprise growth group, Grand Rapids Area Black Businesses (GRABB), was a distinguished voice within the Small Enterprise Advisory Committee that helped form this system and its choices. Various material consultants drive our content material, interactive video modules, and training occasions. In brief, entrepreneurs in metro Detroit will probably be outfitted with digital methods and related learnings—by curated curriculum matters, teaching occasions, and group teams—to use to their companies!
- What steering are the small enterprise house owners you’re employed with looking for?
We all know typically that small enterprise house owners are all for studying extra about financing, digital advertising and marketing, and operational effectivity. Our customers have instructed us they’ve obtained large worth from the academic sources and in connecting straight with consultants–by each one-on-one mentoring and group teaching occasions. Fifty-eight p.c of customers on the platform are all for connecting with a finance knowledgeable and 64% of customers on the platform are all for connecting with a advertising and marketing knowledgeable. The most well-liked matter areas are accessing capital, digital advertising and marketing, and bettering on-line presence. Enterprise house owners would additionally choose to be part of a group the place they will be taught from each other, as 52% of customers need to join with friends with related pursuits.
- How can Verizon assist with group networking on a private degree, not a digital one?
Verizon Small Enterprise Digital Prepared is constructed to be a invaluable instrument to the BDOs, Small Enterprise Growth Facilities, CDFIs and different organizations which can be on the bottom serving to small companies each day. We’re partnering carefully with these kinds of organizations and dealing with them to combine our sources into their choices. Small Enterprise Digital Prepared’s group part additionally lets companies join with different companies and sources by metropolis in order that they will hook up with help of their native space!
On the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Verizon started the grassroots work of internet hosting digital group dialogues targeted on small companies in communities from throughout the state. The aim of those dialogues is to listen to in regards to the nice work small enterprise house owners and small enterprise growth organizations are presently engaged in, the present and ongoing challenges small enterprise house owners are dealing with, and to debate how Verizon might be supportive shifting ahead. Attendees have included small enterprise house owners, small enterprise help organizations and chambers of commerce.
Now greater than ever, we at Verizon will proceed to construct on the extremely invaluable relationships with the communities we serve. These dialogues are solely the start of what we hope will probably be long-term partnerships the place we are able to proceed the dialog and discover future alternatives to be supportive.
- What abilities do you carry to the group as a liaison between Verizon and small enterprise house owners?
As a neighborhood liaison between Verizon and small enterprise house owners, I work to construct bridges of reference to my friends, inner enterprise companions and exterior stakeholders to champion insurance policies that enrich lives and allow a digital future that serves all Michigan communities. I’m able to leverage relationships inside Verizon and with enterprise help group companions to type coalitions to sort out the challenges small companies face, amplify successes and greatest practices, and disseminate details about Verizon instruments and sources. Reflexively, I meet with companies to take heed to their wants and drive the best way through which we deposit goodwill in our native communities and innovate to construct the networks that transfer the world ahead for everybody.
Q&A initially revealed in September 2022.
