Unlocking SME Potential: Blueberry’s Strategic Outreach for a Regional Growth Hub

A region enthused with pride, diversity, and opportunity, the North East of England is home to countless thriving business communities with a deep natural and industrial heritage. With strengths in green energy, advanced manufacturing, and a lively cultural scene, it is no wonder that global companies want to invest here.

Our client is a combined authority (CA) committed to promoting economic growth and enhancing the business sector throughout the North East’s bustling towns, vibrant cities, and stunning coastlines. The authority empowers Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and advocates for tailored business support services through its regional Growth Hub. This body helps businesses overcome work-related challenges and capitalise on opportunities for improvement and growth.

What They Wanted

The regional authority wanted to understand the needs of the region’s SMEs and raise awareness of the support available through the Growth Hub.

The goal was twofold:

• Engage with SMEs through a tailored telephone survey to uncover their appetite for business support, growth ambitions, and any challenges they face.
• Boost engagement and encourage referrals to the Growth Hub by offering helpful support options following the survey.

We were able to categorise three main outputs from the survey completions: those who were interested in a follow-up call with a Growth Hub advisor, those who would prefer to receive more information via email, and those who want to stay updated through the monthly newsletter.

Blueberry’s highly experienced team focused on engaging in valuable conversations, executing thorough surveys, and building a strong pipeline of interested businesses ready for follow-up.

During the campaign, our client then recommended us to another combined authority based in the North East to carry out a similar project.

What We Did

The team conducted structured insight surveys with key decision-makers, captured engagement preferences, and referred warm leads to Growth Hub advisors. By including in-depth questions in our survey, we could better understand business appetite, needs and requirements for Growth Hub support.

We also inquired about which business support they would find helpful: bespoke skills and training for themselves or their employees, financial support, digital and technology support, or help finding new markets and opportunities as well as any export plans. We discovered their preferred methods for receiving business support, such as one-on-one support in a face-to-face or virtual setting, peer support, group events, or self-service options.

Towards the end of the campaign, we focused on manufacturing businesses, using targeted data to highlight the support available through the Growth Hub and the Made Smarter Adoption programme. With a proven track record of engagement in this sector, we successfully connected manufacturers with opportunities to boost efficiency, profitability, and digital uptake. Our data strategy used our client’s unique profiling system, a sophisticated method of finding businesses on a growth trajectory. This approach helped us to maximise relevance and response, ensuring effective and targeted outreach.

What We Achieved

Our team achieved a significantly high survey completion rate of 67% from relevant contacts spoken with. Moreover, 82% of those key contacts we engaged progressed positively into a referral, email follow-up, or newsletter subscription supporting future communications. We exceeded our initial KPI referral targets outlined prior to campaign commencement by over 144%. The outstanding engagement and high conversion rate proved our campaign’s effectiveness and the potential for future collaboration.

Our client was struck by the volume of feedback collected and how significantly we surpassed the initial KPI targets. The survey revealed that many businesses were previously unaware of the available support, which greatly contributed to expanding the campaign’s reach.

Key Findings:

• Digital and technology support, along with skills training, emerged as the top priority for businesses in the coming year.
• Only ~1% of businesses had previously used the Growth Hub. Yet almost 45% of survey participants requested a follow-up call, indicating an excellent opportunity for conversion and support to a new business audience that had not previously engaged the Growth Hub.
• 19% of businesses were already exporting, and 3.56% planned to do so, creating a robust pipeline for export support programmes.

Conclusion

The campaign met and exceeded all KPIs established at the start, delivering a powerful combination of insights, impact, and lead generation. Our client now has a refreshed, segmented, and responsive database to support future outreach and programme development.

“The transformation from cold data to warm leads was remarkable, with over 82 per cent of all survey completions progressing positively – whether through referral requests, email follow-ups, or newsletter sign-ups,” said Andrew Welsh, Blueberry Senior Account Manager.

“This wasn’t just a numbers game; our team prioritised quality conversations with business leaders across the North East, uncovering real challenges and opportunities. The insights gathered provided a rich, actionable picture of the region’s support needs.

“It was especially rewarding to see our approach not only meet but exceed the campaign’s KPIs – delivering both immediate value in terms of referrals, and longer-term benefits through an enhanced database ready for future outreach. This campaign truly showcased the impact of well-executed, insight-led engagement.”

Blueberry has effectively collaborated with many growth hubs, councils and combined authorities to enhance insights, build effective pipelines, and maximise their business support initiatives. This campaign illustrates what’s achievable when strategic outreach meets authentic conversations and highlights the exciting potential for future collaboration. We’re ready to boost your enterprise.

Call 0113 487 7013 or email info@blueberryms.co.uk for more information. We look forward to hearing from you!

[Copyright © 2025 Angela Kunawicz & Blueberry Marketing Solutions. All rights reserved.]