Help To Grow Digital Expanded to Support Event More Businesses

The flagship government scheme, Help to Grow Digital, that slashes the cost of leading digital software has expanded its reach to now support even more businesses.

With Customer Relationship Management software proven to boost firms’ productivity by on average 18%, the Help to Grow: Digital scheme offers businesses discounts worth up to £5,000 on approved software.

Previously, only businesses with more than 5 employees were eligible for the scheme but from Monday 25th July, businesses with at least 1 employee are now eligible to benefit. This boosts the number of eligible businesses by 760,000 so that it now reaches up to 1.24 million.

Help to Grow Digital have also announced that eCommerce software is available through the scheme to help businesses ramp up sales of products and services online. This includes helping them to manage their inventory, take payments and gather data and insights on customers’ needs. Businesses which adopt eCommerce software see on average a 7.5% increase in sales over 3 years.

Businesses can now access a £5,000 discount on 30 software solutions from 14 leading technology suppliers for eCommerce, Digital Accounting and CRM software.

Additionally, the government has announced that Help to Grow: Digital will support one-to-one advice for SMEs on how best they can adopt digital technology. The government will be launching applications for advice platforms to partner with the scheme from Monday 25th July 2022, and the advice service will go live later this year.

To qualify for the financial discount through Help to Grow: Digital, businesses can be from any business sector, but must meet all 4 of the following criteria:

1. be a business based in the United Kingdom registered with Companies House or be a registered society on the Financial Conduct Authorities Mutuals Register
2. have at least 1 employee who is not an owner, up to a maximum of 249 employees
3. have been actively trading for over 12 months, and have an incorporation date of at least 365 days prior to application
4. be purchasing the approved software for the first time

Eligible businesses will receive one financial discount towards the purchase of one approved software product up to a maximum of £5,000 (not including VAT) in eCommerce, Customer Relationship Management and Digital Accounting software product categories. The financial discount covers 12 months’ worth of approved software product core costs, exclusive of VAT.

The approved technology suppliers on the Help to Grow: Digital online website are:

• e-Commerce software:
  • Shopwired
  • Gob2b
  • Kentico
  • Comgem
  • EKM
  • Big Commerce
• Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software:
  • Capsule CRM
  • Zymplify
  • Livepoint Software Solutions Ltd
  • Gold-Vision CRM
  • Deskpro Ltd
• Digital Accounting software
  • Sage
  • Intuit Ltd
  • Crunch

The government intends to further expand the range of software on offer through Help to Grow: Digital. Small businesses who would like to know more about Help to Grow should visit the Help to Grow: Digital site.