Yahoo Offers Grants for Women (March 18, 2008) - Yahoo! Small Business (smallbusiness.yahoo.com) announced on Tuesday that along with entrepreneur Carolyn Kepcher and her multimedia company Carolyn and Co Media LLC (carolynandco.com), it has launched a new grant program to promote women's entrepreneurship enabled by the Internet.
The new program called "Seeds for Success: Empowering Women Entrepreneurs," (seedsforsuccess.smallbusiness.yahoo.com) will award three women with business grants including cash, mentorship and technical services for a total value of more than $25,000 each.
Kepcher, perhaps best known for her work as an executive vice president with the Trump Organization and her role on NBC's The Apprentice, will help select grant winners and connect them with mentors from a team of business leaders while Yahoo! will provide recipients with Web and online marketing services.
"Women and men have similar entrepreneurial aspirations, but the motivation for women often is different," says Kepcher. "As an entrepreneur myself, I am personally familiar with why today, many women launch businesses as a way of maneuvering around challenges found in a traditional work environment. Women want success and financial security, but also balance. So, our team at Carolyn and Co Media is thrilled to join with Yahoo! in highlighting these important drivers of women's entrepreneurship, while helping women become more aware of just how easy and affordable it is to start or expand a business online."
In the press release Yahoo! also takes an opportunity to mention its recent unlimited hosting offering by tying it into the idea that the grant can provide unlimited business opportunities for women. But the parallels outlined like "no limit to women's opportunities to create business success online" and "the unlimited reach of the Internet provided by Yahoo! Small Business" seem to be more of a witty play on words than provide any further details to Yahoo!s actual Web services being offered in this grant.
Yahoo! says the program is open to any women who plan to launch new businesses or who wish to grow an existing business, with an emphasis on using the Internet to help them achieve their goals. Entrepreneurs can apply for the grant by submitting applications online at the "Seeds for Success" website by April 6.
The three grant recipients also will be eligible to win an additional bonus grant of $10,000 in October, to the one business that achieves the most growth resulting from the use of the initial grant and mentorship package.This grant seems to be a natural extension of Yahoo!s focus on helping out small businesses and entrepreneurs. The company currently offers a consortium of articles and videos on its website, designed to provide small businesses with tips on marketing, legal matters and human resources.
Yahoo! Studies Holiday Shopping (November 20, 2006) - Internet service provider Yahoo! Small Business (smallbusiness.yahoo.com) and research firm Harris Interactive Survey (harrisinteractive.com) released the results of a study this week that found three out of four holiday shoppers will buy gifts online this holiday season and that most are likely to purchase from a small business.
Survey respondents also expressed strong support for e-commerce with small businesses that offer a secure payment system, easy customer checkout and free shipping. Nearly a third of holiday shoppers said that they would do half or more of their holiday shopping online, and nearly two thirds, or 63 percent, said online specialty retailers are one of the best places to shop for unusual or hard-to-find gifts.
"Many consumers rely on small businesses that are online during the holiday shopping season because they offer variety, value and unique gifts that aren't always available in stores," says Rich Riley, VP and general manager of Yahoo! Small Business. "The survey shows that shoppers have high expectations, but also high confidence in buying holiday gifts online with small businesses."
Yahoo! says the nationwide survey of 2,766 American online adults is being released in advance of the beginning of the peak holiday shopping season. The survey, conducted in late October, measured sentiment among the general online adult population about holiday shopping online.
Yahoo! Enhances SMB E-commerce Service (August 26, 2005) - Yahoo! Small Business (smallbusiness.yahoo.com) announced this week that it had completely re-designed the checkout process for its hosted e-commerce solution Yahoo! Merchant Solutions.
The company says the new enhancements enable Yahoo! merchants to customize their online stores, helping them streamline the checkout process and improving the overall shopping experience for their customers. The new features, available in a beta release, include checkout page branding and customization, single or multi-page checkout options and the integration of shipping and coupon calculators on the checkout page. Merchants will be able to control the font, colors, button appearance and content in navigation areas throughout the site their e-commerce sites, including the checkout pages. Yahoo! Small Business offers Web hosting, domain names, email and a hosted e-commerce solution.
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