Cheshire West and Chester Council Uses Growth Flag to Drive Business Engagement
- Tuesday, March 25, 2025
- Posted By The Growth Company
Supporting Economic Growth Across the Region
Cheshire West and Chester Council’s Business Growth Team plays a crucial role in driving local economic development. As part of their efforts, they manage key programmes funded by the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) and oversee resources such as the Let’s Talk Business website and Business Tapas platform. Their work spans key account management, business outreach, regeneration, planning policy, transport, and digital inclusion, ensuring businesses receive the support needed to grow and thrive.
A Challenge in Reaching the Right Businesses
To enhance their outreach and engagement efforts, the Council needed a more strategic way to identify businesses that aligned with their UKSPF programme goals, such as innovation and decarbonisation. They sought to proactively reach high-growth potential businesses, particularly those that had not previously engaged with their support initiatives. Traditional methods were time-consuming and often led to gaps in engagement, limiting the effectiveness of their programmes.
The Solution: Using Data to Target the Right Businesses
By integrating Growth Flag’s business intelligence platform, Cheshire West and Chester Council gained a powerful tool for targeted business outreach. Growth Flag’s data allowed the team to build location-specific databases, identifying businesses that met programme criteria such as turnover thresholds, workforce size, and proximity to key areas.
The Council used this data to cross-reference with their CRM system, ensuring they reached previously unengaged businesses that could benefit from support. This proactive approach allowed them to refine their outreach strategy, moving beyond reactive engagement to a data-led, strategic model.
Delivering Impact Across the Region
The results have been highly positive, with Growth Flag’s insights enabling Cheshire West and Chester Council to connect with businesses in strategic locations like Chester and Ellesmere Port. The ability to identify and engage previously uncontacted businesses has significantly enhanced their programme effectiveness.
Iain Paton, Business Growth Manager, highlighted the value of Growth Flag in supporting their efforts: “Growth Flag has proved valuable, alongside the Council’s CRM, in identifying companies to target for UKSPF programme engagement, particularly businesses not previously engaged with the Business Growth team.”
This success has not only strengthened the Council’s ability to deliver targeted support but has also set a foundation for continued strategic business engagement. By leveraging Growth Flag’s data-driven insights, Cheshire West and Chester Council is better equipped to support local businesses, drive economic growth, and maximise the impact of their UKSPF-funded initiatives.
Unlocking Growth with Data-Driven Business Engagement
Cheshire West and Chester Council’s use of Growth Flag demonstrates how local authorities can harness data to improve business engagement and economic development. By identifying high-potential businesses and tailoring their outreach, they are creating new opportunities for growth across the region.