Eurosuccess Consulting: Brand building of EU enterprises through Mentoring
Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the cornerstone of Europe’s economy. They represent 99% of all businesses in the EU. They employ around 100 million people, account for more than half of Europe’s GDP and play a key role in adding value in every sector of the economy (European Commission, 2020). SMEs bring innovative solutions to challenges like climate change, resource efficiency and social cohesion, and help spread this innovation throughout Europe’s regions. They are therefore central to the EU’s twin transitions to a sustainable and digital economy and essential to Europe’s competitiveness and prosperity, industrial ecosystems, economic and technological sovereignty, and resilience to external shocks. As a result of the COVID-19 outbreak it is important to create an action plan towards a more innovative and digitalized Europe.
The “BRANDING Mentoring – Brand building of EU Enterprises through Mentoring” project aims to considerably increase the branding skills of SMEs and make them grow in the single market and beyond. This Erasmus+ KA2 project started in November 2018 and lasted until October 2020. Let’s find out more about its benefits!
What was the Branding Mentoring project about?
The project sought to support, mentor and guide new entrepreneurs, self-employed professionals, executives of SMEs, start-ups, scale-ups and members of Chambers of Commerce in cultivating and enhancing their skills and competences related to branding techniques and strategies and marketing of their products and services.
Who benefitted from the Branding Mentoring project?
- Entrepreneurs/mentees/Start-ups, scale-ups, SMEs with less than 3 years’ experience in the specific business domain
- Mentors over 40 years of age with managerial background and experience in brand development and consultancy
- Relevant stakeholders from partner and other European countries, such as Chambers of Commerce, Marketing Schools, Business Associations, VET providers, public bodies, innovation hubs, European Associations in the field of Vocational Education, etc.
The consortium
The international dimension of the Branding Mentoring project was ensured by a consortium of partners from five European countries:
- KisalföldFoundation for Enterprise Promotion, coordinator & Chamber of Commerce and Industry for Gyor-Moson-Sopron County – Hungary
- EurosuccessConsulting – Cyprus
- OECON GROUP & Chamber ofChalkidiki– Greece
- OIC Poland Foundation – Poland
- CPUCenterza poslovno usposabljanje – Slovenia
Project results
- The ‘Research and Preparation – Final Report’ (available only in English here) compiles the findings of both field and desk research. Field research was addressed to scale-ups, SMEs, entrepreneurs, business agents, business support organisations and other stakeholders that wish to enhance their own or their staff’s skills, competences and understanding of branding strategies by being involved in a mentoring process. Desk research aimed to collect relevant literature, projects, programs, networks, national and international best practices and initiatives both in regard to branding and mentoring process in general.
- The Branding Mentoring Handbook aims to increase mentors’ capacity and knowledge as well as to guide them through the mentoring process and the Branding Mentoring methodology that will be used during the mentoring schemes of the project, with the ultimate aim to support their mentees in the brand-building process. We are happy to announce that the English version of the Handbook has been released! You can download it from here. The other language versions (Greek, Polish, Hungarian, Slovenian) will be available soon. So, stay tuned!
- Implementation of Mentoring Schemes in each project country – current and aspiring entrepreneurs have been benefitted through one-to-one mentoring with experienced mentors for a period of 7 months, with the aim to succeed in branding their own products/services.
Found out more about our project:
- Contact us via email at info@eurosc.eu
- Visit the project website & Eurosuccess Consulting website
- Join us on Facebook.