{"id":284,"date":"2008-04-18T09:28:34","date_gmt":"2008-04-18T08:28:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/startups.co.uk\/?p=284"},"modified":"2021-05-27T11:39:22","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T10:39:22","slug":"thebestof","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/startups.co.uk\/fast-growth-business-awards\/thebestof\/","title":{"rendered":"Thebestof"},"content":{"rendered":"<br>\n<h5>Thebestof burst onto the scene in 2004 as the online version of MyMag, an idea conceived by Sue Botterill. Her husband Nigel has spearheaded Thebestof, now one of the UK&rsquo;s fastest growing franchises. The company began life by selling franchisees community websites, which they then made profitable through selling advertising to local businesses.<\/h5>\n<p>The sites were all inter-connected, which buoyed their web optimisation and meant that, for instance, a butcher in Halifax could get an advertisement for his business at the top of the web rankings. The franchises were cheap (about &pound;5,000) as were the ads, with prices starting as low as &pound;10. It was a win-win for all involved and the business spread across the UK, now covering 362 territories.<\/p>\n<p>Last July the business re-launched and it is through these successful innovations that it picked up the award. Realising that it now operates in a Web 2.0 age, it has developed to offer users and advertisers greater interaction and options. Nigel Botterill explains: &ldquo;Now you really do have to be the best at what you do to appear on Thebestof. We are flying the flag for recommendation and have become a word-of-mouth specialist.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Advertisers are now &lsquo;members&rsquo; and Thebestof is also organising networking events to bring successful businesses together. The new strategy has boosted both user numbers and revenue.Traffic is rising by about 11% a month, and in January this year it attracted 1.4 million unique users. Also, the few franchises it has left to sell can attract as much as &pound;35,000. Finally, Botterill says he&rsquo;s determined to only have small or independent businesses on his site. &ldquo;Lots of big names have approached us, but we&rsquo;ve resisted,&rdquo; he says.<\/p>\n<h5><strong>Company stats Company:<\/strong> Thebestof <strong>Founded:<\/strong> 2005 <strong>Founders:<\/strong> Nigel and Sue Botterill <strong>Turnover 2006:<\/strong> &pound;4m <strong>Turnover 2007:<\/strong> &pound;6m <strong>Web:<\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thebestof.co.uk\">www.thebestof.co.uk<\/a><\/h5>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thebestof burst onto the scene in 2004 as the online version of MyMag, an idea conceived by Sue Botterill. Her husband Nigel has spearheaded Thebestof, now one of the UK&rsquo;s fastest growing franchises. The company began life by selling franchisees community websites, which they then made profitable through selling advertising to local businesses. The sites [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91469,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[153],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-finalists-2008"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Thebestof - Startups.co.uk<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Thebestof - Startups.co.uk\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Thebestof burst onto the scene in 2004 as the online version of MyMag, an idea conceived by Sue Botterill. 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