The debate on social media and its effectiveness in driving traffic to SME sites was highlighted in a recent report from Experian which revealed that, the top 10 fastest growing SMEs have on average seen their share of visitor traffic grow by 180 per cent this year. Amongst social media traffic drivers, to these top growing online sites unsurprisingly Facebook lead the way, followed by YouTube. Twitter - the UK's third biggest social network currently only delivered 0.39% of the traffic.

With an estimated 4.5 million private sector businesses in the UK accounting for 58.8% of private sector employment and 48.8% of private sector turnover, expanding the use of technology amongst SMEs remains a critical objective for entrepreneurs groups.

The survey result comes ahead of the FREE Profit With Technology workshop being hosted by Entrepreneur Country and legal firm Nabarro. The ½ day workshop in central London on the 26th October 2011 is bringing together innovative SMEs and global thought leaders such as Microsoft and IBM for an event aimed at giving start-ups and growth businesses practical information and tools for using technology to accelerate their business growth.

With technology revolutionising the way our businesses are run and how they generate income, service like cloud computing services, virtual working and social media are redefining how we develop products and services, engage with customers, increase our ability to work dynamic and flexibly and help us to control our bottom-line.

The workshop is the perfect way for SMEs looking to expand their online presence and efficiency to network with other small businesses and hear from and ask questions of some of the most influential businesses in their sectors.

Confirmed speakers:

Linda Cheung - CEO, CubeSocial

Linda Cheung has an impressive track record in devising innovative software and business solutions that deliver benefits worth millions of pounds in the toughest of markets.

A former Executive Director at Morgan Stanley, Linda was promoted to a Chief Operating Officer role at 32 after making her mark as a key player in the launch of the company's first ever credit card. Her reputation as an entrepreneurial yet pragmatic business leader, trouble-shooter and fixer, is built upon an infectious passion for excellence and proven commercial acumen – all underpinned by a strong sense of personal integrity.

Eesheta Shah - Partner, Intellectual Property, Nabarro

Eesheta Shah is a Partner in Nabarro LLP's Intellectual Property team. She specialises in brand protection, exploitation and enforcement, and technology licensing.

Eesheta's trade mark work includes advising on trade mark strategies, clearing new brands, filing and prosecuting trade mark applications, dealing with trade mark opposition and cancellation actions, and running brand policing and enforcement programmes.Eesheta is UK trade mark counsel to a number of large technology brand owners.

Bradley Starr - CEO, Bizantra

Commenced work in the engineering industry, progressing to international sales and marketing, working in the UK and the US. Founded the Miller Starr Database Marketing company with Paul Miller in 1985. Sold Miller Starr to the Interpublic Group in 2000, to become part of MRM Worldwide & McCann Erickson. Member of the MRM Worldwide Global Executive Board from 2001 to 2008 with joint responsibility for over 2,000 people in 35 offices, key global client relationships & global marketing data and analytics services. 2003 received the HK McCann Leadership Award for outstanding leadership.

Left MRM Worldwide at the end of April 2008 to start Bizantra.

James Garner - Head of Content, AVG Technologies

James is responsible for all digital content, whether multimedia or written, across all of AVG's social media properties. He also supports the company's marketing department with written and multimedia content.

Previously, James worked for 12 years as a journalist and editor for Reed Business Information and was at the forefront of the company's development of new digital content propositions.

Peter King - UK SMB Cloud Services Manager, Microsoft

 Peter King is responsible for public cloud and partner hosted solutions team. 

King joined Microsoft in 2005 and before his current role most recently led the Information Worker Server and Services product management team responsible for Office 365, Exchange, SharePoint, Lync. Before joining Microsoft, King lead both development and product management teams across the US and EMEA in the video conferencing industry. King started his career with Her Majesty's Armed Forces where he served for 14 years.