As a CSR initiative during these difficult times Virtuzone has launched standtogether.ae a listings site to support the UAE’s SME community. Built with the pro-bono support of Dentsu Aegis brands Isobar and Merkle, the marketplace platform is designed to promote local businesses and provide information to the community on how they can support them.
Stand Together UAE seeks to help any UAE-based businesses raise immediate revenue, maintain its orderbook and thus keep supporting its workforce. Long term it will provide free leads, and through collective data mining, leverage synergies within the SME community. The free marketplace will provide unique offers to the consumer from a range of businesses from accounting and apparel, to construction, entertainment, legal advice, website development and digital demand generation. To register their offers free of charge, SME’s need only provide a valid UAE trade licence number.
Speaking of the launch, Geoff Rapp, Co-Founder of Virtuzone, said: At Virtuzone, we set up and renew hundreds of businesses every month, so when we started to see the negative impact of coronavirus on our customers, we really wanted to find ways to support them in every way possible. Initially, it was through reduced prices on our services, but we felt there were other ways we could support too. That’s when we came up with the idea of Stand Together UAE.
Virtuzone Chairman and Co-Founder, Neil Petch, commented: Stand Together UAE echoes the words of Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, imploring the UAE to stand together. The government has announced a tremendous raft of support plans for SME’s, so we wish to add to the likes of mortage and credit card holidays, which buy invaluable time, by allowing immediate incremental revenue generation. It is this public private partnership which will get the UAE through this and allow our country to come Caratout positioned as global leaders in providing a supportive ecosystem to all startups, who after all fuel the green shoots of all economic recoveries.
Tarek Daouk, CEO of Dentsu Aegis Network MENA, commented: This is a fantastic initiative that will go a long way in supporting SMEs who want to get their voices heard by the local community during this period. I am really pleased that we were able to offer our support in getting this project live and hope that it has a positive impact on both local business and the wider community within the UAE. We are all in this together, and during times of hardship and uncertainty it is essential that we support one another the best that we can, so I am delighted to see that more than 100 companies have signed up on the platform within the first 24 hours of launch and thousands of people are already visiting the site every day.
The portal went live on Monday, April 13 and will continue to grow as more and more businesses sign up and post their offers. Visit www.standtogether.ae to learn more.
