Over the last four years, Venture Forward met with hundreds of local policymakers, economic developers, researchers, and academics to share what we know about microbusinesses. This data is now freely available to you.
January 2023 - Robert Brown, Chief Data Scientist of Venture Forward, spoke at the Alabama Economic Outlook Conference about the state's microbusiness economy. Download his presentation here.
Read the article entitled "Alabama's Microbusiness Economy"A report based on the Milken Institute's "Best-Performing Cities Index" and data on microbusinesses from the GoDaddy Venture Forward Initiative.
Read the article entitled "Milken White Paper: Best-Performing Cities and Microbusiness Activity – Exploring Policy Implications of Online Economies"Built on decades of helping entrepreneurs succeed and backed by data of what microbusiness entrepreneurs need to grow; we're collaborating with cities on customized and free training to their microbusiness communities.
Read the article entitled "Introducing GoDaddy Open"We recently received feedback from over 3,000 entrepreneurs about their ambitions, needs, knowledge of resources and thoughts about inflation. Read the highlights of our findings here.
Read the article entitled "GoDaddy's 5th National Survey Results""Powerful. Uplifting. Encouraging. Incredible. These, among others are words I would use to describe the GoDaddy Open event in Baltimore." Read this firsthand account by Jeremy Hartman, Vice President, Venture Forward and Community Engagement at GoDaddy that highlights the importance of his team's work and the impact it's having on real people across the US.
Read the article entitled "GoDaddy Open: A Recap From Our Evening in Baltimore"
First In-Depth Review of Great Britain's Microbusinesses
Look up your county and its microbusiness and economic statistics
The 20 million online microbusinesses in the U.S. boost annual household incomes and create jobs. See how many are in your county and how they impact your local economy.
Read the article entitled "How does your community stack up?"Venture Forward is dedicated to gathering and analyzing data around microbusinesses, and leveraging those insights to support local efforts that empower the everyday entrepreneurs who own them. Our research team synthesizes Venture Forward data with U.S. Census and other third party data to reveal how microbusinesses contribute to more prosperous and resilient economies. In turn, we make our data and insights available to anyone who shares our vision for stronger, more inclusive and healthy communities.
This October report combines results from the Best Performing Cities Index (BPC) and GoDaddy’s Microbusiness Activity Index (MAI) to examine what may be happening in the economies of a selection of cities in the two rankings, essentially looking at the impact microbusinesses are having in the selected economies.
"Our microbusiness density is three times the national average. We feature that statistic from Venture Forward on our website, and make a point of sharing it on the first day of our six-week Empower Baltimore program to help local businesses boost their digital presence. We want people to know that our city is unique – that we’ve got a lot of people with hustle, who are making things happen."
–Michelle Geiss, Co-Founder & Executive Director, Baltimore Impact Hub
In this data-backed report, the authors leverage data from Brookings Institute, US Census, and Venture Forward in-concert to discuss the variety of benefits online microbusinesses bring to their communities, who benefits most and what those benefits are, and how policymakers can encourage the creation of more microbusinesses.
The COVID-19 pandemic delivered a massive shock to America’s workers – one result of this was a burst of microbusiness startups. But because microbusiness patterns of growth vary from state to state and community to community, local economic development officials need to understand these entrepreneurs in order to help them succeed.
They’re the people who build websites, run restaurants, and offer classes online. But their impact has largely gone unnoticed. Our mission is to change that. We use data to show policy makers how microbusinesses make communities more prosperous and resilient.
Many Americans responded to the economic turbulence of recent years by starting microbusinesses. While all of these everyday entrepreneurs need to be scrappy, ambitious and optimistic, one demographic group stands out for these qualities: those under the age of 30.
How skills training and a microloan helped one woman thrive through the pandemic
