Bizna Kenya - About Us

Bizna Group LLC

Vision

To be the go-to portal for marketing and promotion of businesses, entrepreneurship and careers.

Mission

To avail effective marketing and promotion solutions for businesses, entrepreneurs and professionals.

Bizna Core Values

Entrepreneurship: Businesses, entrepreneurs and professionals are integral in the provision of quality goods and services.
Quality: Marketing and promotion of goods and services improves their quality.
Technology: Use of technology improves access to quality goods and services.
Life: Provision of better goods and services improves the quality of life.

Core Purpose

To improve the quality of life by marketing and promoting access to better goods and services.

Motto

Better Business. Better Life.

Bizna Kenya - About Us — Richard Ngatia, Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KNCCI) president (second from left), Tonnie Mello, Bizna Kenya CEO (right) and other dignitaries cut a celebration cake at SME Awards 2019 gala dinner at Laico Regency, Nairobi

The company

Bizna Kenya is a company that supports and promotes small business by providing marketing and enterprise development services.

Bizna was started in September 2014 to address some of the challenges that small business in Kenya and Africa face. These include but are not limited to:

Lack of access to markets.
Lack of access to finance.
Lack of entrepreneurship capacity (Knowledge, information and resources) to manage and grow their businesses.
Lack of adequate entrepreneurship infrastructure (incubation services) for startups.
Skewed entrepreneurship culture guided by the belief that “If you build, they will come”.

Through the founder, Tonnie Mello, Bizna took the challenge to intervene in 2 areas:

Marketing services
Enterprise development services (capacity building).

Bizna is digital led; our operations and founded on digital and social media channels. Our digital channels include Bizna which is a small business portal. Bizna has a presence in 10 African countries including: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana and Ethiopia.

The flagship of the business is https://biznakenya.com. Bizna Kenya has 5 content pillars. These are:

Other websites include: Newsday Kenya, a general news, lifestyle, politics and sports news website, Msanii, a music-led and creative industry blog and Hallelujah, a Christian and inspirational blog.

History

Bizna Kenya was started in September 2014.

At that time, there was no website dedicated to small business or SME-based content in the Kenyan market. From those humble beginnings, Bizna has grown focused on providing curated content for small business owners, managers and aspiring entrepreneurs.

Bizna won the Bloggers Association of Kenya (BAKE) Business Blog of the Year in 2016 and was nominated for the Social Media Awards (SoMA) Biz Yangu Category in the same year. Subsequently, Bizna Kenya has been nominated for BAKE Business Blog of the Year in 2018 and 2019.

In 2016 Bizna started the expansion and established her presence in key markets in Anglophone Africa in Eastern, Central, Southern and Western Africa.

The other tenets of Bizna include:

Bizna Forums.
Bizna Agritours.
Bizna Club.
Bizna Awards.

Bizna Forums

These are networking and empowerment events that Bizna hosts every month. They bring together small business owners, managers and other stakeholders to network and discuss current and emerging issues that affect their businesses.

Bizna Agritours

Agribusiness is a key business sector in Kenya and among the Bizna community. Bizna organizes visits to demo farms where aspiring farmers can witness first-hand how the farming business and obtain tips from successful farmers and Agro-Vet specialists.

Bizna Club

Bizna Club was established to help businesses grow by creating value through a network of business people and business enablers. The club established in September 2018 focuses on individual and corporate business membership. Membership comes with different packages and is renewed annually.

Bizna Awards

To drive the mandate of the business, Better Business. Better Life, Bizna organizes Bizna Awards to recognize, showcase and celebrate Kenya’s most successful small businesses. Currently, Bizna hosts 2 awards: SME Awards and Young Entrepreneur Awards (YEA).

SME Awards 2019 gala dinner

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SME Awards focuses on businesses with turnovers of 5 – 50 million Kenya Shillings. Businesses to be awarded are required to meet a set criterion. This includes business formalization, compliance, financially sound and endorsement by industry stakeholders.

Young Entrepreneur Awards focuses on young entrepreneurs (under 35) who have attained significant success in their area of business. They need to have formally registered businesses and have been operational for at least a year. Additionally, they require endorsement from industry stakeholders.

YEA 2018 winners

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