UK Business Labs

Over the next few months I will be offering my own unbiased opinion on the business forum scene in the United Kingdom. Last week, I wrote a piece on 4networking, today is the turn of a relative newcomer, UK Business Labs.

UKBL’s is the brain child of Mark & Emma, I should really say Emma & Mark. The pair embarked on the venture after realising there was plenty of scope for a new kid on the block.

The major players within the UK’s business community are; Ecademy, Linkedin, 4networking and UKBF, these organisations have large followings but struggle with spam, over aggressive moderation and the cult ethos. This certainly leaves the door open for a venture like UKBL’s to demonstrate their ability in offering a more rounded product to the UK's business community.

The main thing you notice on UKBL’s forum is the laid back, friendly approach to moderation. They are able to solve minor disagreements with ease, whilst their peers seem happy to adopt the sledgehammer approach. In terms of moderation I feel UKBL’s and A1 currently lead the field.

The forum is clear in construction, easy to navigate and actively linked to social media. The site contains plenty of page strength as shown on Google’s alert channel.

In the future I would like to see Business Labs build up their profile and possibly move into regional offline meetings, there’s certainly scope for a new player in this domain.

UKBL’s get a big thumbs up from me, I will report back in the second quarter of 2011 to see how they are getting on.


Pete Arkwright

Date Written: Sun, Jul 11th 2010