We’re searching for the best businesses in Bradford… and we need your help.

We launched our Bradford Means Business Awards 2011 just before Christmas, with a host of categories for the district’s companies – from single entrepreneurs to organisations which employ thousands – to enter themselves in.

But we also want to hear about the best employers and those who provide the best public services or cus-tomer satisfaction, and those nominations are better coming from the people who know best.

So two categories – Retail/ Hospitality Business of the Year, sponsored by Welcome To Yorkshire, and Employer of the Year, sponsored by Last, Cawthra, Feather Solicitors – will be judged by our panel on the basis of nominations from, in the first instance, the general public and, for the second category, the workforce.

The first category in which we’ll be seeking public nominations is the Retail/ Hospitality Business of the Year. We want to hear about the highest standards of customer service from our readers’ favourite businesses.

It might be a hotel, pub, restaurant, shop or any business that has day-to-day contact with the general public.

We’re accepting first-stage nominations on our website at telegraphandargus.co.uk /bradford-meansbusiness, via the usual online form which is used for any of the categories, but today we’re also running a coupon for you to fill in and send to us by the deadline of Friday, February 11.

When it comes to the category of Employer of the Year, we know that the only people who can truly nomi-nate for this award are those who work for the business.

We want to know about working environment, people development, training, and a commitment to the general well-being of the workforce.

Again, online entry is permitted but you can use the same coupon for this. We want as much information as we can get about why a particular organisation should be Employer of the Year, with plenty of examples of the things they do to make working for them a pleasure.

If there’s not enough space on the form to put all the information in you want to, by all means continue your nomination on a separate sheet of paper – the more information the better.

There are also three categories in which colleagues or bosses can nominate – these are Young Business Entrepreneur of the Year, Woman in Business and Business Personality of the year.

These three awards can be nominated via the online form on our web page. It’s absolutely fine to self-nom-inate for these categories, of course, and when the judging panel is drawing up its long-list they’ll probably want more specific information.

The Business Personality of the Year is looking for an inspirational leader who has demonstrated motivational qualities that have made a real difference to the performance of the business, the Woman In Business award is for the businesswoman who has shown outstanding leader-ship and may well have had to overcome gender-related difficulties to find success, while the Young Business Entrepreneur winner will be someone under the age of 25 who is perhaps a sole trader or has gained huge success as part of a larger organisation.

Our partners at the Bradford Chamber of Commerce have assembled a judging panel and their first job will be to sift through the initial entries.

We are doing entries in two stages. For the first stage of the competition, we want entrants to fill out the form online (or the coupon on this page for the two special public nominations) and include – in the space provided – a write-up as to why the business in question fits the bill for that particular category. Also include as much information as you can.

The deadline for this first wave of entries to reach us is FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 11.

When we’ve got all the first-stage entries in, they will be passed to the judging panel who will assess their suitability for the next stage of the awards.

All those entrants who are deemed to be suitable for their chosen category will be contacted again and asked to fill in another form which will ask for more specific information and which will allow the judges to properly score each entrant on a level playing field. These forms will need to be in by NOON on MONDAY, FEBRUARY 28.

If some entries are good but not in the right categories, the judges may well suggest at this stage that these nominations are moved to more appropriate categories.

Then the panel will convene and sort through all the second-stage entries, and will draw up a short-list of three finalists in each category, which will be completed on or around MONDAY, MARCH 7.

The glittering awards night for the Bradford Means Business Awards 2011 will be held at the Aagrah restaurant group’s Midpoint Suite in Thornbury on SATURDAY, MARCH 26.

The venue is a fine example of Bradford’s business clout – the Aagrah is one of the most successful restaurant groups in the area, and the Midpoint centre, opened in 2009, is the zenith of their expansion.

The venue was the scene for our Bradford’s Best community awards in 2009, and the night proved so successful that we couldn’t think of a better place to host the Bradford Means Business night.

The Midpoint is a sumptuous restaurant, banqueting suite and conference centre that was the brainchild of group chairman Mohammed Sabir and managing director Mohammed Aslam.

Prime Minister David Cameron has thrown his weight behind the awards. He said: “I’m very pleased to be supporting the Bradford Means Business Awards.

“It’s great to see the Telegraph & Argus playing such a leading role in recognising and promoting business and entrepreneurship in Bradford.

“These awards are about the companies, business leaders and entrepreneurs who can help to create a new economic dynamism in our country.

“And it’s their success – and the success of others like them in communities all over Britain – which will ultimately create the jobs and growth on which the future of our economy depends.”