Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) may seem somewhat unimportant to the global economy. However, small and medium sized enterprises should not be underestimated as they actually account for 99% of all firms worldwide, which suddenly makes them seem as important as the global giants.
In the UK alone, there are around 97,000 new SMEs formed each year. The other thing to consider, is that all new businesses are digital natives. Newer businesses have been born in the digital age, and their owners are used to going online to look for recommendations, and discover ways that would help their business scale in the short term.
Many SMEs have now started to quickly adopt new software technology to take the place of an in-house marketing team, which is much more cost-effective. Now, 53% of SMEs say that they favor a “one stop digital shop” for outsourced services.
Small Business Adoption Of Software-As-A-Service (SaaS)
Up to 55% of small businesses are looking for digital offerings to help them complete some of the tasks they cannot afford paid employees to do. SaaS companies can have clients in every world market, opening up the prospect of sustainable capital gains, regardless of local market fluctuations.
Digitally minded SaaS companies can stand to gain from the predicted 90% global growth that will originate outside of Europe, including 60% growth from developing markets. This global trend is not restricted to the SaaS sector alone, a survey revealed that half of all SMEs in the EU are already involved in international business. Showing that SMEs are eager to buy the best SaaS platforms, regardless of where they are located in the world.
The growing connectivity of the global marketplace is happening everywhere. In a recent blog post, Michael Fauscette, CRO at G2 Crowd, suggested that technology and the Internet have created a more level playing field for businesses . For the first time, SMEs have the opportunity to compete on a global level. In Australia, 46% of businesses are planning overseas operations for the first time.
In 2017, NBN spokesperson, CT Johnson created the phrase “glocals” to describe how SMEs were “harnessing fast broadband and online applications to expand their business internationally, while enjoying the freedom and lifestyle of staying local.” Nowhere is this more apparent than in the event industry, where videos of local events from across the world are enjoyed by millions with the help of event marketing technology.
As we are all ‘glocals’ now living in a much smaller world, the demand for software services from SMEs will also be affected by the rising economic climate in the U.S, where 84% of small business owners think that 2018 will offer even better returns than 2017. In the U.S, small businesses anticipate 9.1% in growth in 2018, laying the groundwork for a profitable situation for those investing in services for small business.
In addition, a report from the G2 Crowd revealed that most small businesses are looking to invest in new technology and marketing to help facilitate their growth this year. There are several reasons why SMEs are investing in SaaS as part of their business growth plans. One of the most pressing, is the low 4.4% unemployment rate in the U.S, which has forced companies to adopt labor-saving technology. Tom Porcelli, Chief U.S. economist of RBC Capital Markets, told USA Today, that the job market in the U.S “will encourage companies to look into productivity-enhancing technology.”
Software-As-A-Service For Cross Channel Social Media Marketing
Despite SMEs unprecedented growth, they have still been a little slow to adopt cross-channel marketing. Despite having some fluency in Facebook, in part from personal use, small business owners are not capitalizing on cross-channel marketing, which is the bastion of corporate marketing strategies. Bill Gaines, the Digital Marketing Director of Custom Creatives, told Business News Daily;
“Very few small businesses today do any sort of cross-channel strategic advertising. Many owners even have separate vendors for Facebook, Google, web content, web maintenance, etc. Large brands do this rather well, and I believe in 2018 we will see small businesses utilizing integrated strategies – and these small businesses will outperform their competitors.”
This is mainly because 49% of small business owners do their own marketing, and therefore do not have the expertise to promote their content on all channels effectively. 19.4% also said that they struggled to find the time to put into marketing, making a quick and easy solution highly desirable. The vast majority of small business owners place the weight of their online marketing solely on to Facebook’s shoulders, with 90% of small businesses reporting that they use it as the main part of their social media strategy. Another 22.9% use YouTube, which is the second largest search engine on the web behind Google. In general, the majority of SMEs are already posting and trying to share content on social media, but only half of them use in-house marketing teams.
Video Marketing For Small Businesses
One of the first forms of cross-channel marketing SMEs will adopt is likely to be video marketing, as 23.1% of SMEs already use video to promote their business and get new customers. Only a minority of SMEs are using video marketing right now, with the explosion of video marketing online, it is only a matter of time before others follow suit and embrace video as a cost-effective, potential viral form of marketing.
Cross-channel video marketing is more important than ever for small businesses because Facebook is growing more crowded by the day. According to Brian Peters, Social Media Manager at Buffer, “There’s just too much content on Facebook.” In addition to the increasing flood of content, Facebook’s algorithm also favors content from advertisers, making organic reach decline dramatically.
Small businesses have seen their organic reach diminish to almost nothing in the last few years. According to a study by Locowise, only 10% of followers are reached by the content posted by small businesses, leading to a shockingly low average engagement of less than 4%.
Video marketing may offer a salvation for small businesses, as video posts on Facebook receive 135% greater organic reach than photos, and get 400% more engagement. In fact, according to new research by Cisco, 82% of all internet traffic will come from video by 2020. This would indicate a drastically changed commercial landscape, where small business might be able to carve out significant market share by producing high quality, viral videos that could potentially reach millions.
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