Hello SMEs, Technology calling!

‘Small is the new big’ – this is true especially if we consider the Indian Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises. Our SMEs have come far from a dingy and sparse office; unkempt workers – often cheap labor; no computer; the bossman struggling to source raw materials, coordinate with his workers, rushing to and from the to manage payments and deposits.

Despite the rough patches, today our SMEs contribute 22% of our GDP.

Thinking of the 90's, when a SME had a lot of struggle to market itself and expand its reach. The one man army aka SME had to travel physically to find relevant buyers and also manage the sourcing of raw materials, production and logistics to make sure that the goods are despatched and delivered in time. The SME had neither the bandwidth and account books nor the money for expansion.

When I started my career with IndiaMART, I found that most of our SMEs did not have Internet or even email address to communicate. I saw how difficult it was for SMEs to promote their business across borders. Telephones were largely available in PCO booths and I distinctly remember the serpentine queues in front of the PCOs in the evenings. SMEs were happy doing business with even using postal mails and were still largely profitable.

Today the world is travelling at the speed of thought. With 220 Million smartphone users, buyers from all over the world are available in the palms of suppliers. With 354 Million Internet users online, we not only get contact details but also we can verify and compare different buyers on various aspects while sitting in our offices. Deals mature in no time and orders are fulfilled faster than ever.

We have plenty of cost effective marketing and advertising options available that the SMEs can avail to fuel their growth.

We should know that we had 9 Million SMEs in 2002 with <1% online penetration, and today we have over 50 Million SMEs with ~25% penetration.

SMEs today contribute 80 Million employment opportunities, 45% of manufacturing output and over 40% of exports.

Comparing with the world, USA today has 26 Million SMEs with 90% online population and has the B2B commerce market size of $780 Billion. Similarly, China has 56 Million SME and at 70% online population has the market size of $1380 Billion. We have 50 Million SMEs but online population penetration in India is merely 25% and market size is $300 Billion (2014). It projects a great upside opportunity for India. As per the estimates, B2B commerce market size would be $700 Billion by 2020.

Miles to go... Despite all the success, there is a long way ahead!

Today, we stand at the 130th rank in the world for ease of doing business. SMEs in India are facing ground level challenges like access to new Buyers, reliable suppliers, financing, availability of skilled workforce, and management of logistics to name a few. And the solution is the adoption of technology.

With e-commerce penetrating the world like never before, we have top internet companies like Google, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, IndiaMART, Skype and Instagram, who are investing Billions in digital payments, analytics, and digital advertisements to provide hassle free solutions for making the complex life of businesses easy.

It’s time to be tech-ready! Behind that every need that SMEs may have, we have a software or on cloud solution that increases efficiency and reduces investment.

There are companies that provide easy loans to SMEs and all due diligence is done technologically. Accounting management solutions make it easy to not only record sales but also manage complex taxation processes with just a click.

Companies are endeavouring to organize people management right from identifying candidate to selection to payroll to performance management to succession planning, to separation to even re-hiring later. Companies are focussing on CRM tools that make your customer life cycle easy to understand and manage. Logistics has real-time tracking of the shipments.

Demographic, Geo-coordinates targeting and analytics make the sales conversions very attractive. Marketing budgets have gone down considerably as the Internet has the capability to provide most economic business leads from prospective buyers compared to any traditional media or advertising channel.

Technology is the driver that can help you keep pace with the fast moving world!

Let's look at the speed of execution. Telephone took 75 years to reach 100 Million users, the same number was achieved by Mobile in 16 years. Internet took 7 years to reach this milestone but Facebook took just 4 years. WhatsApp took 3 years but Instagram reached there in just 2 years. Candy Crush took 1 year and the recent sensation Pokemon Go reached there in just 1 month.

The world is moving at a very fast pace. We are trying Drones for deliveries and Chatbots for customer care. We are deploying robots for manufacturing. We are experimenting driverless cars and so on.

Adopting technology is not a choice anymore, it’s the need of time.

Change is the only thing that is constant and the companies that change like Samsung or Apple create history and become case studies.

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About Author:

Amit Jain is working as Vice President - Products & Operations with IndiaMART.com - India's largest business marketplace.

Connect with Amit on Twitter.

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