With about 1 million people accessing the internet through their mobile phones, India is witnessing an increase in mobile broadband users. With this surge in the number of consumers moving online, businesses cannot avoid responding to this growing need.
They not only have to maintain a reputable online presence but provide consumers an opportunity to access their business offerings online; such as buying products, marketing campaigns, making payments and other services.
The Internet has a great potential to impact the outcomes of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) positively. In this fast-moving internet-savvy environment, only those businesses will survive and thrive in the future that will leverage the Internet.
Here are some major internet trends that small business owners should adopt to become successful in the near future –
5 Internet Trends for SMEs in 2017
Leverage internet by adopting these major trends for your SME’s success:
(a). Don’t ignore the millennial; the driving force on internet
India will be the youngest country in the world by 2021, and 64 % of its working population will be between 20-35 years of age group; according to the Economic Survey, India.
These millennials will become a significant consumer base for businesses driving the consumption of their products and services. A significant portion of this consumer base is already digitally active and is the driving force behind the online marketplace.
Being a business owner yourself, you can’t afford to miss this huge target audience. So, it’s the right time to be online. Choose the right media, start creating offerings for millennials, communicate and engage them, understand their needs and offer them value.
(b). Internet users are mainly on mobile: Meet them there!
India being a mobile-first country, most people here access the internet through smartphones. Build a mobile responsive website as most of your audience will see it on their handsets.
You can leverage mobile apps for driving brand experience, customer engagement, and running targeted marketing campaigns.
(c). Social Media: A great marketing opportunity
For small and new businesses, social media is an easy and effective way to connect with your audience. It also offers the opportunity for small businesses to increase their brand recognition, and deliver effective marketing campaigns.
(d). Leverage cloud-based services
Usage of the cloud-based services is expected to rise in 2017. As a small business owner, you should leverage IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) and (SaaS) Software-as-a-Service to cater your rapidly growing technology-based requirements.
Cloud technology will allow you to manage your business operations better and enhance efficiency without having an in-house technology team. It comes with many added benefits for small businesses such as ease of deployment, system backups, data loss prevention, and business continuity and disaster recovery solutions.
(e). Data with analytics is extremely powerful: Leverage it!
Consumer data, if used effectively, can provide some useful customer insights that can help you develop better future business strategies.
By using various analytics tools, businesses can extract meaningful data and actionable insights. This data can help your small business maintain competency in the dynamic SME industry.
The internet trends, if leveraged effectively, can help your small business survive even in the toughest competitive environment. Leverage them for the success of your SME!
(Opinion piece exclusively written for SMEpost by Paras Singh, Head – Digital Marketing, Biz2Credit India , an online credit resource for start-ups and small business loans)