The other day I was talking to a small business owner of an advertising agency in New York City with about 35 employees. We got into a lengthy conversation about how his company differentiates itself from all the other New York ad agencies, what some of the common marketing mistakes typical businesses make and what he wants people to think about when they hear his company's name.
What I found interesting is that even though his company is "small" and private, he views his company as an industry giant, as a company that is no different than an Omnicom Group.
"Yes I'm a small business but I have the same challenges and concerns as the big guys. I worry about internet security, bad New York weather, and believe it or not...I even worry about federal regulations. In fact, because I'm small businesses I need to address these things even more so because it could put me out of business! One federal penalty, for whatever reason, and I might not be able to recover from it financially. One computer virus could infect the network, infect customer data and equate to lost business. I can't afford that so I need to be proactive and forward thinking."
The conversation sparked my predictions for 2007 for Small Businesses:
1. Internet Security for the real life example listed above
2. Remote communications: wireless internet connections, smartphones, voip, Blackberries. Work smarter and more efficiently.
3. Web Collaboration Technologies like WebEx to increase corporate productivity, shorten sales cycles, increase market reach, improve customer retention and satisfaction while reducing travel time and cost. Do more with less.
4. Asset Utilization and Optimization. Leverage new technologies with strong integration capabilities. Reduce the number of siloed environments, create a seamless and standard platform where back end systems can communicate with one another.
5. Invest in SaaS technologies: zero implementation and deployment costs, minimal IT resources, not tied to a corporate VPN or corporate network since it's 100% web-based, global access, automatic updates, quick ROI, low risk.
It should be an interesting year for small businesses. Following a few of the predictions could be the difference between a good small company and a great soon to be industry leader.
