Recently, I was thinking that it’s been a while since I’ve discussed “small business talk or inbound marketing” on this blog and then I read this wonderful article – “why small companies will win in this economy?” that I came across through Jim Kukral’s post – “We don’t trust companies anymore…we trust people“. The moment I read this post, I knew that I had to write something about it as not only this was a great article to share with all of you, it’s one point that definitely deserves commentary from almost all the bloggers -
We all can see that how social media marketing is increasing and how various tools are bringing us closer to each other. Be it blogs, twitter, facebook, youtube, digg or just about any other tool – there is some social element that helps us connect us with our known ones and those who are not known to us, however are authority in one or the other subject. Now, the question arises that why exactly social media marketing is booming?
Peter Bergman hits the hammer at the right spot -
We simply don’t trust companies anymore. We trust people. And in big companies, it’s hard to even find a person to trust as we scream “operator” into our telephones only to get transferred to another menu whose options have changed.
So true! Call it Word of mouth marketing, referral marketing or just about anything – we all are seeing this trend increasing as we lose the trust in those big corporations. In today’s world we all are interested in solutions that are catered for us and we all seek personal attention for every single penny that we spend. We are getting sick of those long queues over the phone and various different answers that lead us to no solution but lot of headache. I agree that it is not true for every aspect of the economy & industry and is more focused towards service industry.
If you’ll ask the question from yourself, that when was the last time you were really happy from the service you received from a large corporation then I’m sure you’ll get the point that Peter, Jim and now I’m trying to convey over here.
Being a small business owner, I certainly have my own experience to share as even we are in a position to expand our venture from 4 people to more. I myself have got lots of new clients just because one of our old client’s referred us to them. There are already lot of large web design firms however, its small companies and individual wordpress theme designers who are getting the attention in the space of WordPress theme designs. Why is that? Because, those client’s trust their friends who referred us to them.
Small is the new big. Sustainable is the new growth. Trust is the new competitive advantage.
This very small line says almost everything that you’ll see is happening in the market at the moment. Small is becoming big because small businesses can easily manage to give the right amount of attention to its customers and if a business can sustain that, then they’ll surely grow as well as they’ll get the referral that they deserve.
I’m sure that this trend will only increase as more and more people will interact on the web and will chose to trust the person they know and not just the advertisement they’ll see on TVs, website or radios. We’ll surely see more and more small businesses and will see many new entrepreneur’s until those big corporations decide to get back to basics and start giving enough attention to their customers.
Or should we say that today’s customer has become much smarter and demanding that small businesses have been able to handle as compared to large corporations? What are you thoughts on the same?
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Nice informative post, Mayank
To add into it:
What I feel is that the present economic recession is strongly gonna prevent small firms and start-up companies from securing the private equity investment they require these days to launch, develop and grow there new products and services.
During this state, many small businesses have already proven they are very good at leading the way the are leading the economy, and because of their size, business agility and deep customer understanding, small businesses have several inherent innovation advantages over large corporations. They can now be able to more readily identify opportunities, quickly react to changing market and industry conditions, and nimbly compete with bigger competitors. Which is going to be at there advantage during this recession period.
No surprise that small business owners are becoming natural innovators. Many are in business for themselves because they knew of better ways to do business and not just to produce and promote a unique product or service. As we can follow the trends, these small business owners are closer to their customer base as active members of their communities and, as such, have a better "read" on people and can instantly adjust to their ever-changing expectations. That level of intuition and nimbleness is integral to innovation and the people behind all those bright ideas. Again, which gives them one more advantage during the recession
The final reason for small businesses be stronger when this recession is over has to do with fundamentals. There's a newfound wariness in selling too much into one industry or relying on just one customer. There's a recent understanding of the importance of putting a few bucks away to ride out the ups and downs. There's now a new appreciation for those accountants and consultants who warned people against building up too much of overhead. There's a respect for a guy who didn't upgrade his computer systems just because some propeller head told him it would "be cool to do it." We're seeing those auto dealers and parts suppliers crumble as their industry is shaken. We're watching those companies—with too much payroll, too many facilities, too high rents, too much useless yet expensive technology—go down.
Because, when things turn south, business owners that have lived through this downturn will have learned to be flexible. They will have learned how important it is to be able to cut prices or add more value to their offerings because that's what customers are going to want most of all. Many big companies, have also learnt the same and have improved there internal structure relating to the same trends.
I have to agree with the article and Abhinav, flexibility is the key to surviving the recession. Small business tend to have the infrastructure to be flexible however, I have noticed a trend of new and small businesses being more stubborn than the larger established businesses. Seems counter-intuitive but there is a lot of pride that goes into a small business where as the larger businesses will do what ever it takes to survive.
Thanks for dropping by! That's interesting however that stubborn attitude will not take them anywhere. I've yet to come across these kind of startups however have experienced the stubborn attitude in large corps. One more thing, I just wish I don't get to meet those kind of startups
It is not all startups that are stubborn, most are indeed flexible. It was just an observation that agility must be adhered to whether it be within a small or large corporation.
The final reason for small businesses be stronger when this recession is over has to do with fundamentals.
i do Social Media Marketing specially when promoting a new website or an affiliate product. Social media is more effective than offline advertising in my opinion.