With the arrival of cloud computing and other advances, small businesses now have access to some of the same technologies traditionally only available to larger companies. But the adoption of these technologies by smaller firms is not widespread and those who don’t keep up with technology are at a competitive disadvantage.
A recent study by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) titled “Lessons on Technology and Growth from Small Business Leaders” reveals small companies that are well-versed in technology and cloud computing outpace their technology-challenged peers in sales and job growth.
Researchers surveyed small businesses from a wide-range of industries in five countries including Brazil, China, India, Germany and the United States. During the study, researchers divided the small businesses into three categories:
- Leaders use “bleeding edge” technology to power their businesses; these companies are known as early adopters and employ things like cloud technology for data storage.
- Followers make use of well-established technology; examples would be company websites and mobile apps.
- Laggards have low levels of technology usage; only 60 percent use computers and they usually have no online presence.
Other key findings included:
- Small businesses are major contributors to their countries’ economies.
- Tech leaders tend to be early adopters of new technologies.
References
“Tech Savvy Small Businesses Outperform Peers”. Smallbizlabs.com. 11/26/2013.
“Lessons on Technology and Growth from Small-Business Leaders”. Bcgperspectives.com. 10/5/2013.
