subject: Managing your way out of the downturn [print this page] Managing your way out of the downturn Managing your way out of the downturn
Small business Britain has been struggling to survive one of the worst recessions of all time. The exact scale of business closures and employee redundancies amongst small businesses may never be fully known but with over 35% of the UK economy reliant on the 4,727,945 small businesses operating in the UK, their success is as vital as any of the large publically quoted businesses. Indeed, the Government was quick to recognise this and attempted to implement measures from the beginning of the recession to assist small businesses to survive. This in itself was quite a contrast to previous recessions where most of the focus and help was aimed at the large employers. Intuit UK asked small business owners what positive management steps they had taken over the past twelve months. Their experiences should also hopefully provide inspiration and insight to other small business owners.
Business strategy
1. Focused only on existing business/clients
This batten down the hatches mentality that appreciates that what matters most is protecting and serving the customers you already have and rely upon, was a dominant strategy adopted by nearly half (45%) of our respondents. In the vast majority of instances (80%) our respondents have witnessed the success of this strategy and not a single business owner surveyed felt this had been unsuccessful with the remainder unable to definitively state that there was a positive impact upon the business.
2. Improved customer care
Obviously this is closely linked to the point above and while slightly fewer of our respondents (38%) had deliberately adopted this strategy as a response to the recession, those that did had an extremely positive experience 83% reported that this approach had proved successful for them and, yet again, there were no negative experiences.
3. Tapped into e-Commerce
While not appropriate to all types of business, 18% of our respondents had invested in e-commerce during the recession. Of those, 63% felt it had been a successful thing for them to do, 21% were unsure and 16% felt that there had been no positive impact.
4. Dramatically changed the focus of the business
Understandably, few businesses took this course of action but nevertheless, the fact that 14% did will surprise many and shows that any accusations of complacency in the face of a recession would be unfounded when it comes to small business Britain. This bold strategy was also reasonably successful for those businesses involved, with just
over a half (53%) reporting success and only 15% saying that it had failed to deliver the turnaround they were seeking. For the remaining third there has been no negligible impact to date.< /p>
