With the world economy deglobalizing and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic not just changing how people work, but also what motivates employees in their choice of employment, the small/medium business (SMB) and small office/home office (SOHO) markets provide a beacon of hope when it comes to growth opportunities in the enterprise telecoms market, finds GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.
The challenge faced is that the enterprise telecoms market is too diverse, complicated and confusing for your average telco. There are at least **400 million identified small businesses globally and they are the part of the enterprise market that is growing. However, developing, selling, and supporting this hugely diverse market is a massive challenge for telcos who do not have the right strategy to manage this complexity.
Robert Pritchard, Senior Analyst at GlobalData, said: “Traditionally, service providers have segmented the SMB and SOHO markets by the number of employees, but this is a simplistic approach. By pursuing a more insightful and targeted strategy, they can more clearly define opportunities by business challenge and customer technology need.”
According to GlobalData’s analysis, service providers and vendors have historically struggled to deal with the size and complexity of small business markets – they vary by country, by vertical sector, by technology maturity, and – most importantly – by buying behaviour.
The ideal strategy would be to segment the market by customer behavior and needs simultaneously, so building on the product portfolio but making it relevant to the business goals of groups of target customers. This is more difficult, but it helps avoid the pitfalls of a straightforward product push. It also addresses the small business need to adopt technology that improves their market proposition, enhances customer acquisition and satisfaction, cuts their costs, improves productivity, increases revenue growth and leverages channels to market (e.g., web, partners, chat, etc.). All of which can be delivered through the appropriate technologies including unified communications, mobility, cloud services, data mining and customer relationship management.
Pritchard continued: “Although there is considerable competition for business in the SMB and SOHO markets, established service providers have the opportunity to leverage their breadth of portfolio, brand, existing customer base and associated data in an increasingly automated and insightful way to compete against challengers who are often focused on price. A judicious balance of a premium direct channel, and a third-party or automated go-to-market ‘value’ strategy optimizes both the addressable market and potential margins.”
