Small and medium businesses in Tier-III Indian cities are the highest adopters of smartphones and personal computers for communicating with customers, managing business data and accounting related activities, according to a recent report.
The report by content marketing platform Nowfloats, in association with Zinnov, shows that 89 per cent of small and medium businesses (SMBs) use smartphones to reach out to customers and 7 per cent for supplier interactions.
This is higher than Tier-I cities where 73 per cent SMBs use smartphones for interactions with customers, while 4 per cent use it to interact with suppliers. The number stands at 78 per cent and 8 per cent for Tier-II cities for customer and supplier interactions, respectively.
Similarly, 52 per cent SMBs from Tier-III cities use personal computers (PCs) for data management, while 39 per cent use it for inventory management. This is against 46 per cent for data management and 15 per cent for inventory management in Tier-I cities.
Interestingly, the report found that 80 per cent of small businessmen across the country use applications such as Whatsapp in `Vinglish’ (vernacular + English) to instantly connect with customers. Such businesses have witnessed about 10 per cent growth in the overall business over a period of time, it added. While 37 per cent use aggregator websites such as Yellow Pages to reach out to potential consumers, 27 per cent SMBs use social media to do target marketing. Only 17 per cent of SMBs use e-commerce platforms to drive new customer traffic and make the transactions easier. The report was compiled by a group of researchers who travelled more than 5,000 km and covered 24 cities from Amritsar to Kanyakumari. They spoke to more than 200 SMBs about how they are using technology to drive business. The report defines Tier-I cities as those with a population of more than 4 million, Tier-II with populations between 1-4 million and Tier-III with a population of less than a million.
