The Top Three Tech Trends Impacting the SMB in 2009

Technology is always changing. Staying on top of trends is critical to your company’s success. Here are some things happening in 2009 that your small to mid-range business (SMB) should be ready to take advantage of.

1. Mobility. Unchained from the desktop, consumers are in the field using powerful, high-resolution wireless devices at broadband speeds everywhere. Instead of using a computer strictly in the home or office, today’s computing experience is immersive and real-time. Consider:

a. Mobile advertising. How is your advertising and SEO (search engine optimization) strategy designed to attract the mobile consumer?

b. Mobile self-service. How are your customer service solutions and web site engineered to provide exceptional self-service for your customers? How do your online technology solutions help them do business with you?

c. Mobile sales. How is your sales team positioned to collaborate, share leads, and land the deal at any time and any where?

d. Mobile workplace. Given the state of the economy, think about the incentives that go along with telecommuting: how is your firm positioned to work from anywhere, to minimize lease and utility expenses, and to obtain state and local tax benefits for reducing carbon emissions?

e. Mobile advantage. How can your business processes be optimized and extended by mobile computing to give your small business the dexterity to run circles around your larger, more inflexible competition?

2. Transparency. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to deduce that more regulation and accountability will be an outcome of 2008’s financial melt-down. The need for greater transparency is coming. So, how is your firm positioned to provide immediate transparency to your customers today? In the upcoming year, how can you use technology to make it easier to do business with your company, and to automate business transactions while providing useful business intelligence and auditing tools to interested 2^nd and 3^rd parties? And in an age of fiscal volatility, how will you be prepared to rapidly answer strategic questions from your functional management team, stakeholders, and shareholders?

3. Open Computing. Unlike any other time in the history of microcomputing, the consumer has a wider range of software and application choices, and many of these products can be acquired at little or no cost. Email, contact management, document management, productivity applications, project management solutions, operating systems, advanced graphical editing tools… all of these applications whose licensing costs – historically – presented a barrier to entry for the SMB can be acquired today for free. Listen, save a buck and use it wiser: where your competition will be shelling out useless dollars in software licensing this year, get your software for free, gain immediate capability, and throw your money where it matters – like at advertising or customer service improvements.

Understanding how these factors can influence your company’s reach, further your cost containment strategy, and may very well be what separates you from your competitors this year.

R

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