IT-friendly SMEs suffered less in the recession that firms
that dismissed IT by a margin of two to one, the country's biggest
study of the impact of the recession on small and medium
enterprises (SMEs) has found.
The
study
of 7,200 UK SME decision makers by Vanson Bourne for BT, found that
companies with a positive attitude to using technology had a better
than average experience of the recession that technology laggards
by 69% to 34%.
Mick Hegarty, head of BT Business, which published the results
this morning as part of its sponsorship of Small Business Week,
said a company was twice as like to increase turnover by more than
10% if it had a positive attitude to technology than those that
didn't.
Technology helped firms save money (30%), network and find
advice (32%), and find new customers (28%).
Smaller firms were starting to use social networking
extensively, while larger, older firms felt faster broadband speeds
had helped their businesses.
Larger SMEs were also keen to converge their communications
media such as voicemail, e-mail, and text into a single system.
London and the North East were most advanced in their use of IT,
while the South West was the least keen on IT. Yorkshire and
Humberside didn't think IT could contribute to their businesses at
all.
Londoners and smaller SMEs were keenest on social networking.
"Last year social media hardly featured on small businesses'
agenda," researchers said.
Women were less likely than men to adopt IT, with 35% saying
they would bring in it "only if we have to" compares to 25% of men.
More women than men said their businesses had suffered in the
recession. They also felt they had been hit harder.
But more women than men saw the value of social networking as a
business tool by 22% to 17%.
The study also revealed a digital age gap. Under 30s saw cutting
edge IT as vital to their businesses compare to 35% of those over
46. Where younger bosses went for mobile technologies to be
independent of location and for social networking, older ones said
they wanted faster broadband.