What is a SME?

The more I run my business, the more I get irritated with the term SME (Small to Medium Sized Enterprises). Why? Well, a SME can be any business between no staff members right up to 249 members of staff. There's a world of difference between the two. Someone with no members of staff (the vast majority of SMEs) will have completely different issues and concerns that someone with 1 member of staff, let alone 249.

I was with a group the other day that was being led by a guy who clearly did not understand small businesses. The only problem is, the group he was addressing were all small business owners. He thought that the sole problem the business owners faced was dealing with members of staff and forgot about all the other areas of running a business - i.e. marketing, time management, strategy, finance and actually running the business.

And that's the problem when I hear small business owners say that their customers are SMEs too - who do they really mean? Usually when I dig down, they're trying to attract medium sized companies and certainly not one man bands.

So, my challenge for this week is, if you've been using the term SME, try to really narrow down who you're talking about. Do you mean one-man bands or a business that is much larger than that? What issues, motivations and frustrations might the company you're trying to target have? And if you really mean SMALL businesses, make an effort to get to know about them...they do not have the same issues as medium sized companies and the way they think is completly different too.

I'm very happy to help people get to know about small business owners - just contact me and ask!