As an SMB marketer, you might find yourself wishing you had the resources and yearly revenue of some of your bigger competitors, but take heart! What you don’t realize is how often those bigger competitors of yours are looking at you with the same envy.
Sure, they’ve got larger teams and a bigger budget than you do, but in today’s world, neither of those mean as much as they used to. The internet has put small and big companies on a much more even playing field — and these days, it’s the companies with the biggest brains, not the biggest wallets, that are seeing the most success.
If you’re an SMB marketer, you can revel in the fact that four-hour town hall meetings aren’t taking huge chunks of time out of your day. Not to mention the fact that you aren’t jumping through hoops just to get a few sentences of copy approved. But what other advantages do SMBs have over their larger counterparts? Let’s take a look.
SMBs are nimble.
If you’ve ever attended a Pardot webinar, then you’ve probably heard the term “agile marketing.” Because of their ability to act quickly and make more immediate decisions, SMBs can take this principle and apply it a lot more easily to their business. When the decision-making hierarchy doesn’t involve several layers of management, a number of committees, and your boss’ uncle (okay, I’m exaggerating here, but you get the idea), it’s much easier to make the game-time decisions that are needed to keep your company ahead of the curve. And in an industry where your business depends on keeping up with the latest trends and technologies, agility can be everything.
SMBs are innovative.
Big companies are often stuck in their ways. They have set processes for getting sh** done — and those processes aren’t changing anytime soon. Implementing a new technology is likely going to require extensive approvals and reviews from all of the higher-ups, making it difficult for bigger companies to innovate at the same speed as their smaller competitors. If you’re an SMB, take pride in your ability to pivot and innovate right when you need to.
SMBs are scrappy.
You’ve probably heard the phrase “scrappy startup mentality,” which can just as easily be applied to SMBs (many of which are startups!). Small businesses are used to having to develop workarounds to accomplish tasks that are easy for their larger counterparts. They’re also used to having to fight for every last bit of business — and it’s this tenacity that makes them successful where others aren’t.
SMBs are personable.
If there’s one word that can’t be used to describe SMBs, it’s “faceless.” In a time when buyers are craving authenticity with companies, smaller businesses are able to provide more personal, 1:1 business relationships. With fewer brand standards and a smaller, core group of employees, SMBs have more freedom to really express their personalities and give buyers a look behind the curtain. Company culture has quickly become a competitive advantage, and it’s the little guys who are able to compete at the highest level.
So the next time you’re feeling envious of the bigger companies in your space, remember each of the unique advantages of being an SMB. In some ways, being a startup or an SMB is a lot like being the Peter Pan of the business world. As your company grows, it becomes more difficult to scale each of these advantages in a feasible way — so be careful not to grow up too fast!