'Indian SMB companies online presence still low'

BANGALORE, INDIA: India ranks as the country with the 3rd highest number of internet users, with 137 million users of the internet out of a total population crossing 1.2 billion (Source: http://bit.ly/WkAo).

We spoke with Shashank Mehrotra (Business Head, BigRock), Jasjit Sawhney (Chairman & MD, Net4 India), Rajiv Sodhi (VP & MD, GoDaddy India), and Sridhar Reddy (Chairman & MD,CtrlS) to find out if SMBs are capitalizing on the online market...

Q) What is the trend in SMBs creating a web presence?

Mehrotra: "In our customer base, 60 percent are from tier-II and tier-III cities. While the number of addressable SMBs (those who are IT users in some way) is 10 million in India, only between 500,000-700,000 of them actually have a website. The SMB market is still underserved with less than 10 percent penetration for online presence.

We are still at the stage of saying "if you have a business, get a website" and creating awareness. We use ads on regional language channels to get through to rural markets, and there have been promising signs of adoption"

Sawhney: "The SMB market has seen a lot of changes in the last two years and there is certainly a noticeable shift in the quantum and type of businesses looking to establish a web presence.

SMBs have slowly but surely started to realize the importance of having a web presence and there are a lot of first timers who want e-commerce enabled sites"

Sodhi: "India has more than 137 million Internet users; however, domain name penetration is only 3 percent of users according to IAMAI's annual report on the Internet in India 2012. Predictions indicate that Internet user growth will reach 300 million by 2014. As Internet adoption increases in emerging markets like India, we expect more and more Indian SMBs to get online"

Reddy: "People are spending money on search engine optimization, Google adwords, Facebook etc, to improve traffic to their site. Making sites mobile phone friendly is another trend being seen. Presence in Youtube & Images search has also become a new trend now".

Q) What are the main barriers preventing SMBs from having a website?

Mehrotra: "In India, a lot of small businesses still ask the question "Why do I need a website, when everybody else doesn't have one?" In countries like the US, it's not an option because all your customers are looking for you online! Only ~10 percent of customers in India look for businesses online. Other developed countries see 40-85 percent of customers looking for services online. Once the process of discovery becomes completely online, only then will SMBs truly feel the need to have a website"

Sawhney: "Whilst there is an overall issue of lack of awareness, the biggest misconception is that making a website is "highly technical" and complicated. Second comes the misconception that it is very "expensive". Neither is true, of course, it costs as little as Rs 499 per annum to have a website and if you are even moderately computer literate you can build your website in a few hours using drag, drop, cut and paste type actions"

Sodhi: "Small business owners often believe getting online is hard or time-consuming. Building a website has not always been easy, but now it can be. Security is also becoming a major concern for SMBs. In markets like India, people are not accustomed to online payments."

Reddy: "Competitors gathering intelligence and then using to their own advantage; snooping on product drivers and strategies are some of the fears that SMB's have about creating a web presence. They fear about their edge and USP being given away easily. Many people especially older generation business owners underestimate the importance of web presence"

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