Small business

3.6 Marketing and public relations
Objective: To communicate effectively with the public at large, with the media and with all the key stakeholders
to create wide awareness of SME development issues.
The vast majority of SMEs is often unaware of government service programmes. One problem is the
method of communication: small businesses do not in general acquire information via formal literature, glossy
booklets and brochures, but learn mainly by verbal interaction with other entrepreneurs and stakeholders.
‘Know who’ is more important to them than ‘know what’. The owner-manager has little time for public
agency channels of information that are not of immediate  importance in ‘doing the business’. 
Ensuring that information services are organised on a ‘need to know’ basis is therefore the major
challenge for government/small business relations. Another challenge is to ensure that the organised voice
of SMEs in government is as powerful as that of large firms. The key guideline in designing effective
communication with SMEs is to ensure that information is passed through channels which entrepreneurs
trust. Stories about peer businesses’ accomplishments, for example, are more convincing than pamphlets
setting out formal guidelines. Marketing of small business services is best done through the channels which
the businesses normally use as part of business activity.