Online marketing in a small-medium enterprise (SME)

Abstract

Whether viewing online content via a personal computer (PC), tablet, or smart phone, it is inevitable that the viewer will be inundated with marketing from all sides. Whether it is an HTML pop-up ad, an Adobe Flash commercial, or a targeted Google Ad, large corporations have spent millions of dollars on coordinated marketing initiatives. In Canada (as in many other areas of the world), Small and Medium Enterprises (SME’s) outnumber the larger corporations but don’t have the capital (monetary and intellectual) to dedicate to complex marketing campaigns. Taking these constraints into consideration SME’s are still faced with an increasing number of consumers using online sources for researching and purchasing products and services. With global markets being brought even closer by the web, the option for SME’s to neglect online marketing is not viable. This paper’s purpose is to examine the challenges facing SME’s as it relates to online marketing. Recent literature on the subject matter will be discussed and case study will examine how a SME facing a marketing dilemma attempted to address it via the web while facing a steep learning curve. The study shows that SME’s are hindered, not only by the tangible constraints listed above, but by misconceptions associated with the costs and efforts associated. In many cases, including within the case study, these misconceptions provide more of a hurdle than the actual constraints themselves.