• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, April 11, 2004

Small Business Dependence on the Internet

An ACNielsen survey of small business owners or decision makers who made a business purchase on eBay within the past 12 months, and general small business executives, about their growth plans and Internet usage, found that nearly 90% of the eBay group uses the Internet to research business purchases, and 80% access industry expertise online.

Comparing the eBay sample to the non-eBay users, the eBay purchasers are more likely to expect their business to grow, expect expansion of the number of offices/locations, and expect the number of full-time employees to grow. Also, only 2% of the eBay group says the economic climate is the most important factor in making their company more competitive or successful, compared to 7% of non-eBay executives.

US Small Business Attitude Toward Internet 2004 (% respondents)

	General Small Business	eBay Small Business	Non-eBaySmall Business
Helped business grow/expand	58%	82%	57%
Helped business become more profitable	51	79	49
Helped business reduce costs	49	78	45
Business relies on Internet to survive	15	31	14
Internet has no impact on business	33	15	34

Source: ACNielsen, March 2004

The biggest challenges for SMBs in the manufacturing and retail industries, are cutting costs, streamlining business processes and managing market conditions. According to the ACNielsen study, eBay users are using the Internet to help with precisely those sorts of challenges.

Major Business Related Challenges (% respondents)

	Manufacturing	Retail
Need to lower costs	54%	47%
Need to improve efficiency	51	37
Manage changing competitive and market conditions	43	34
Conform to suppliers' demand to be online	33	18
Lack of real-time information	15	18
Difficult to forecast and budget	12	26

Source: Yankee Group March, 2004

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