SMB Challenges and Priorities

What keeps small and midsized businesses (SMBs) up at night? What are their top goals? To find out, Bredin recently surveyed 500 SMB principals.

The top business challenge for very small businesses (VSBs, with 1-19 employees) is finding and retaining customers, followed by inflation and cash flow. Among small businesses (SBs, with 20-99 employees), the biggest challenge is inflation, followed by finding and retaining qualified employees, and dealing with competition. Inflation is also the biggest challenge for midsized businesses (MBs, with 100-1,000 employees), followed by cash flow and taking full advantage of technology. The through line? Managing increasing prices is a serious challenge for SMBs.

Top SMB Business Challenges

We also asked SMBs about their priorities. For VSBs, maintaining profitability is the most important task, followed by finding and retaining customers. For SBs, finding new customers, keeping data and applications secure, and maximizing employee productivity are the top (and equally important) goals. MB have a very different set of priorities: managing the cost or availability of raw materials, supplies, or inventory, followed by attracting top talent and dealing with competition.

Top SMB Priorities

Looking for actionable SMB insight? Bredin’s global research gives you high-value insights to improve your go-to-market, product, pricing, UX, and other strategies. We also generate uniquely valuable data for high-impact content, PR, social, and sales support programs.