MSME Technology Trends for 2021

 

The pandemic year has been a tipping point for over 7 crores micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) which account for 40% of total exports, 45% of total industrial production, and 30.5% of services to India’s GDP.   

 

Covid-19 has helped digitally aware businesses (food & beverage outlets, auto-ancillary, retailers, training institutes, etc.) to mirror their physical presence to the internet and mobile ecosystem. However, a significant number of MSME’s, who had a poor digital understanding, found it extremely difficult to carry on their daily operations. Now in 2021, they have come to realize the need to prioritize digital tools in improving human efficiency and productivity, enhancing data security, and upgrading customer service.  

 

In 2021, MSMEs are now moving their business-critical applications to Cloud and taking benefits of free credits, SMB discounts, and GTM programs due to stiff competition between AWS, Microsoft Azure, Ali Baba Cloud, and Google Cloud. Unlike large enterprises who can utilize their IT resources for tech-development and roll-out, MSMEs are relying on simplistic and self-service tools (DIY, do-it-yourself) that make a quick and direct impact on their business. SaaS, another type of offering is ideal because it is very cost-effective and helps gain access to the same enterprise-grade, secure, modern technologies that are available to large enterprises. Who would have ever thought that one day we can have a CRM/email/invoicing system at around Rs 100/month and not worry about reliability, management, hosting, etc.?  

 

Additionally, MSMEs want to improve their competitiveness by mass personalization and outreach to the market at scale. Effective collaboration and remote work management within its workforce are another key focus area for MSMEs, as they look for reliable, cost-effective HR-Tech solutions for messaging, team conferencing, virtual desktops, and product learning and training.  

 

MSMEs are becoming more cautious about privacy and are starting to use licensed and paid software instead of the free consumer ones (that give access to sensitive company data to 3rd party companies for marketing). So, MSME’s benefit by becoming more private and safer not only for themselves but also for their customers, directly increasing their business footprint. In fact, according to a recent survey conducted by an SME agency, 34% of MSME’s, not just in metros but even in Tier-II and III cities have already adopted digital tools for interactions with employees, customers, and suppliers. More importantly, 50% of the MSME respondents have claimed benefits in terms of profitability by going digital. 

 

State of MSME Digitization (IT Software)  

  1. 1. Basic (56%): Productivity & Email software (Emails, Website & Social Media)  

  1. 2. Intermediate (34%): Cloud Storage, CRM, ERP, CMS & Workforce Collaboration tools   

  1. 3. Advanced (10%): AI-powered – Analytics, Big-Data, Automation  

  2.  

The need of the hour is for MSMEs to make technology and digital solutions at the center of all business strategies to get to the next level of business growth. 

 

2 Apr 2022
2 Most Important Chat Features for Any Business

According to IBM’s Security report, the average cost for an Indian company due to a security breach was Rs 14 crore in 2020. Businesses of all sizes are affected by such an event, with customer details, patient records, employee, faculty & student data, and insurance and financial datasets being especially at risk. In fact, leaks on SMEs and MSMEs are higher given the lack of focus and awareness on data privacy in this sector. 

 

One of the biggest causes of data breaches in India were from human errors (21%). And it is expected that with the usage of consumer messaging applications and software, data compromise from human errors will only become more common and difficult to control.  

 

Despite many wake-up calls, only a few small and medium-sized companies have been able to put in practice measures to safeguard data, with many lacking personnel to handle cybersecurity.  

 

There are three key reasons why a secure communication channel is a must for every business:  

  • To instill confidence in customers who do business with the company   

  • To protect internal discussions from the public  

  • To protect the company’s intellectual property  

  

If your communication channels are to be protected against such hacks, then your infrastructure MUST have these 2 features:  

 

Understanding security authentication vs. authorization is vital for any website. 
 

  1. Identity and Access Management (IAM)  

 

Authentication and authorization play an important role in ensuring secure communication between the workforce, customers, and clients associated with your company. Authentication first confirms the identities of the communicating individuals and then grants a different level of access to an application.  

 

  • Authentication: this is the step that validates the identity of a user and is traditionally done by giving users (workforce) a username and password  
  • Authorization: once the user is authenticated, the authorization step determines what the user can do or see when they signed in (for example department-specific files) and who they can communicate with. Such settings are changeable only by the admins & owners, and not by the users 

 

A recent survey by a leading cybersecurity company established that 63% of Indian businesses worry about data hacks due to staff error. This makes authorization even more important, limiting possible careless actions that can be performed by an individual.  

 

2. End-to-End Encryption (E2E)

Businesses share internal data over messaging apps many times per day. Such a practice has led to a new set of problems and opportunities for data breaches, making End-to-End Encryption (E2E), the strongest form of encryption, essential for secure communications. 

 

So, how does E2E work? Put simply, it is a process of applying encryption to message & files on one device such that only the device to which it is sent can decrypt it. The keys cannot be reused to view any other message, dramatically reducing the security risks.   

 

Zoom until recently wasn’t end-to-end encrypted. Cell phones, Google Hangouts, and Skype calls, for example, are not E2E. Similarly, Telegram does not provide E2E for group chat and one to one chat, meaning that in theory, it has access to the contents of the messages sent via its platform (while its secret chat option offers E2E). 

 

Secure communication channels are no longer just a tool for your organization but have become a kind of insurance to protect your company from illegal activities and protect it against legal obligations. 

3 Mar 2022
Your Business Requires a “Private” App

If you’re a business owner or in charge of Sales for an SME, you would have probably considered at one point if your company needs a mobile app – be it for outreach to your clients on new products or to constantly train and take feedback from sales executives in the field.  

With over 44+ lakhs apps on the App Store, you might also be thinking the market is saturated & the existing combination of Apps such as Google Forms, Dropbox, Email & WhatsApp do just fine, so why bother? On the surface, this makes sense. But try answering these questions:  

  • Do the current consumer apps give you the exclusivity, privacy, confidentiality, and connect, which all your prospective customers look for before getting connected with your services and products?  
  • Can your website continuously engage your prospects/ clients with new products and push customised incentives to interested users?  
  • Do the existing apps give you visibility on communication between your sales network and prospects and clients?  
  • Does the app guarantee that your customers don’t take a screenshot of your product/ideas/pricing and share it with your competitors?  
  • Does your website or current app tell you when & what prospective customers are looking for?  

These are just a few reasons for the in-built marketing value your private mobile app brings over consumer apps. If you are still wondering, then look at the smartphone stats – about 87% of the time is spent on apps while the remaining 13% on mobile websites.  

A recent study by a top Indian app development company found out the following three key reasons why an SME creates an app:  

  • Increase sales (43%)  
  • Compete with other businesses (33%)  
  • Improve customer service (24%)     

And finally, SMEs found their mobile apps to be most useful for:  

  • in-app forms & 2-way communication channel to streamline operations and free up service staff (56%)  
  • using push notifications to engage customers (30%)  
  • reward loyal clients and customers with special discounts (14%)  

Planning Your Private App  

Even if you feel that your private “branded” app is the right step for your organization, the task of getting the app designed, developed, tested, and maintained gets daunting sometimes.  

This is because the first step that naturally comes to mind is to get the app built in-house or hire an app development company. But in the majority of cases, this step becomes ineffective given the high cost & time involved.   

There is also a third option, “SaaS” (Software as a Service), which becomes the ideal offering for SME’s because it is cost-effective and provides for a configurable packaged software, like an email license, where you pay for the subscription on a monthly or annual basis based on the features you desire. SaaS additionally helps you gain access to the same enterprise-grade, secure, modern technologies that are available to large enterprises.  

What about ROI?  

No matter how you develop and support your “private” app, recouping your costs and measuring impact will always be on top of your mind. Thus, determining your KPIs is important to help you gauge your success in reaching prospects, retaining clients, and creating repeat customers.   

 

20 Feb 2022
4 Must Do’s If You are using WhatsApp, Telegram or Signal for Office

For any company – big or small, the mobile device of a workforce is the weakest security link in a business environment. Whether it is sending a sensitive presentation outside the intended group or sharing office-threads, or taking screenshots of work-chat, all these attempts constitute a serious data leak without the organization being aware.  

With the surge in remote work during COVID-19, the risk for a business of such privacy, legal and reputational leak have increased exponentially. So, if you are allowing the use of WhatsApp or any other consumer messaging app in your organization, then here are five things that you must ensure:  

  • Get two separate accounts sanctioned: Work & Personal  

We are repeatedly advised to keep personal and professional life separate. The same holds for an instant messaging channel. Convince employees to use one messaging platform for personal use (WhatsApp) and the other for business use (Signal, Telegram, or WhatsApp Business). It will limit increase distraction and mixing of work-related messages with personal conversations in the absence of instruction.  

  • Require deletion of sensitive company data regularly  

Spam through unknown chats has been at the center of some of the most notable data breaches in recent years. Not long ago, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ data compromise from his phone represents an instance of how data can be intruded without any use of sophisticated techniques or brute-force hacking. The workforce must be regularly reminded to delete sensitive files residing on their phones after a defined period.   

  • Use more of “Admin Only Message” settings  

Conversations in a group over a period become difficult to control and administer. Critical communication often gets overlooked, forgotten, or is seen too late to be relevant. Assigning admins only message settings can be a good method to highlight and keep important information relevant and ‘cut’ the noise.  

  • Invest in workforce communication on security:  

Regular communication, especially in SME’s must be designed in a manner that strengthens workforce security posture. This includes making the workforce aware, reminded, and encouraged not to use the same passwords across work and personal accounts, not to forward sensitive information to unauthorized people, but ensuring the least access as possible. 

Productivise: Get Your “Own” Private Messaging App   

At Productivise, we take your security very seriously, allowing you to keep your data within your privately owned or approved servers so that you can communicate without any compromise. 

Launch your own branded app & get going within 10 business days! 

 

 

 

17 Jan 2022
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