World Bank, OECD and Facebook have released “Future of Business survey”, a report that showcases how online tools play an important role in SMEs’ ability to trade internationally and grow.
According to the report, SMEs that trade internationally are more confident and more likely to increase jobs.
Major Highlights
NEW: Scale:
- Launched in February 2016, with 22 countries. Today, it includes 42.
- Since January 2017, added: Czech Republic, Ecuador, Hungary, Nigeria, Pakistan, Portugal, Romania, Russia, and Taiwan, China.
- The 42 countries represent economies accounting for 40% of the world’s populations and 73% of global GDP.
NEW: Reach:
- To date, more than 218,000 Facebook business Page owners, from both younger and longer-standing companies across a wide range of sectors, have taken the monthly survey – nearly a 60% increase since January 2017.
NEW: International Trade Report Results:
- Consistent with past results, SMEs that trade internationally are more confident and more likely to increase jobs
- Traders are 5 percentage points more confident in their businesses, and 10 percentage points more likely to have added jobs in the last six months than non-traders.
- For exporting SMEs, trade is at the core of their business models and success
- Among exporting SMEs, 4 in 10 report that >25% of their revenue comes from international trade.
- Exporters rely on online tools to trade internationally
- Nearly half of exporting SMEs (45%) report that more than 75% of their international sales depend on online tools.
- SMEs attribute growth – in revenue, resources, and employees – to their use of online tools to trade internationally
- 58% of exporters agree that using online tools for selling internationally has increased their revenue.
- However, International trade is a challenge to SMEs, and only a minority of SMEs trade internationally
- Furthermore, almost half of exporters (48%) identified “selling to foreign countries” as a challenge.
About the Future of Business Survey:
- To help businesses succeed in the new mobile economy, we need to understand their current environment. We believe better business insights can inform decision-making at all levels and help businesses grow.
- That’s why in September 2016, the OECD, World Bank, and Facebook collaborated to launch the Future of Business Survey, a new source of information on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
- The Future of Business Survey is a unique window into the new digital and mobile economy.
- The partnership was a natural fit:
- The OECD and World Bank understands what questions to ask small businesses.
And Facebook can ask those questions to the largest online communities of SMEs in the world.
