LCCI, others boost SMEs’ capacity for market access

As access to markets unveils new challenges to small businesses, especially in the area of selling their goods and services to consumers, the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in conjunction with Facebook, has advocated increased understanding of consumer behaviour and markets by SMEs in order to sustain their operations.

According to the stakeholders, the emergence of various online platforms and dynamic nature of consumer behaviour have necessitated the need to strategise in reaching a wider audience for business profitability.

Speaking at the LCCI-Facebook Small and Medium Enterprises’ forum in Lagos, recently, the chamber explained that the move to improve small business owners’ capacity was borne out of the need to ensure that small businesses take a share of the growing digital market and reach a larger audience with their solutions.

The spokesman for LCCI, Segun Alabi said: “We are in a digital age and the need to catch up with the world has necessitated the move by the Chamber to partner with Facebook to assist SMEs with requisite skills and online tools to reach larger market and take their share in the global value-chain”, he added.

Facilitators at the forum urged business owners to continuously profile their customers and improve engagement with them while constantly improving their offerings to ensure that they are meeting the needs of their consumers.

According to them, it is not enough to have access to various online and social media platforms but utilising such platforms profitably to engage with consumers and other businesses.

One of the participants, Lisa Peters, a Regional Sales Manager of RCI Document Solutions Limited, said the forum is an eye-opener to learning how to maximise the available online platforms for business aside from personal and social use.