SME's

Our High Streets, we are often led to believe, are a battleground fought over by the big name retailers keen to see the colour of our money.

Retailing is undoubtedly a competitive business, and, in contrast to many SMEs, much of what the biggest and most successful retailers get right they get right in public.

It follows, logically, that when they misjudge a market or product or their customers’ demands, it is all pretty public too.

Smaller business with smaller customer bases may not have to conduct their affairs under such unforgiving glare. On balance, that’s probably desirable for most small businesses. That’s not to say the relationship between an SME and its customers is not as important as the one, say, between a supermarket and its customers. Customers matter most to any business.

So, can smaller businesses learn from the Big Boys? How, for example can a smaller business succeed in attracting new customers – perhaps even new customers who may be prized away from their existing suppliers?

Quality, pricing, reliability, reputation can all make a significant contribution to the thought process which makes a client decide where to spend money.

There are other tactics too.

Finding out what your competitors are offering, then improving on it has been a basic business technique since Day One. So too have efforts to persuade potential customers to compare and contrast the service they get from one supplier with what’s on offer at another.

Businesses relying on footfall are always dreaming up ways of enticing more people through their doors. “Get them in, show them what we can offer and they’ll be back for more,” goes the theory here.

This week it’s that very basic theory which has formed the basis of one of the most bizarre pieces of marketing we have seen on our High Streets in many a while.

And, surprise, surprise, it involves the booming supermarket sector.

The weekend newspapers carried full-page advertisements that effectively left two of our largest food retailers eye-balling each other over that High Street battleground.

There nothing subtle about this one either when you consider the headline on the ads: “At last, good news for Kwik Save customers. Free bread and milk at Asda.”

In an effort to create high footfall through its stores – at the expense of a rival – Asda is giving away milk and bread to anyone producing a Kwik Save bag or receipt in one of its stores.

Simple? Yes. Effective? Too early to say. But surely it’s one of the smartest ways to draw shoppers through the doors of Asda’s up and down the land. And if they like what they see when they collect their free food and drink, they’ll be back.

Your move Kwik Save.