20 Great Small and Medium-Sized Business Facts You Should Know

“The future of our economy relies on the Imagination of entrepreneurs- President Barack Obama”

Given the quote above I thought I would share with everyone some facts/figures I have found and shared on Twitter over the last few months.  If you like the quotes below I would greatly appreciate it if you would retweet the post or comment below.

SMB (small and medium sized business) definition, based on the U.S. SBA, is < 500 employees

1. 78% of SMBs employing > 20 people have a website.   Source: NFIB
2. 82% of small businesses report word-of-mouth contributes substantially to generating their sales.   Source: NFIB
3. 46% percent of small-business owners obtain 95% or more of their household income from a business.  Source: NFIB
4. 78% of small employers think that adding innovative products/services is important to business success.  Source:NFIB
5. 55% of SMBs think that their products/services pretty much sell themselves.  Source: NFIB
6. 70% of SMBs say retaining customers cheaper than getting new customers #fact Source: NFIB
7. 7 out of 10 new employer firms last at least two years, and about half survive five years.   Source: SBA
8. In 2007, the overall rate of self-employment (unincorporated and incorporated) was 10 percent.   Source: SBA
9. 16% of Americans are self-employed.  Source: Pew Internet Project (conflicts with above data – tough to gauge)
10. Commercial banks & other depository institutions are the largest lenders (65%) of debt capital to small businesses.  Source: SBA
11. In 2008, there were 29.6 million businesses in the U.S., according to Office of Advocacy estimates.  Source: SBA
12. Firms with fewer than 500 employees accounted for 64% of net news jobs from 1993 to 2008.  Source: SBA
13. SMBs employ over 50% of the country’s private sector workforce.  Source: SBA
14. SMBs hire 40 percent of high tech workers, such as scientists, engineers and computer workers.  Source: SBA
15. The number of women-owned firms continues to grow at twice the rate of all U.S. firms (23 percent vs. 9 percent).  Source: SBA
16. Between 1997 and 2002, women-owned firms grew by 19.8 percent while all U.S. firms grew by seven percent.  Source: SBA
17. SMB employees are 2x as likely to be uninsured for health coverage (24.6 % vs.12.6 %) in 2007.  Source: SBA
18. Small business has created about 2 of every 3 net new jobs in the United States since at least the early 1970s
19. Women are more likely to seek business advice-69 percent women vs. 47 percent men.  Source: American Express
20. Small businesses account for nearly 30% ($4.7 trillion) of commercial spending in the U.S.  Source: Visa USA, 02/2006

One last interesting snippet.  At one time Microsoft was an SMB.  Microsoft was founded in 1975. The ensuing rise of the stock price has made four billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires from Microsoft employees.  Source:Wikipedia

Did the above SMB facts/figures intrigue you?  If so, I would greatly appreciate it if you would re-tweet the post or comment below.  Have some other great figures to share with everyone?  Please post them below or send them to me at dan {at} BetterBizIdeas.com.

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