Tag: Abhijit Bose

Mumbai: WhatsApp India on Tuesday unveiled #SMBSaathi Utsav, a programme aimed at supporting small businesses in adopting digital tools like the WhatsApp Business App to conduct their operations. The goal of this programme, which was launched in partnership with Josh Talks, is to educate and assist small businesses in realising their full potential through WhatsApp.

#SMBSaathi Utsav has kicked off with a pilot in Jaipur’s Johri Bazaar and Bapu Bazaar where 500+ small businesses are being trained on various aspects of running their business online. 

India is home to approximately 63 million MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises) accounting for 30 per cent of the country’s GDP (gross domestic product) and employing over 110 million people at present. During the pandemic, these businesses were severely affected witnessing a 20-50 per cent decline in their overall earnings. One of the major reasons behind this fall was the lack of market access. To help these businesses revive from this downturn, WhatsApp launched the #SMBSaathi initiative earlier this year. The #SMBSaathi Utsav is the second phase of the #SMBSaathi campaign. 

The initiative showcased inspiring stories of business owners across India who pivoted to digital ways of doing business during the pandemic. For many of these businesses, WhatsApp was their first digital gateway and an easier & more effective alternative to building and maintaining a website. 

Businesses across sectors such as traditional arts and handicrafts, jewellery, fashion and apparel, food and beverage outlets and several others are being trained on using the various features of the WhatsApp Business App and are being guided on how they can market their product to the right audiences.

WhatsApp India head Abhijit Bose said, “We are excited to launch the #SMBSaathi and #SMBSaathi Utsav, programmes that are dedicated to India’s small business community. Small businesses are the backbone of our economy and technology has the potential to further boost their business. During the pandemic, we saw several small business owners thriving by using simple platforms such as WhatsApp Business App to stay connected with their customers. A small beauty salon in suburban Mumbai used WhatsApp Business App to keep her regular customers engaged through the lockdown, a dhaba owner in Gurgaon, is directly connecting with his customers using WhatsApp Business App thus driving an overall efficiency in his operations and reaching newer markets. Examples such as these are a testament to the fact that India’s small business owners have the ambition, passion and creativity to leverage simple and reliable technologies. We are committed to finding new ways of increasing awareness about simple digital tools for businesses to support and celebrate the spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation in India.”

Jaipur’s Rupam Jewellers owner Arvind Sharma said, “I always thought that taking my business online would be a difficult and tedious process. As small business owners, we have earlier focused only on the traditional ways of doing business. However, the pandemic taught us that it is important to innovate and find new ways of running our business on digital platforms as that is where the audience is today. WhatsApp plays a very important role in our everyday communication with our regular customers and now with my business digitally available on the WhatsApp Business App, it will become a lot easier to connect with newer customers and service them quickly.”