Technology Simplified for Small and Medium Businesses
TechWise Today Digital Magazine | October 2018
News | Views | Training | Trends | Success Stories
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In This Issue
Trends
Finance Getting loan approval in just 59 minutes
Understanding Internet of Things
6 reasons why small businesses fail
Data protection for small businesses Broadband to connect the world’s other half
Digital Marketing
Digital skills to youth for decent jobs
Creating your office on the web
Tech for Women
Are you ready to use digital marketing?
Online education for women entrepreneurs
Cost-effective ad options
Meet the winners of “Women Start” program
Social Media
Events
Social media may not be helpful to you
Internet of Things for startups in India
Entertainment
TiE Global Summit to help entrepreneurs
Bollywood actors promote Skill India
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Note from the Editor Most governments in the world realize today that small and medium businesses (SMBs) form the backbone of their economic systems, as these smaller companies hold the potential to create nationwide uniform business ecosystems and provide employment to local people. That’s why the governments roll out numerous incentives-based schemes to promote SMBs and help them grow. However, most such initiatives fail to deliver meaningful results because they are based on traditional, archaic methods of business management. In today’s modern and always-on business environment, the use of technology is inevitable for the growth of any business. But most bureaucrats and political leaders are clueless about the technology implementation processes. Governments, therefore, have only set up huge, monolithic organizations to help SMBs, but they fail to meet their objectives as they lack knowledge on tech trends. Technology vendors, on the other hand, just want to make a fast buck by selling their usual stuff under the garb of SMB offerings. They also lack resources to reach out to small user companies in smaller cities and towns. But at the same time, they want to gain business volumes by hook or by crook. So, most vendors use clever sales tricks to sell their products to gullible business buyers, and disappear after selling their systems. While these smaller units need constant support to implement the tech systems and realize good return on their investment, the support is missing. Consequently, most SMBs are not willing to spend their time and money on technology, though they know that it’s technology only that can help them leapfrog in the increasingly globalized business world. So, they need systematic and continuous tech education.
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Keeping all these factors in view, the global tech media property RMN Digital has launched TechWise Today magazine to educate SMBs across the world about the finer nuances of technology selection, adoption, and management. It will serve as a comprehensive information resource and provide useful and actionable information to SMBs so that they could benefit from technology deployment in the most efficient and cost-effective way. So, stay tuned. Rakesh Raman Editor [ Continue reading on the next page… ]
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Microsoft Ventures to Help Indian Startups Expand in Europe India Portugal Startup Hub is an initiative of the Government of India and the Government of Portugal to enable international market access for Indian and Portuguese startups. The program was launched last year during Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi’s state visit to Portugal.
Photo: Startup India
In the first phase, applications are invited from Indian startups aiming to expand their businesses in the European market by working with partners in Portugal. In this program, Startup Braga is an innovation hub designed to assist the inception and development of high potential entrepreneurial projects for international markets. In partnership
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with Microsoft Ventures, it provides business acceleration programs for startups with global ambitions. Innovative Indian startups in the fields of Fintech, Urbantech, Medtech, Nanotech, building a product or service with business potential in the Portuguese / European market were invited to apply. The startups must have a registered company and operations in India. The selected startups will be unveiled in a special ceremony at the Web Summit in Lisbon on 5th November 2018.
Developing Digital Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies APEC Business Advisory Committee’s (ABAC) Micro, Small to Medium Entrepreneur (MSME) and Innovation Summit in Port Moresby aimed to provide recommendations to APEC leaders in November on measures that advance growth and further participation of MSMEs in regional economies. ABAC PNG (Papua New Guinea) Alternate and Chair of MSME Summit Committee, Stan Joyce, during his address to delegates said digital innovation and platform developed at present is a stepping-stone for APEC economies to embrace and use to expand their opportunities. Mr Joyce said; “ICT infrastructure is key to digital inclusion. In many economies digital infrastructure is concentrated only in urban areas. What is required is all ways of thinking to deliver infrastructure to everybody in our economies.” “It is clear that if we stick to traditional methods of delivering infrastructure we will simply be left behind. Time waits for no person and if we are to participate in the fourth industrial revolution, we need to take action today and prepare the future workforce.” There are a number of recommendations by ABAC Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) report, which are relevant for economies to take on board. ‘’Recommendations such as
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regional bench mark and internet speed and minimum internet penetration must be integrated into the national broadband plans of individual economies,” he said.
ABAC PNG Alternate and Chair of MSME Summit Committee, Stan Joyce
“There is also a need to identify issues and progress solutions for emerging economies, and APEC governments should provide education and skills acquisitions for the upcoming generations for digital entrepreneurship.” Mr Joyce said the report also highlighted the potential of more than 50 million jobs that can be created across all APEC economies through mobile technology. He added that platforms which facilitate MSME access to finance and market and addressing issues and harnessing opportunities in e-commerce, digitization, regulation and capacity building will enable budding entrepreneurs to participate more in this sector.
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Nasscom Program to Help Tech Startups in India India’s leading software industry body National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has unveiled Accelerate 10X program that aims to take tech startup ecosystem onto the next level. NASSCOM estimates that AI (artificial intelligence) has the potential to add US$957 billion, or 15% of current gross value added to India’s economy in 2035 and tech startups will drive this transformation as well as spearhead the broad structural transformation of the economy. “Prowess in deep tech and artificial intelligence will be one of the main drivers of economic competitiveness in the near future,” Debjani Ghosh, president, NASSCOM said. In the last 5 years, NASSCOM says, its 10000-Startups program has spread its wings to nurture early stage startups by incubating them in startup warehouses in 10 cities with the support of the state governments and sponsors. It adds that the Accelerate 10X program is designed to channelize the nation's entrepreneurial zeal into emerging technologies that will catalyze business and economic growth in future. As the Indian public and private sector focuses on the adoption of next generation technologies, the demand for advanced deep tech and AI-related technologies has seen an enormous growth, creating an opportunity for startups and tech players to provide innovative products and services. The AI startup sector saw an increase in funding of over 70% in 2017 with Natural Language Processing being one of the major focus areas for investors and estimates suggest that 50% of firms in India are implementing AI in their products.
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In an effort to build on this momentum and mentor 100 mature stage startups every year, the immersive six-month program divided in phases of 45 days each will focus on three key aspects - Product (Global Acceleration & Mentoring), Technology (Engineering & Deeptech Lab), and Access to capital. NASSCOM is a global trade body with more than 2,100 members, which include both Indian and multinational companies that have a presence in India. NASSCOM’s membership base constitutes over 95% of the industry revenues in India and employs over 3.5 million professionals.
Indian Minister Launches E-Newsletter for Small Businesses An Indian minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME), Giriraj Singh, launched “MSME Insider” – a monthly e-newsletter of the ministry. Giriraj Singh said that the e-newsletter will give information of the activities undertaken by the ministry and also act as a bridge between the ministry and millions of MSME units spread across the country. He said employment generation is the main motto of this ministry. The e-newsletter will assist in the regular flow of information about the sector to the MSMEs and will also help in developing a two-way communication between the ministry and its stakeholders, he said. Apart from providing information to MSMEs and the general public about ministry’s schemes, the e-newsletter will provide information about latest innovations in the field of technology, upcoming events, and training programs for the month and will also carry articles on relevant topics.
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Giriraj Singh launching the ‘MSME Insider’ e-Newsletter in New Delhi on September 19, 2018. Photo: PIB
It will also carry success stories of the entrepreneurs who have benefited from schemes of the ministry. The e-newsletter will be available on the website of the ministry as well as on the websites of its allied organizations. It will also be distributed to about 50 lakh (5 million) MSMEs registered on the Udyog Aadhaar Memorandum Portal. For Your Information
Internet of Things Internet of Things (a.k.a. Internet of Everything) is an ambitious future computing concept. It aims to connect all objects and even people in the world with Internet. All of them will have unique identifiers that could be monitored with the help of computers. It’s estimated that over 30 billion objects will be connected wirelessly with Internet of Things by the year 2020. However, it’s not yet clear how this concept will help businesses or people at large. Top tech companies in the world are working to create applications around Internet of Things.
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Can Social Media Help a Small Business? by Rakesh Raman As the hype around social media is constantly increasing, small businesses are more confused than enthused about this emerging digital media concept. With this article, I am trying to bring some clarity to the subject mainly for the benefit of small companies. So what is social media? Social media is a relatively new development in the web space. Social media sites are like your normal websites. But unlike conventional websites, social sites allow users from all over the world to create their own web pages on them and interact with each other on diverse subjects in a socially connected environment. You can create your personal web page or your company’s web page on social media sites – also called social networking sites. Although it is difficult to know their actual number, estimates suggest that social media sites connect about 2 billion (yes, 2 with nine zeros) people all across the world. As many of these users are presumed to be the consumers of various products and services, marketers target them through social media messaging to promote their brands. Yes, this is similar to advertising in a newspaper or magazine. Social Media Sites There are further categories of social media sites including general-purpose sites, professional networks, and microblogging sites. Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter are some of the popular social networks. Similarly, YouTube for video sharing and Pinterest for picture sharing are the other examples of social networking sites. You can use these sites for your business publicity in different ways. For example, you can create your own (personal) profile with basic information, pictures, and videos, and connect with
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your friends and other users, and start sharing your brand information with people in your network. You can also create an exclusive page or section about your company or brand on a social network and invite others to connect with that page. If you have your company website, you can share different links of your website on social network to attract people to know more about your company on your website. Unlike newspapers or magazine ads that have short life, your social media information will always be available to others. All this can be done free of charge. Specialized Job However, it is not very easy to attract users to your brand messages. Social media messaging is a highly specialized job. It is easy to create your social media presence through profiles or pages. But you can attract other eyeballs toward your brand only with right messaging, scheduled at different time periods while targeting different groups of users who can be your potential buyers or business partners. Remember, the number of users connected with your social media page won’t have any significance in the absence of their engagement with your brand messages. Level of engagement is the only measure to evaluate the success of your social media-based promotions. Engagement can be in the form of users’ comments and sharing of your information with others. Although there are quantitative software tools available to estimate social media engagement, they are not quite effective. A true impact of your social media campaigns can be measured only with qualitative analysis, which is a very difficult task. Although you need not pay for using popular social media sites, you have the option of advertising on them if you want enhanced level of publicity for your business. You can advertise your brands on these sites for which you will have to pay to the social networking service providers.
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As social media communications – right from creating your brand presence to regular messaging – is a specialized job, you may have to hire these services, though the skills availability is scarce. Private Networks While most public social media properties have not yet established their utility for marketers, big companies have started creating their own private social networks to interact with their buyers and other stakeholders including channel partners or resellers. Today, the most important aspect of social communications is to build and manage consumer communities around your brand. So, big brands are managing such communities for all types of brand communications. They are educating their buyers and resellers by delivering multimedia (text, pictures, videos, animations) content through private networks. Companies are also offering after-sales support to buyers using these community networks. Employee training is another application of social networks. The online communities can be created for customers, resellers, employees, investors, suppliers, etc. depending on your requirement. And only content can drive these communities. Believe it or not, content is not just English language. It is a combination of language, domain knowledge, mass communication skills, expression, user experience (UX) design, and so on. If you think your company doesn’t have proper content skills and you don’t have the budgets to hire these services, you need not use social media. Simply stay away from it, because confusing content and wrong social media messaging can be more harmful than helpful for your business. Do you agree?
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Goldman Sachs Offers Online Education to Women Entrepreneurs The Goldman Sachs Foundation is offering an online education program to further 10,000 Women, providing female entrepreneurs across the world with a digitized curriculum and interactive platform of women business owners. In partnership with Coursera, the world’s leading online platform for higher education, 10,000 Women will provide greater access to its curriculum, providing female entrepreneurs with business education and a global peer-to-peer network. The course is free, and has been built to meet the needs of women business owners in developing markets. According to Goldman Sachs, it will provide focused and tailored exercises in an introductory module where participants will assess the strengths and weaknesses of their business and themselves as business leaders. The additional modules will review strategies to identify, optimize, and execute growth opportunities. Learners at the end of the course will have a Business Growth Plan to follow as they continue to grow and evolve their businesses. Participants in the course will be supported by a network of fellow students and alumni that will provide real-time support, mentoring and group learning across a number of technologies and channels. “This is a question of opportunity, not capability, and this partnership with Coursera allows us to expand 10,000 Women to reach those entrepreneurs we haven’t been able to before,” said John F.W. Rogers, Chairman of the Goldman Sachs Foundation. “Helping businesses grow is at the core of what we do as a company, and increasing access to business education to support smart, driven, and talented women is good for their businesses, their communities, and the world.”
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In 2008, Goldman Sachs had launched the 10,000 Women initiative to foster economic growth by providing women entrepreneurs around the world with business education and access to capital. The course is free and open to all learners. Women business owners with at least three employees and $50,000 in annual revenue are eligible to receive a certificate upon completion.
Digital Marketing Services Business is Marketing…Marketing is Content. In today’s information-driven world, it’s not possible to manage any business without the right content, delivered to the right people, at the right time, using the right communication channels. With this belief, Raman Media Network (RMN) Company - the publisher of TechWise Today - offers to provide its Digital Marketing Services to SMBs. These services are packaged under our iManager brand, which is a combination of content creation and communications using digital media channels.
RMN Company Offering Digital Marketing Training Program to Exporters of India
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With specialization in digital media, RMN Company has provided its digital marketing programs to hundreds of companies in India – in association with the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO). While our current rates are $75 USD per person-hour, you can contact us to hire our digital marketing services under a retainer arrangement if you have a minimum annual budget of $60,000 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) for these services. Business and trade associations in all parts of the world can also contact us for digital marketing training programs for groups of their members. The price for training programs is $1,500 USD per day. [ A ll prices are excluding taxes and other actual costs. ] Contact: Rakesh Raman Raman Media Network (RMN) Company 463, DPS Apts., Plot No. 16 Sector 4, Dwarka, Phase I New Delhi 110 075, INDIA Contact by email
Broadband Technology to Connect the World’s Other Half Broadband technology is critical to connecting the 3.8 billion people around the globe who still do not have access to the Internet—the world's “other half." This is according to more than 60 participants from United Nations agencies, governments and the broadband industry, who came together in New York City in September at the annual fall meeting of the United Nations Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development.
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The global group of key influencers and decision-makers met parallel to the 73rd Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations also taking place in New York City. Connecting the “other half" of the world was a resounding call to action echoed by participants, including the Co-Chairs and Co-Vice Chairs of the Broadband Commission.
Ms Audrey Azoulay, Director-General UNESCO at Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development Meeting September 2018. Photo: ITU
Ms Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), who serves as Co-Vice Chair of the Broadband Commission said: “We are reaching an important milestone with half of the population online. But advantages of internet access are not shared equally. Access to Internet is not enough in itself to improve livelihoods. We must put emphasis on digital skills and knowledge."
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The meeting comprised two substantive sessions examining the 50/50 moment of half the world being online and the changing face of information and communication technologies regulation.
Web Portal to Help Small Businesses Get Loan Approval in Just 59 Minutes The Finance Minister of India, Arun Jaitley, has launched a web portal for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME).
Arun Jaitley chairing the Annual Review Meeting of the CEOs of Public Sector Banks (PSBs), in New Delhi on September 25, 2018. Photo: PIB
It will enable in principle approval for MSME loans of up to Rs. 1 crore within 59 minutes from Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) and 5 Public Sector Banks (PSBs). It is a
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strategic initiative of SIBDI-led PSB consortium incubated under the aegis of Department of Financial Services (DFS), Ministry of Finance. According to the government, the portal sets a new benchmark in loan processing and reduces the turnaround time from 20-25 days to 59 minutes. Subsequent to this in principle approval, the government says, the loan will be disbursed in 7-8 working days. A new step in MSME banking credit space, the portal is one-of-its-kind platform in MSME segment which integrates advanced technology to ensure seamless loan approval and management. The solution uses sophisticated algorithms to read and analyze data points from various sources such as IT returns, GST data, bank statements, etc. in less than an hour while capturing the applicant’s basic details using smart analytics from available documents. The system simplifies the decision-making process for a loan officer as the final output provides a summary of credit, valuation and verification on a user-friendly dashboard in real time.
Bollywood Actors to Promote Skill India Program Bollywood actors Varun Dhawan and Anushka Sharma, through their new Bollywood film Sui Dhaaga – Made in India are telling the story of India’s entrepreneurs and skilled workforce, especially artisans, craftspeople, and weavers. Dhawan plays a tailor named Mauji and Anushka plays his wife and embroiderer Mamta. Innocent yet ambitious, they dream big of making a name for themselves. The Sui Dhaaga stars have been signed on to promote and endorse the Skill India Mission, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The film highlights the untapped potential of India’s talented craftsmen and skilled workers at the grassroots level and the challenges and issues faced by them.
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Bollywood film Sui Dhaaga – Made in India
Varun and Anushka, the star cast of the film, have partnered Skill India and will dedicate time to promote India’s skilled talent and their fine work by engaging with them across different parts of the country. Led by the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE), Skill India aims to standardize vocational training. A film about finding love and respect through self-reliance, Sui Dhaaga – Made in India is a story that celebrates the spirit of self-reliance.
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World Bank Data Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play a major role in most economies, particularly in developing countries. Formal SMEs contribute up to 60% of total employment and up to 40% of national income (GDP) in emerging economies. These numbers are significantly higher when informal SMEs are included. According to World Bank estimates, 600 million jobs will be needed in the next 15 years to absorb the growing global workforce, mainly in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. In emerging markets, most formal jobs are generated by SMEs, which also create 4 out of 5 new positions. However, access to finance is a key constraint to SME growth. Without access to capital, many SMEs languish and stagnate.
Orange Fab France Welcomes 9 Winners in “Women Start” Program The “Women Start” initiative is dedicated to women entrepreneurs across the world. After receiving over 300 applications, Orange - world’s leading telecommunications operator - is welcoming the first nine winners. Two are from Africa and the seven others are from the French ecosystem. The 9 winners are: Adalong, in social marketing, with Clémence Demerliac, Brastorne , in m-Agri, with Naledi Magowe, Caysti, in the education sector, with Arielle Kitio, Citeazy, in pedestrian ecomobility, with Alma Guirao, Cohapi, in workplace well-being, with Nesrine Smati, Fifty, in artificial intelligence, with Alexia Cordier, GeoKaps, in social media sales, with Hélène Lucien, Key Infuser, in robotics and digital marketing, with Domitille Esnard-Domerego, Numevent, in digital event solutions, with Géraldine Auret.
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For the Group, the aim of the initiative is to encourage the creation of startups founded by women in the technology and digital sectors.
Photo: Orange
Orange Fab France is part of a network of 14 Orange Fabs located across 4 continents worldwide. To date, according to Orange, over 350 startups have been accelerated through this program.
TiE Global Summit in Delhi to Help Startups TiE Global Summit - positioned as a global entrepreneurial leadership event - brings together the TiE community from across the world to create a global platform for entrepreneurs. The IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiE) is a Silicon Valley non-profit supporting startups through networking and raising capital for them. The summit is the culmination of TiE’s year-long initiatives. It showcases success stories and business strategies for emerging businesses and aspiring entrepreneurs. In addition, the event offers networking and investment opportunities.
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TiE Global Summit III, which will take place in New Delhi on November 29 – 30, 2018, will focus on entrepreneurship as the engine of job creation. Advertise on TechWise Today TechWise Today is a digital magazine of Raman Media Network (RMN) Company which is working in diversified content creation, management, and distribution businesses on a global scale. Among other activities, the company runs 4 global news sites. These are: Raman Media Network – General Global News Site [ w ww.ramanmedianetwork.com ] RMN Digital – Global Technology News Site [ w ww.rmndigital.com ] RMN Stars – Global Entertainment News Site [ w ww.rmnstars.com ] RMN Kids – Edutainment Site for Kids [ www.rmnkids.com ] RMN Company offers the following advertising and marketing options to organizations on TechWise Today. Full-Page Ad (per issue): US$ 1,500 (one thousand five hundred USD) or equivalent Half-Page Ad (per issue): US$ 800 (eight hundred USD) or equivalent Custom ad options can be discussed. Article Hosting: The client’s article of up to 800 words with an external link can be published on TechWise Today for $500 USD per article per link. The article will be written by the client. However, if the client wants us (RMN Company) to write the article for them, the client will pay an additional amount of $400 USD for an article of up to 800 words. [ All prices are excluding taxes and other actual costs. ] Contact Rakesh Raman Raman Media Network (RMN) Company 463, DPS Apts., Plot No. 16, Sector 4, Dwarka, Phase I New Delhi 110 075, INDIA Contact by email
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Three Steps to Start Your Office on the Web by Rakesh Raman You’d agree that most micro and small businesses don’t have a website because either they don’t get time to build and run a site or they lack knowledge to create it. This fact holds true not only in developing countries, but also in the advanced parts of the world. It’s estimated that in developing countries, eight out of every 10 small businesses don’t have their proper website, though in the current information-driven world it’s extremely difficult to do business without a website. So, small businesses must have their presence on the web. But how? Here are the three main steps to bring your business on the web. 1. Hiring a Website: It can be a cumbersome task, because the market for website hosting is utterly unorganized – full of small and fly-by-night operators. But you can find a hosting service provider in your local area by looking at ads in local newspapers or through search engine sites like Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. To ensure that it’s a genuine service provider, you can even visit their office to get some idea on the quality of their service. Take a look at their other clients and if possible talk to a couple of them to know about the vendor’s service quality. If you are satisfied after your brief research, you can choose your website name. Take care; it should be a simple, easy-to-grasp name – preferably containing only alphabets with a dot com (.com) extension. A normal website with storage space of about 100 MB to 1 GB (sufficient for a small business), e-mails, etc. will cost you nearly US$75 (or equivalent) per year and an additional about US$10 for your site’s exclusive domain name.
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In any case, you won’t spend more than US$100 (or equivalent amount in other countries) on your site hosting for a year. Most service providers would promise 99.9% uptime, but it’s likely that they won’t deliver on this promise. But never mind. Go ahead and get your site hosted. It’s okay if your site’s uptime is anything above 95%. As it’s a cheap hiring option, you should be prepared to face about 10 – 15 days of downtime over a period of one year. Normally, it takes less than 48 hours to get your site hosted after making the payment for it to the service provider. 2. Building a Website: After getting your site hosted, you need to design the site by creating different sections: about your company, your products and services, chief’s message, contact, etc. Site design is a technical work, which requires certain software skills to do it. If you think, you can’t do it yourself, you can hire a website designing agency for this work – which shouldn’t charge more than US$100 as a one-time design fee for a basic site design. But you need to provide the information including text, pictures, etc. to the design agency that will go in different sections of your site. You must ensure that the language that you write is flawless and engaging for the online readers because your website is the face of your company that will be seen by your buyers and others in all parts of the world. You can even hire the services of content writers who can take the raw information from you and write readable content for your site. The cost for content writing work will depend on the volume of content and the skills of the content writers. But for a website of 5 – 10 web pages (one web page is up to 500 words), the writing charges can be somewhere between US$100 – 500. Your design agency can upload this content on the site. And now it’s available for access in all parts of the world. 3. Operating a Website: It’s not enough to just hire and build a website. You must ensure that your site gets updated regularly with fresh information. For this, you can make a content updation plan for uploading fresh content for at least some of the sections on the site. As a rule of thumb, you can update your site at least twice a month.
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The fresh information can be about your products, services, CEO’s message for the customers, or some opinion on the market in which you operate. Here again, you can take the help of professional content writers, and your site design agency can again upload the content on your site. These are the basic steps that you can follow to build and run your website. Then you can get it renewed after a year from your hosting service provider. If you still have some doubts or queries, you can contact us.
Data Protection Study Suggests Relaxations to Small Businesses The regulation on data protection and privacy should adopt a risk-based approach and provide certain relaxations and exceptions for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) under specific circumstances, suggested a new ASSOCHAM-PwC joint study. “In Indian context, it is also important to ask questions on the applicability and impact of any such data protection regulation on small and medium businesses (SMBs),” said the study titled, ‘Privacy in the data economy,’ jointly conducted by The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM) and global professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). The report stated that stringent regulations may deter MSMEs due to the high costs and technology investments necessary for compliance. However, in the new age economy, a number of small enterprises are capturing and processing large volumes of data. It further said that certain categories of private processing, such as processing carried out by not-for-profit organizations or charitable institutes, may have to be dealt with categorically and provided with certain exemptions.
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The ASSOCHAM-PwC study suggested that privacy laws should also cater to specific sectors such as healthcare, telecom, banking and finance to address various nuances in each sector. With a view to establish a robust, transparent and enforceable regulation, the study has outlined a number of recommendations. Photo: ASSOCHAM
SIDBI Awareness Campaign Udyam Abhilasha उ यम अ भलाषा Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) launched a National Level Entrepreneurship Awareness Campaign, Udyam Abhilasha (उ यम अ भलाषा) in 115 Aspirational Districts identified by NITI Aayog in 28 States and reaching to around 15,000 youth.
Photo: SIDBI
SIDBI will join to contribute to “the transformation mission” unleashed for these districts. It was planned to run the campaign from October 3 - 8 across India. The campaign would create and
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strengthen cadre of more than 800 trainers to provide entrepreneurship training to the aspiring youths across these districts thus encouraging them to enter the admired segment of entrepreneurs. SIDBI has partnered with CSC e-Governance Services India Limited, a Special Purpose Vehicle, (CSC SPV) set up by the Ministry of Electronics & IT, Govt. of India for implementing the campaign through their CSCs. SIDBI is a financial institution for the promotion, financing, development, and coordination of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME) sector.
Providing Digital Skills to Youth for Decent Jobs ITU is leading the joint ITU-ILO "Digital Skills for Decent Jobs for Youth Campaign" to train 5 million young people globally with job-ready digital skills by 2030. The objective is to connect young women and men with the job opportunities offered by the digital economy. The program will incentivize different stakeholders to invest in training youth with job-ready, transferable digital skills. These include basic, mid-level, advanced digital entrepreneurial and soft skills. The program will also enable teachers to provide young people with new skills by introducing computational thinking and coding into school curriculum and non-formal training programs. Digital entrepreneurship will focus on digital skills required by entrepreneurs. It will cover topics such as online market research, strategic planning and business analysis, using financing and crowdfunding platforms, online marketing, online networking, and establishing mentoring relationships. Photo: ITU
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6 Reasons Why SMBs Fail While most SMBs believe that lack of funds is the main reason for their failure, this is an unfounded belief. Here are the 6 main reasons why SMBs are not able to survive in the market.
6 Reasons Why SMBs Fail 1. Communications: They do not understand the modern-day communication techniques to acquire and share business knowledge. Most SMBs can’t even write an email properly. 2. English: While English is the common lingua franca across the globe, SMBs do not know the right English language that can help them create content for business development. 3. Web Presence: Majority of small businesses do not have a proper website that can connect their businesses with buyers across the world. 4. Domain Knowledge: Entrepreneurs do not have sufficient knowledge of the business domains in which they operate. They cannot survive with the limited knowledge that they have. 5. Marketing: While digital marketing which is essential for survival may be difficult for them to learn, most SMBs lack even basic marketing skills. They do not even understand the difference between sales and marketing. 6. Technology: Small businesses find it difficult to keep pace with the evolving tech solutions. As they are mostly dependent on archaic systems, they fail to leverage technology for business growth.
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Internet of Things Event for Startups in India The 3rd IoT (Internet of Things) India Expo 2019 will focus on the IoT infrastructure in India and emerging IoT market in business areas such as engineering, automotive, healthcare, energy, agriculture, and banking. The 3-day event will be held at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, India on January 29-31, 2019. It will showcase the innovations of startups. The startup-investor meet will allow emerging companies to give product demos, presentations, and introduce their products to leading angel investors and venture capitalists.
Task Force to Work for Skills Development in India Dharmendra Pradhan, a minister for skills development and entrepreneurship, launched a Task Force for Closing the Skills Gap in India, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum. The Task Force will bring together leaders from business, government, civil society, and the education and training sectors to accelerate the future-proofing of education and training systems in the country. Dharmendra Pradhan will co-chair the Task Force along with Salil Parekh, CEO of software company Infosys. The goal of the Task Force is to develop an action plan to address skills gaps in India and make the Indian workforce ready for jobs of future. Pradhan also released reports on ‘Future of Work in India,’ an enterprise survey on future of work in India, and ‘Young India and Work,’ a survey of youth aspirations in India. According to a government statement, the Task Force is the second country-led public-private collaboration of the World Economic Forum’s Closing the Skills Gap Project after South Africa.
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NASSCOM Centre to Provide IoT Infrastructure to Startups The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has announced the launch of its Centre of Excellence for Internet of Things (CoE–IoT) at Gurugram in Haryana. The Centre is stated to be the most recent addition to a hub-and-spoke network of CoEs across the country and is a part of a collaborative initiative involving state governments and NASSCOM. According to NASSCOM, this initiative is in line with the government’s focus on strengthening the IoT infrastructure in the country as well as providing high-end technology capabilities, data, expertise, thought leadership, and curated programs to augment capabilities. NASSCOM will work with the industry and the government towards accelerating innovation, enabling industry-oriented research, promoting adoption of data-driven decision making by enterprises, and enabling appropriate skills and talent development. The CoE will stimulate co-creation in consultation with industry experts through NASSCOM programs in order to provide startups with access to IoT infrastructure. With an aim to accelerate the technology ecosystem in Haryana, it will specialize in real-world solutions for Industry 4.0. NASSCOM will also work with the industry and government to identify use cases for technology intervention and connect academia, industry, and policymakers to bring cutting-edge research to the market. Marketing Agents TechWise Today invites marketing professionals and ad agencies to work as its marketing agents on commission basis for selling ads and generating more revenue streams. Contact by email
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Meet the Editor The editor of this magazine Rakesh Raman is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. Besides working at senior editorial positions with leading media companies, he was writing an exclusive edit-page tech business column regularly for The Financial Express (a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group). Nowadays, for the past over 7 years, he has been running his own global news services on different subjects. He is also the founder of a humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society. Earlier, he had been associated with the United Nations (UN) through United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development. Contact
Raman Media Network (RMN) Company 463, DPS Apts., Plot No. 16, Sector 4, Dwarka, Phase I New Delhi 110 075, INDIA Contact by email
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