Business Information: Turning Small Business into Big Business

They have succeeded in the conquest of upstart Internet competitors, have "annexed" numerous businesses through acquisition, and have continued to grow revenues among top-tier customers. But where is the next big wave of growth?Most vertical information markets are growing slowly, if at all. As the business mantra in B2B shifts from acquired growth to organic growth, providers need to determine how to grow existing businesses. Bloody share battles for the largest customers, even if successful, will not be enough.

Fortunately, there is an unexplored region of growth among smaller and middle market firms in need of quality information and services. This underserved market, often dismissed for its more limited financial means, represents a significant new growth opportunity in an increasingly mature sector.

Tapping into smaller customers requires a change in mind-set — away from high-cost custom packages and field sales. Addressing a market with smaller budgets, greater price sensitivity, and demand for à la carte buys and small packages requires a new set of marketing capabilities, as well as a lower-cost sales and service model. Carefully tailoring the product and service offering tosmaller customers is critical to prevent cannibalization of higher-priced offerings. But the benefits of this market are clear: incremental revenues, ability to more fully leverage content investments and overhead, and, ultimately, a more defensible position versus current and future competitors.

Booz Allen's Sumita Bhattacharya and Matthew Egol are the authors of "Business Information — Turning Small Business into Big Business."