Date: September 16, 2020
Despite COVID-19 having a strong effect on SME market, several members of Zubair Small Enterprises Centre (Zubair SEC) have turned the challenges thrown by the pandemic into opportunities.
While many of them concurred that the pandemic has cast a shadow over the SME sector in Oman, many spirited entrepreneurs said their passion for their businesses has inspired them to look for new opportunities by utilising the resources they have.
The members expressed their gratitude and appreciation for the support and guidance rendered by Zubair SEC advisors who offered solutions and responses to foster resilience. Specialists at Zubair SEC helped by focusing on special measures to enable business continuity and assist members in preparing the grounds for recovery while looking for new opportunities.
Ali Shaker, Advisor, Business Development and Strategic Partnerships, Zubair SEC said, “It cannot be denied that COVID-19 pandemic has unleashed extensive impacts, putting many small businesses at difficulty. The degree of impact has been low to high in some cases. It was heartening to see many of our members rise to the occasion and look for new windows of growth. In this challenging time, we were pleased to have offered and suggested solutions to help our members not lose hope but facilitate their working situation. They were open to resources and tools provided to help them navigate the pandemic shock.”
He also informed that Zubair SEC’s advisory team is working all day and even over the weekends to think together with its members and guide them on how best to tackle the challenges they face and how to come out of this situation with least losses and in many cases with better business models.
Adel Hubeishi, Senior Advisor, Zubair SEC, “It is true that COVID-19 has hit small and medium enterprises across the globe. We are happy to state that along with our members we are implementing strategies to minimise the negative impacts and strengthen their resilience. We are delighted that our members are identifying and commercialising new market trends.”
Speaking on the impact of the crisis on his business, Ali Said Abdullah Al Rashdi, owner of Muaawana, and member of Zubair SEC’s Direct Support Programme said, “While COVID-19 affected our usual income sources it made us look for new income opportunities. As a company we specialise in providing high quality facility maintenance services for buildings and houses and we are normally dependent on long-term contracts. Working with a proactive approach, we are known for our prompt response. We use our fleet of vehicles to reach clients’ premises wherever they are located in Muscat through the requests received through our call centre. But the lockdown and closure of activities in Muscat, Muttrah and other locations affected us greatly.”
Elucidating that they continued to look for new opportunities Al Rashdi said, “We reviewed our plans and decided to alter our marketing strategy and decided to look for daily projects instead of long term one. We intensified our marketing activity on social media platforms in order to reach out to the largest number of people. This helped us to increase our clientele who started requesting our services on a daily basis. This opened a new source of income which covered the losses we suffered otherwise. We were able to face the crisis by adapting to new market circumstances and working hard. We got the confidence because we worked in close cooperation with the consultants at Zubair SSEC who supported us by encouraging us to reinvigorate our business. In addition, we had a team of inspired and qualified young Omanis who coordinated with ground staff and supported the new strategy.”
Ali pointed out that they were advised by Zubair SEC’s team to explore how they can utilize existing resources for new revenue streams. As such Zubair SEC advisors facilitated an opportunity for Muaawana to contract with SouqMazoon, which is an e-commerce platform, to provide them with call centre management services and vendor relations management services. This has proven to be a great opportunity for Muaawanah that helped preventing their existing call centre staff from becoming redundant, while at the same time generating new income.
Aliya Abdullah Al Nahbani, owner of Al Rawaye Al Shamikha and member of Zubair SEC’s Direct Support Programme said “There is no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has greatly affected everyone, especially the small and medium-sized enterprises. Right at the beginning I prepared a plan as to how to deal with the pandemic situation in cooperation with specialists at Zubair SEC. We reviewed aspects related to access to customers and suppliers. I continued to provide home deliveries for my customer base while taking all precaution measures to protect the health of my suppliers and clients.”
Speaking on managing other business fundamentals, Aliya said, “We decided to reduce production quantities while maintaining profitable revenues. We also marketed our products on social media and electronic platforms. I would advise all SMEs to audit and develop an alternative plan in the light of this pandemic and pursue new customers by reworking new business strategies.”
Abdul Aziz Saleh Ahmed Al Mawali, founder of Smartech Solutions and member of Zubair SEC’s Direct Support Programme explained that his “project was greatly distressed by the suspension of all activities. This inspired us to think of other solutions for our project. We created an application for smart devices through which the entrepreneur or the owner of the project can start working FROM HOME with ease. Through this app he can market his project through online platforms that he can design, build, and manage remotely without the need to open a physical store”. He pointed out that such technologies helped many entrepreneurs to manage their commercial projects, which reduced the impact of the crisis.”
Mansoor Nasser Al Rahbi, owner of Abraj Al Zahira (AZ Medcare) and member of Zubair SEC’s Direct Support Programme said, “Our company specialises in the supply and distribution of medical products and medicines to private and government health institutions throughout the Sultanate. We are also agents of a vendor company in Jordan specializing in sterilizers. We distributed sterilizers to private health institutions, pharmacies, markets and large stores in the Sultanate. As a CSR strategy we decided to reduce sterilizers prices so that they become accessible to everyone. I advise entrepreneurs to reduce expenses and work on investing in the things necessary for their business to survive in order to overcome this crisis with minimal losses.”
As per Zubair SEC experts there are three categories of SMEs facing the COVID-19 challenge – Low Exposure SMEs, Moderate Exposure SMEs, and High Exposure SMEs. The Low Exposure SMEs category in the current times formed potential positive impact and a good opportunity for boosting their business, especially those who work in food retail, medical supplies, pharmaceuticals, home delivery, tech-startups, and SMEs who started running their businesses online and using technology platforms. The current situation presented them with an opportunity and exposed a gap in the market that might have been given enough attention by SMEs previously.
The Moderate Exposed SMEs are partially affected and faced some difficulty. Zubair SEC advised them to immediately look into cost cutting and rationalization and urged them to revisit their business model and adopt smart technology to be more efficient and competitive in the market, which proved to provide businesses with resilience lately.
The High Exposure SMEs who are facing challenges, mainly with cash flow and limited capabilities to cover their expenses because their business has been hit hard were advised to try come out of the situation with least losses by trying their best to stop financial bleeding and cutting costs as much as possible. They were urged to use this time to diversify their business and products portfolio and try approach the market with more relevant products and through online platforms and home delivery services if possible.
Zubair SEC supports SME community with virtual session
Meanwhile Zubair SEC supported the SME community by holding virtual Tajribati sessions to discuss measures and steps the SME sector must take to prepare for the post COVID-19 world. The sessions have been attended by entrepreneurs and SMEs from Oman and neighbouring countries. Participants discussed how different sectors in the economy were affected by the pandemic while illustrating a heat map to reflect the topic. Participants concurred that despite the negative effect, opportunities for innovation and excellence were available. Expected changes in markets and consumers behaviour during and after COVID-19 were discussed. Participants also deliberated on how to respond to situation and put forward some possible solutions.