Digital Technology Impact on Small Business Growth: Pound Mart Study

This report investigates the impact of digital technology on Pound Mart, a small, single-price retailer in the UK. It examines how digital technologies can provide opportunities for growth and innovation for small businesses. The research project aims to recognize the application of digital technologies in the operation, investigate employee participation, understand the effectiveness of digital technology in revenue growth, and evaluate changes in customer satisfaction. The report includes a literature review discussing how digital platforms, social media, and e-commerce marketing methods can address business challenges, improve recruitment and retention, and facilitate business expansion. The research methodology includes secondary research, surveys, and interviews, with a detailed cost consideration, project plan, Gantt chart, and risk log. The study emphasizes the importance of digital technology in enhancing business operations, marketing efforts, human resource management, and customer satisfaction within small businesses like Pound Mart.

The Impact of Digital Technology on Business Activity
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Task 1.........................................................................................................................................4
Task 2.........................................................................................................................................8
Task 3:......................................................................................................................................19
Task 4.......................................................................................................................................20
Conclusion................................................................................................................................21
References................................................................................................................................22
Appendices...............................................................................................................................24
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Introduction
Digital technology has exposed a plethora of new opportunities for small businesses to create
an impact on the business world by growth and innovation. The small businesses can develop
new business model and innovate in the digitalised world to stabilize their business
operations. A continuous transformation of sustainable and successful business plan is
essential to innovate into digital technology. The digital bandwagon is crucial for small
businesses to reap the benefits of innovation and growth.
In this project, investigation is done about the influence of digital technology in Pound Mart,
a small and single price retailer in UK and the strategies adopted by the small business to
convert the opportunities of growth and innovation into profitable revenues.
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Task 1: Establish project aims, objectives, and timeframes based on the chosen theme.
Project Brief-
Aim: The research project evaluates the impact of digital technology on small business for
their growth and innovation.
Objective: The objectives of the research project are as follows:
 To recognize the application of digital technologies in the operation
 To investigate the participation of employees in using digital technology
 To understand the effectiveness of digital technology in the revenue growth
 To evaluate the change in customer satisfaction after initiating digital technology
Scope: The scopes of the research are as follows:
 The influence of digital technology in the regular operation of Pound Mart
 To identify the customer perception after digital innovation
 To evaluate the growth in company
 To judge the adaptive nature of the organisation
 To evaluate which department faces more impact of digital technology
Limitation: The research is limited to primary research in a small organisation Pound Mart
and the marketing and promotional activities and hindrances in growth of company are not
studied. The revenue earned before the introduction of technology and after the effects of
digital technology is not studied. Due to the small number of employees in small business,
the primary research is conducted with small sample size and time constraints were taken into
consideration (Henderson et al., 2017).
Project Approach-
Resources: There are three types of resources required in conducting this research project.
Firstly, the most important of all, information regarding digital innovation is required which
is obtained from articles, journals and websites. Secondly, human resource is required for the
research conduction in an efficient manner under timeframe. Lastly, financial requirements
are to be considered for printing and survey conduction (Fitzgerald et al., 2014).
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Business Case-
Cost consideration:
Activities Required
Hours
Cost/Hour
(£)
Total Cost
(£)
Secondary Research 24 5 120
Analysing digital technology in Pound
Mart
10 10 100
Surveys and Interviews 72 15 1080
Data Analysis and Results 48 12 576
Drafting the final report 60 10 600
Total Cost 2476
(Table 1: Cost Consideration)
Project Plan and Control-
Task
No. Name of Activities
1
Developing the concept of the research
topic
2 Choosing an organisation for the research
3 Researching about the topic of research
4 Defining the key activities of the research
5 Secondary research
6 Developing questionnaires
7 Performing interviews and surveys
8 Developing literature review
9
Primary data collection from the
organisation
10 Developing the project plan
11 Application of suitable research technique
12 Analysing data from various resources
13 Recommending conclusion
14 Preparing a rough draft
15 Submission of project
(Table 2: Work breakdown Structure)
Gantt chart: The Gantt chart helps to make the research to be on track and the overview of
the project can be projected by the comprehensive project management plan.
Research
Activities
1-2
weeks
3-4
weeks
4-6
weeks
7-9
weeks
9-11
weeks
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Research topic
development

Literature review  
Research data
collection
 
Primary data
collection
 
Research layout
formation

Research plan
development

Suitable research
technique
selection
 
Data analysis of
collected data
from sources
 
Concluding the
data

Rough draft
preparation

Project
Submission

(Chart 1: Gantt chart – Comprehensive Project Management Plan)
Risk-log:
Department Potential Risk Effect on
Project
Contingency Planning
Human
Resource
Biasness in recruitment
and selection
Low Innovating the recruitment
procedure by digital technology
Operations Lack of capability to
adapt new technology
High Training and influencing the usage
of digital technology
Management Improper respond to
surveys and interviews
Medium Improving the communication
Researcher Delay in completion of
research
High Regular reviewing and Gantt Chart
(Table 3: Risk log of research)
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Communication Plan: The submission of the project depends upon achieving milestones
like gathering of proper secondary research, conducting various primary researches like
interviews and surveys and analysing the data based on qualitative and quantitative approach
to obtain results accordingly. The results will evaluate the influence of digital technology on
Pound Mart and its impact on various factors for emergence of growth and innovation. The
project will have time span of 11 weeks to submit the final report (Blackwell et al., 2014).
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Task 2: Conduct small-scale research, information gathering, and data collection,
generating knowledge to support the project
Introduction: Pound Mart is a single priced retail with a small business of selling products
ranging from toys, baby accessories, household items, and entertainment, hardware,
confectionary, and food items. Unlike large businesses, a small retailing business of Pound
Mart is trying to overcome the challenges and adopt digital technology. Digital technology
will influence greatly on the operation and customer satisfaction of the small business. The
acceptance of digital technology should be motivated among the employees and proper
training should be conducted for the successful establishment of innovation and growth in the
business.
Literature Review:
Across the small businesses in UK, 85% uses at least one digital platform to reach out to
customers and provide information about the information to customers, 80% uses social
media platform to advertise their products and service and more than 75% of small business
have grown sales by using digital technology (Nambisan, 2017). The digital technology is
very useful in addressing the business challenges and constraints regarding the small
businesses. The world is using internet adversely and small businesses uses internet to build
an online presence to spread its popularity in order to grow and innovate constantly to meet
the challenging demands of customers. It is required for beating the high competitive level
and finding the correct tools for innovation and improvement of process. One of the
challenges faced by small business is recruitment and retention of employees. After
successful launch and establishing small businesses, it becomes difficult to recruit responsible
people for the continuous growth of business. Human resource is an important part of
business for which digital technology helps to innovate in recruitment process and selection
of high potential candidate is facilitated (Oldham and Silva, 2015). The employees are
retained in the business when they witness digital changes are adopted for growth and
innovation. It motivates employees and in turn human resource power increases.
The small businesses operate in the particular region and often face difficulties in expanding
their business. They cannot establish proper methods to start the process of growth and
innovation (Hermsen et al., 2016). Moreover, the small businesses are also reluctant for
trading internationally because of trade barriers and export tariffs. Digital technology is an
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important tool for spreading the information and utility of the business on a large scale. It
helps small business to advertise their products and services and gain more popularity. The
digital technology in retail and e-commerce marketing methods has proved to give significant
tribute. The small business can utilize digital technology because they can adopt the changes
in technology faster, because small businesses contains less than 250 employees in the
organisation and the adaptability of lesser number of employees becomes faster. Due to small
number of employees, they can adapt digital technology at affordable cost. The digitally
advanced small businesses gain more benefit than business, which has lower level of digital
advancement. In addition, the small business contributes more to their profit account by
adopting more digital technology (Arts et al., 2015).
The small business realise benefits that are more significant by adapting digital technology.
They earn more revenue almost two times more than other business. Their revenue growth
increases from two to four fold after adopting digital technology. The digital technology also
increases the opportunity for employment, almost three times than previous years. On the
other hand, the small businesses which had average employment growth rate increases to
about six times more (Manganello et al., 2017). The export also increases in small businesses
after the employees successfully incorporate digital advancement in their daily life.
The operations of the organisation increases more efficiently with the use of digital
technology. The digital technology is used in the process makes the operations more
innovative and less time consuming. The human efforts decrease with respect to usage of
digital technology. The finance team increases the calculation and finance management of the
organisation more conveniently and more correctly. It is well required for the effective
management of the project (Deegan and Sutherland, 2016). Along with finance team, the
marketing team also works towards the financial aspect by effectively marketing and
advertising about the company is digital enabled platforms like social media, and website and
create blog content. It reaches to a broader mass of target market. The market is saturated
with print media advertisement and marketing which is encapsulated by large business.
However, for small businesses it is important to market their organisation in cost effective
manner. It also helps to curb the growing demands for innovation and digital technology
(Jenssen et al., 2016). Hence digital enabled social media platform is effective for the
marketing of small businesses.
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Any organisation is dependent upon the human resources or the employees working in the
organisation. It is very important for any organisation to recruit talent into the work force and
retain the senior employees. The usage of new technology enables motivation among
employees and they allure to the growth of company and in turn stay back in the organisation.
The recruitment and selection gets easier with the digital technology. The digital technology
helps in facilitating more sourcing of candidates who are well suited for the job roles and
filtering of desired candidate profile becomes hassle-free. In turn, the digital technology helps
an organisation to recruit new employees who will prove to be asset for an organisation and
helps to increase the profit and revenue earned (Vlachokyriakos et al., 2016). The efficient
and fresh young minds often bring about innovative ideas and new technology into the
organisation, which is very much required in the overall development and growth of
technological advancement within the organisation.
The organisation efficiency increases with ease of digital technology. It helps organisation to
keep records of the materials input and output. It helps to materialise the changes in the
operation cycle. The digital technology efficiently calculates the operation cycle time. It helps
organisation to avoid wastage of time and resources. The effectively management of
resources can be facilitated along the departments and work force is handled to increase in
productivity. In a retail format, digital technology helps to utilise all the resources available
on floor and divide and allocated tasks accordingly. The operation in retail glides smoothly
and often helps to increase in revenue by increasing the work effectively. The proper
allotment of tasks takes place that motivates the employees and increases their specialized
knowledge in relatable departments (AlHelal et al., 2016). The employees work across the
departments gain in depth knowledge of the departments and in turn increase the chances of
promotion. The digital technology also evaluates the performances of employees in desired
qualities and framework and helps in appraisal. The process of performance appraisal also
becomes easy and transparent, as employees gets clear insight of their performance as well as
performance of their peers.
The most important aspect of a business is customer satisfaction, which is death more
logically by digital technology. The business when adapts digitalisation, the process of
customer service becomes more satisfying for the customer. It helps a customer to avail
services more convenient way. The services are facilitated by more extra benefits and hence
the value of service increases. In retail format, the digital technology makes the payment
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gateway more operable for customers. The payment gets more secure and safe with digitally
enabled payment options. It helps a customer to avail payment in transparent way. This
increases the footfall in the store and trust is enabled about the store. The customer service
gets more satisfying by increasing their trust and building relationship be giving them facility
of customer service. When customer service is enabled for almost entire day then customers
feel amiable to shop with that particular store. Customer satisfaction increases to increase the
profit earned by the company in turn increases the growth (Selwyn, 2014).
Methodology
A mixed approach, having both qualitative and quantitative methods is undertaken for this
research. While quantitative data involves measurable values and figures, qualitative data
includes factual data (Bernard, 2017).
A quantitative method of research has been applied by conducting a survey including 50
employees of the company in focus. Qualitative data is also collected by conducting in person
interviews of three managers from different departments of the company.
Quantitative Analysis:
Q1. Specify your age.
30%
20%20%
30%
Specify your age.
18-25 26-30 35-45 45 and above
(Graph 2: Age of respondents)
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Inference: 30% of respondents fall in age group of 45 and above, 30% respondents fall in the
age group of 18-25, 20% respondents in 26-30 years and 20% in age group 35-45 years.
Q2. Specify your gender.
30%
60%
10%
Specify your gender.
Female Male Others
(Graph 3: Gender of the respondents)
Inference: 60% of the respondents are male, 30% are female, and 10% are others in their
gender category.
Q3. For how long have you been associated with this organization?
20%
40%
40%
For how long have you been
associated with this organization?
01-Mar 04-Jun 6 years and above
(Graph 4: Association of employees with the organization)
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