New logo to aid Omani SMEs

BUSINESS REPORTER

MUSCAT, FEB 13

SIMPA Marketing Research has come up with a simple and successful idea to help SMEs with their accounts receivables.

It has developed a logo which can either be used electronically or as a physical stamp that goes on all invoices and payment requests made by the SMEs. It simply says, ‘Thank you for supporting Omani SME’.

The idea is to remind the B2B purchaser of the goods or services that they are dealing with 100 percent local SME company and thanking them for their business hoping that this in turn will help the SME by receiving their due payments sooner rather than later.

Khalifa Almukheini, SIMPA’s Managing Director says, “The idea behind the logo is basic behavioural psychology. When a business client sees the logo, they will hopefully be reminded or ‘nudged’ to process the invoice quicker knowing they are supporting an Omani SME. Such simple ideas have been used in many industries for different purposes and they have proven that they are worth trying.” In the last few months SIMPA themselves have been experimenting with the logo on all their invoices and so far, the results have been very encouraging and positive. The hope is now that more SMEs will make use of this initiative.

Hafeez Ul Haq, SIMPA’s Operations Manager, said, “We know first-hand that SME’s most important accounting issue is cash flow and when clients and customers pay on time or a little quicker it makes a big difference and, in some case, it is life saving for small sized companies.”