Business Culture Index (BCI)

BCI: Enhance your understanding of SME culture

The Business Culture Index (BCI) is a tool that analyses and explains the culture of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), helping marketers to understand what drives business priorities and shapes decisions in this market.

Unlike other business surveys that focus on individual decision makers, BCI captures and describes an SME entity as a whole the collective mindset, character, attitude and decision-making dynamic.

A collaboration between TGI and CultureMap – a think tank dedicated to illuminating and promoting Britain’s small business culture – BCI is the first ever SME profiling tool designed for marketing purposes.

With market conditions increasingly tough for media owners and agencies, BCI offers insight into new markets and revenue streams for their clients to target, particularly in a time of recession when BCI data shows SMEs are particularly open to switching suppliers. The SME sector is a particularly valuable one to target because it comprises:

• 99% of UK firms
• 56% of the UK work force
• 52% of UK turnover

BCI is based on a proprietary survey amongst business owners and board directors, conducted once a year. The dataset covers a wide variety of business descriptors: structural aspects, cultural attitudes and behaviours, product/service behaviours and media usage.

BCI 2009 survey information & sample structure:

• Represents small and medium sized businesses in the UK
  - Sample size of 3,500 businesses, representing a universe of
  1.26 million UK businesses
• A broad SME sample, covering everyone from sole traders up to
  businesses with 250 employees (the official government definition of
  SME size)
• Respondents are owners/founders or board directors invited to
  participate in the survey
• Panel selected on ability to accurately express all aspects of
  company culture
• Database available in user-friendly analysis software, allowing data
  interrogation according to specific needs

As well as a number of enhancements to the survey including a larger sample size and broader SME definition, BCI 2009 also includes various new additional content, including:

• Media: newspapers (on & offline), radio stations
• 12 month business trends
• Steps taken to address recession
• Environmental policy
• Attitudes to technology
• Financing the business

Further information

For more about CultureMap, please visit: www.culturemap.org.uk