UK ecommerce adoption rate falls -report

The rate of ecommerce adoption among UK SMEs has fallen from 26 per cent to 21 per cent, according to a new survey. Is this a statistical quirk, or a lot of companies switching off their etail businesses?

Ecommerce survivors - most of them, at any rate, - 71 per cent of UK e-biz sites run by SMEs are profitable, according to the 2003 SME Ecommerce Market Report. This is more or less identical to the findings of the 2002 survey, so it shows real sustainable business is being conducted in SmallBiz Land.

Actinic, the ecommerce software business which funds the survey, will be pleased with the findings that all the profitable businesses have spent at least £1,000 on their site, and that almost half build their site using boxed product. Apparently, there is little correlation between profitability and custom-built design: "In fact spending more on a bespoke
site does not increase profitability," Actinic claims.

This is Actinic's third annual UK ecommerce survey. The full report is here (pdf). ®