Consider the plight of Mr Tsang.

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Mr Tsang is the owner of a SME factory in China, and he is planning to move part of his business to another country.

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To this end, Mr Tsang develops a lengthy to-do list: set up company, market business potential, housing, education, tax, residency, employment…etc.; and he googles for information and browses the websites of various overseas service providers, and wants to arrange for meetings.  Mr Tsang prefers small-medium size service providers due to budgetary considerations.

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To Mr Tsang's dismay, there are only a small number of overseas service providers with a Hong Kong office and these are large corporates that cater to the corporate or high-net-worth market segments i.e. too costly for him.

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Mr Tsang is not alone.

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Consider Mr. Chan, who is the owner of a boutique Southeast Asian gourmet shop; and he is looking for niche Singapore products and ideas.

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Then, there is Ms. Lee, the owner of a niche but popular local condiments brand; and she is looking for a partner for the Malaysian market.

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Like Mr Tsang, they google and browse the websites of various Singapore and Malaysia SMEs, shortlist those of interest, and decide to arrange for meetings with them.​  To their dismay, their preferred companies do not have a Hong Kong office and a person in Hong Kong that they can contact.

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Mr. Tsang, Mr. Chan and Ms. Lee are fictitious for illustrative purpose, but the scenarios are real based on our on-the-ground interactions in Hong Kong with clients and business associates.

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Like many developed markets, Hong Kong has a vibrant SME and mid-high income market:

• Over 340,000 SMEs in Hong Kong employ approximately 45% of private sector workforce

• About 25% of the population, or 1.66 million Hong Kong people, have an education qualification of university degree or above

• Of the 2.6 million households in Hong Kong, one-third of them have monthly household income of more than HK$40,000 or about S$7,000.

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We believe that there are opportunities for international companies in the SME and mid-high income market segments.  However, all stages of the marketing and business development funnel are not being adequately met on-the-ground in Hong Kong.

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Find out how our outsourced marketing services can help in a cost-effective way and read our experiment and suggestions for a Singapore SME.

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