Selling online? Make it work for you

Supporting small businesses means understanding what really helps them start, run and grow — and listening directly to the platforms they rely on every day.

I recently hosted a roundtable with Small Business Minister, Blair McDougall MP, bringing together the UK’s major marketplaces (eBay, Etsy, TEMU, Fruugo, etc.) with leading payment providers (Stripe, PayPal, Square).

In the room, we had a group that reached most small businesses in the UK. So what did we talk about? Here is the inside track…

Giving founders time back

Show me a founder who doesn’t want to free up time to spend on more meaningful work!

Luckily, marketplaces take on some of the admin chores that small businesses need to comply with (the main one being VAT collection). We’re now looking at whether this can be quantified and what more could be done to help reduce business burdens.

Faster finance, when it’s needed

Through access to live performance data, platforms can identify their merchants who would be eligible for a loan. Access to lending is achieved in a few clicks, and money can be in the account of a small business the next day.

If Carlsberg made lending, it would look like this! This rapid access to growth capital is allowing small businesses to grow. It will be interesting to see if lessons from this could be applied across the wider lending sector.

Helping small businesses sell to the world

Marketplaces and payment providers enable international trade, with one platform stating that 9 out of 10 businesses selling with them sell to the world.

Some have seller dashboards to offer forecasting on sales volumes to support founders with inventory planning. We also discussed how to navigate the changes to de minimus (small value trades) as a small business.

Building digital confidence to scale

Digital adoption is key to growth, and small firms need to feel digitally capable and confident using digital tools to save time, work more efficiently, and stay competitive.

Most attendees are running education programmes or schemes with one platform offering free AI subscriptions to 10,000 businesses. Other topics included the introduction of e-invoicing.

Preparing small businesses for what’s next

Through AI technology, the way people shop is changing, and more are using AI agents to shop on their behalf.

It was agreed that we will take the next steps to convene a larger group to discuss a national effort to deliver education and support for small businesses on how to be ready for and make the most of agentic commerce.

This content is contributed by a guest author. Startups.co.uk / MVF does not endorse or take responsibility for any views, advice, analysis or claims made within this post.