Ministry of SMEs and Startups Opens Recruitment for 'Marketing Support Project' Participants... "Solving Sales Barriers for SMEs"

Infographic of the recruitment announcement for the 'Small Business Marketing Support Project' by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups.
[Photo by Ministry of SMEs and Startups]

[Asia Economy Reporter Junhyung Lee] The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced that it will begin recruiting companies to participate in the 'SME Marketing Support Project' from the 12th to support small and medium-sized enterprises in securing sales channels. Applications can be submitted online through the distribution support website 'I'm Stars.'

This project is one of the follow-up measures to the 'SME Sales Channel Innovation Support Plan' announced at last month's Central Emergency Economic Countermeasures Headquarters meeting. It focuses on enhancing capabilities to create domestic sales markets for SMEs and resolving policy blind spots by expanding the targets and scope of sales channel policies.

It reflects the opinions of SMEs that have expressed difficulties in securing sales channels due to rapid changes in distribution market trends such as non-face-to-face transactions caused by COVID-19. According to a survey conducted by the Korea Federation of SMEs at the end of last year, 51.1% of SMEs reported difficulties in securing sales channels.

In particular, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups explained that the necessity of introduction set for each detailed task directly reflected the opinions of companies, thereby enhancing policy validity. According to the Korea Federation of SMEs, when new sales channel innovation policies are introduced, SMEs' sales increase by an average of 32.1%.

The Ministry plans to support sales channel policy innovation with a budget of 20.9 billion KRW, a 14% increase from the previous year, to reduce the burden of sales channel creation for companies through the establishment of sales channel infrastructure. It is also expected to contribute to expanding the domestic market by supporting entry into new markets such as integrated online mall management and subscription economy. In addition, the Ministry will strengthen responses to the spread of non-face-to-face consumption by supporting non-face-to-face product evaluation meetings where SMEs can directly introduce new products to distribution companies online.

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups will finalize the support targets after evaluation by a selection committee composed of marketing experts for companies that apply for participation. Eligibility and other criteria are based on detailed application and reception standards for each project.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.