With 72% of small businesses stating that new business generation is their top priority in 2010, they are turning to technologies they know will quickly and easily bring them new clients through the door. These technologies are still websites and telephones over newer methods such as social media.

When asked whether social media such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, has been useful in generating new business, 63% answered no, with a staggering 75% not knowing how to use social media effectively for new business generation.

The survey was conducted by Cloud Net, a business phone systems provider, who carried out face to face interviews at the Business Growth show in Edgbaston on 5 March 2010. The company spoke with a 100 visitors as it launched its small business VoIP system at the event. 

The small business owners ranked websites top as the most effective technology for generating new business at 38%, followed by telephone at 33%, social media at 24% and email marketing at 5%. With nearly a quarter of respondents rating social media as the most effective, this demonstrates how those small businesses who have understood its benefits and have time for implementation are using it to grow.

The key criteria for selecting a technology for new business generation is speed of response at 52%, ease of use 33% and ability to track success at 23%.  With a tough 2009 for many businesses, quickly gaining new clients is a must to make up for losses made last year.

With a growing interest in the use of social media by small businesses for both sales and marketing, the biggest drawbacks of using social media for new business generation were cited as:

lack of time to implement social media at 52%

being unclear of the benefits of social media 33%

lacking policy or guidelines 20%

The technology used most for new business generation was the telephone at 41%, followed by website 37% and email marketing at 22%. This is also reflected by the fact that websites and telephones have been used the longest to generate new business, with nearly a third of businesses actively using their websites to generate new business for over 2 years, followed by over a half getting on the telephone to drum up new sales.

The technology that was the fastest at gaining new business was again the telephone 44%, followed by a website 37% and email marketing at 16%.

David Hill, Chairman of Cloud Net: "Currently for many small businesses, the hype around social media exceeds the reality, especially as small companies are under pressure to make sales quickly. At Cloud Net, we, like other small businesses, are using social media as part of an integrated sales effort, but when we know who our customers are, we favour making direct contact by picking up our VoIP phones, rather than tweeting or inviting them to connect to us on LinkedIn."

"This survey also highlights that small businesses are focused on using technologies that can help them generate sales quickly. Putting together a targeted list of prospects, and contacting them directly is often quicker than hoping they will find you on Facebook," he concluded.

Cloud Net is the company behind Cloud Net Connect, a service which allows small businesses to replace their traditional small business telephone systems without any capital expenditure on either PBX hardware or handsets, meaning that Cloud Net customers do not need to purchase new VoIP phones to benefit from cheaper and free call rates.

The company offers its "Switchboard in the Sky" online PBX system on a monthly contract basis making it a fraction of the price of a traditional hardware based switchboard which costs several thousand pounds to purchase with additional license fees on top.