Last month we asked readers of Mentoring and Enterprise Monthly how they tackled all things digital. We asked what aspects of digital your business can not survive without, what are your biggest digital headaches, and where you turn for help. This was to help us explore in what ways we can support small businesses as part of the Go ON UK campaign.

This is what you said (click on the graphs to see them in more detail).

To kick off the survey, we asked which aspects of digital technology are most important for your business. At first look it seems surprising that social media activities scored lowest, although when you see what digital activities scored highest on the list, email, search engine and website, you see that these are mission critical for most businesses.

Based on research Go ON UK have identified the basic online skills that businesses need as these listed in the chart on the left.

We weren't too surprised to discover that all but two of the basic online skills presented a slight challenge, with the two top activities being 'somewhat challenging'. These results were in fact lower than we anticipated which might reflect the digital skills the respondents already have.

It seems that all can tackle using a search engine, sending and receiving payments and making online payments without encountering any, or at least, very few skills issues.

Go ON UK also identified the skills areas in relation to keeping safe online. These are listed in the chart on the left and again it seems the companies that responded to the survey weren't finding these much of a challenge.

 We then of course asked what kind of help the respondents thought businesses would find most useful for those keen to develop their digital skills.

We were interested to find out that ideas sharing and training courses came out top, with the other options not far behind. Perhaps it is a combination of these forms of support that work for the business community, it would be interesting to know how those companies that are succeeding in this area are gaining their digital skills.

Unsurprisingly, when we asked what the challenges were for small businesses in developing digital skills, lack of time was by far the strongest reason given, with lack of funds, perceived need and confidence all being equally cited as reasons. Very few of the respondents felt that businesses had a lack of urgency in this area, suggesting that it was high on people's concerns but the challenges were creating barriers in addressing these needs.

We next asked people what they considered to be their greatest digital successes. We had some great responses to this, mostly around launching websites, starting to trade online and developing social media channels that had gained a lot of support. One business said that it now achieved 82% of its business online. Other great successes included developing databases of existing and potential customers and having integrated online sales with marketing activities.

We thought it was very interesting that one company had indicated that one of its best successes in this area was recruiting a Social Digital Apprentice from Digital Youth Academy. For those companies struggling with digital skills in this area this sounded like a great way to bring some expertise into your business. It would be great to find out more about company's experiences of recruiting apprentices to help them take on digital challenges in their business.

We then went on to ask what the biggest frustration was for businesses in developing their digital skills. Most answers again centred around lack of funds and time. Companies also had specific challenges around marketing and selling online. One business was struggling to afford the professional price tag with web design and logo but lacked the confidence to use DIY web design sites. Other issues were around creating secure sites and optimising site rankings on Google.

We asked what companies thought the biggest opportunities were for small businesses, the majority of the answers focused on the opportunity that social media presented to businesses, opportunity to compete with larger companies with a good website, and the tools that will enable you to develop customer intelligence. A couple of respondents were also keen to highlight the opportunities that mobile sales and marketing could present.

Finally we asked whether the respondents felt that companies could learn from each other's experiences in this area. 60% said that yes they could and 40% said possibly. No one said that companies couldn't potentially develop their knowledge in this way. At the IOEE we will be exploring how we can support this.

We'd like to thank everyone that took the time to take part in the survey. It's been incredibly useful as a way for the IOEE and its partners to gain insight into the challenges facing businesses and how these could be addressed.

It would be great to gather further details and case studies from those individuals that said they were happy to be contacted.

To support connections and experience sharing between businesses tackling digital challenges we have set up a new group in the IOEE called 'Tackling digital for my business', please join if you think it could be useful for your business.