Mobile-First Gives Rural Small Businesses a Real Shot at Growth

Small businesses don’t sell the same way everywhere, but it’s the digital shift that can be the tailwind to sales growth, no matter the location, especially as the mobile phone is being used in brick-and-mortar settings.

PYMNTS Intelligence data shows small‑town and suburban firms are the least likely to live by the cash register alone, that is, through physical sales. Rural merchants lean hardest on in‑store sales, and big‑city operators spread their bets across most channels.

Data gleaned from 527 small to mid-sized businesses (SMBs) shows that channel mix is the biggest dividing line when accessing how firms reach their customers.

Rural-Urban Divide

Four in 10 rural businesses (42%) rely on physical‑only sales, roughly double the rate in large cities (17.4%) and well above small towns and suburbs (19%).

By contrast, a majority of big‑city SMBs sell through a blend of online and in‑person channels (53.9%). Small‑town and suburban firms also favor that blend (47.1%), while rural (38.2%) and small‑city peers (38.6%) are less likely to mix.

Digital‑only models are most common outside rural America. About a quarter of small‑town/suburban and large‑city SMBs sell only online (27% in each), compared with 15.4% in rural areas and 25.6% in small cities. That shows up in the breadth of tools each group uses: the average rural business sells through just two channels, versus 2.4 for small‑town/suburban firms, 2.2 for small‑city operators and three for large‑city SMBs.

What sits behind those mixes is familiar but telling. Small‑town and suburban businesses are more likely than rural peers to run their own websites and to use social media as a sales engine. They also stand out as the group “least likely to rely solely on physical sales,” reflecting greater comfort with simple digital storefronts and customer acquisition beyond the neighborhood.

Beyond the Store Counter

Rural merchants, meanwhile, are more anchored to the store counter and phone orders, a pattern consistent with fewer sales channels overall.

Industry makeup doesn’t fully explain the gap. Small‑town SMBs skew a bit more toward retail than their city counterparts, and rural areas are slightly more represented in construction and professional services. But the report finds “no real pattern” by sector strong enough to account for the differences in how firms sell. The divide looks more like access and adoption than industry destiny.

Source: PYMNTS Intelligence

Fortunately, the vast majority of small businesses are sanguine about their prospects. Overall, 82% of SMBs say that it is “extremely likely” that they will survive the next two years. The chart above shows that the smallest firms we surveyed, with sales that are below the $150,000 threshold, are well aware of the fact that increased customer demand is leading to the resilience.

Only about 16% say the shift to online sales has been a factor, which leaves some room for improvement, as more than 30% have seen a benefit from improved customer outreach and marketing. A combination of digital initiatives and engagement, ranging from promotions to inventory management, would bolster operations and profits.

For banks, processors and FinTechs, the takeaway is practical: Product sets should flex by place. Rural clients may need help modernizing in‑person acceptance and easy on‑ramps to web and marketplace sales. Small‑town and suburban SMBs benefit from tools that tighten the link between storefront, website and social commerce. City merchants tend to need orchestration across many channels. In every setting, meeting the customer where they already sell, while modernizing the interactions, can pay dividends.