Short answer: because the way people buy has changed seven times in 18 years — and most Malaysian SMEs changed once, or not at all. Their products did not get weaker. What got old was the medium, the way customers find them, and the way they count the cost of a customer.
I started building RichWorks in 2008. Over that time I went through every one of these transitions myself — including the ones I was slow to see. I am writing this so you can identify which phase you are stuck in.
Phase 1 — 2008 to 2010: the shop and big-advertising era
The perception then was simple: to do business you needed a shop. To open a restaurant you needed a restaurant. To look substantial you needed an office and a signboard.
How people found you was limited to a few expensive channels: newspapers, TV, radio, billboards and flyers handed out in the neighbourhood. If you were in business, you spent heavily on those — I was one of them.
Customers came from a radius of a few kilometres. Sales happened when the shop was open. Customer data barely existed — at best a notebook and phone numbers in a handset.
What decided who won: location and capital. Good location plus money for rent and stock, and you won.
Phase 2 — 2010 to 2012: the Facebook era
This is the transition most people forget was so big. For the first time, someone could start a business without a shop. A Facebook Page, some posts, and then Facebook Live — all free, with organic reach that was extremely high at the time.
A great many business owners today started in this phase. They began at 25 or 30, with no rent, no renovation, no staff. Their startup capital might have been under RM1,000.
What decided who won: the nerve to appear on camera, and the discipline to post consistently.
Phase 3 — 2012 to 2015: the smartphone and database era
Smartphone penetration in Malaysia climbed fast. People began buying from their phones, not their computers. Facebook advertising became serious and targetable.
This is also when people started to understand the thing that changed everything: you do not need to sell to new people every day — you need to keep the data of people who already bought. Database, email, SMS and later WhatsApp became the follow-up medium.
From around 2014 onwards, Facebook organic reach began falling noticeably. Businesses that depended entirely on free posting started to feel it.
What decided who won: an asset of your own — a customer list you could contact without paying anyone.
Phase 4 — 2015 to 2019: the Instagram and marketplace era
Instagram, and then Stories, changed how people showed products. Appearance started to matter. Influencers began replacing conventional advertising.
At the same time, marketplaces like Lazada and Shopee entered Malaysia and reset customer expectations: fast delivery, transparent pricing, open reviews, pay on arrival.
Your competition changed too. No longer the shop down the road — now everyone in the country, including overseas sellers with a lower cost base.
What decided who won: the ability to sell on platforms you do not own, and to compete on speed and price.
Phase 5 — 2020 to 2022: the pandemic, TikTok and live selling
The pandemic compressed ten years into a few months. Shops closed, people stayed home, and buying moved entirely into the phone.
TikTok exploded in Malaysia during this period. Live selling became a primary sales channel for some businesses — one live session could match a month of shop sales.
Businesses that could move in this window jumped. Those that could not, disappeared. Not because their products were bad — because they waited for things to “go back to normal”.
What decided who won: speed of decision, not size of company.
Phase 6 — 2023 to 2025: the saturation and rising-cost era
Everyone was online, which meant attention became contested. Advertising costs rose. Reach that used to be free now had to be paid for.
Platform commissions began squeezing margin — in some F&B cases, up to 32% of the selling price. Delivery, packaging, refunds and returns added costs that never appear on the price list.
This is the most painful phase for businesses that have never calculated their real costs. Sales rise, profit does not — and they cannot see where it is leaking.
What decided who won: margin and systems, not sales volume.
Phase 7 — 2026: the AI agent era
What is changing now is not just a new tool. It is a change in who does the work.
Clients I work with finished this year somewhere between RM20 million and nearly RM70 million — among them NOIR, Eskyavie, Bartech, Inai Republic, Dr Samhan Him Wellness and Najib Assadok. Many of them are not 20-year businesses. Some jumped within two to three years.
What they did was not “try AI”. They integrated it into real work: advertising, content, customer follow-up, operations, people management and finance. The gap between curiosity and execution is the gap between those who jumped and those still waiting.
Business 18 years ago versus now
| Item | 18 years ago (2008) | Now (2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Traffic | People walking past your shop | People scrolling past your feed |
| Customer area | A few kilometres | The whole country, 24 hours |
| Cost to start | Rent, renovation, stock — tens of thousands | A phone and content — close to zero |
| Advertising | Newspaper, TV, billboard. Expensive, slow | Digital ads. Cheap, instant, measurable |
| Customer data | A notebook | A database you can retarget |
| Competition | The shop down the road | Everyone in the country, and abroad |
| Building trust | Years of reputation | Reviews and social proof — in days |
| Selling hours | When the shop is open | When the customer wants |
| Working capital | Stock had to exist first | Pre-orders, dropshipping, agent models |
| Measuring results | Gut feel and annual accounts | A daily dashboard |
What has not changed at all
I do not want you to misunderstand me. Some things were the same in 2008 as they are in 2026:
- A product or service that genuinely solves a problem
- Trust. Without it there is no repeat purchase
- Cash flow. Businesses die from cash, not from ideas
- The discipline of counting costs and setting prices
- Quality of leadership — good people do not stay with weak leaders
Platforms change. The fundamentals do not. What brings a business down is not the platform shift — it is the fundamentals neglected while waiting for the next platform.
Why so many SMEs are still behind
I meet business owners every week. These are the real reasons I see — not because they do not know:
- The old success trap. The old way still produces a little, so there is no urgency to change.
- Platform confusion. Too many options, so they pick none.
- Tied to physical assets. Rent, fittings and staff turn change into a cost rather than an investment.
- No measurement. They do not know where customers come from, so the decline is invisible until it is late.
- Identity. “I am a shopkeeper” versus “I own a business”. Identity drives decisions.
- Waiting for the right time. The right time does not arrive. It is created by a date you set yourself.
- Age and runway. Most business owners today are 45 and above. You do not have 20 years. You may have five or ten — which makes this decision more urgent, not less.
What I would do
- Work out which phase you are stuck in. Phase 3? Phase 4? Most businesses I meet stopped at phase 3 or 4 — they have customers, but no system.
- Pick one transition you have postponed for over a year. Just one.
- Set a date — not “when I have time”.
- Measure one thing from this month: what it costs you to acquire a customer, and what that customer is worth over their lifetime. If you do not know those two numbers, you cannot make platform decisions properly.
FAQ
Why is a business that used to succeed now slowing down? Because the medium and the place customers buy from have moved, while the way that business finds customers is still the same as five or ten years ago.
Do I need to abandon my old platform? No. But do not make the old platform the only place you exist.
I am 50. Is it too late? No. But your runway is shorter. That is a reason to start faster, not a reason not to start.
Which platform should I pick now? Follow where your customers buy today, not where they bought five years ago.
What is the difference between “trying AI” and “AI integration”? Trying AI is using one tool for one task. AI integration is putting it into the real workflow — marketing, sales, operations, HR and finance — so the work runs without you sitting in front of it.
If I only have time for one thing, what is it? Work out your cost of acquiring a customer. Every other decision becomes clearer once you know that number.
Every time the business world shifts, I ask myself one question: if I were starting today, from zero, with the experience I have now — how would I do it? The answer usually tells me what to change tomorrow morning.
If you want to know where your business is actually stuck, message me for a business assessment I do myself.
— Datuk Wira Dr Azizan Osman
Note: the client growth figures above reflect their own business performance and were confirmed in October 2026.