Small businesses in the South-East could be missing out on opportunities to boost their turnover by up to £34 billion.

Business advice organisation Clearlybusiness says small firms were suffering through a lack of resources and a reluctance to work more closely with other small businesses.

More than 180,000 small businesses in the South East admit in the past year alone they have been unable to take advantage of new ideas or opportunities.

Clearlybusiness said the average small business in the region had lost out on additional turnover of £57,000 in the past year.

When faced with a money-making opportunity firms were unable to take forward themselves, nearly two-thirds admitted they did not consider working with another business to take advantage of the situation, though this was one of the lowest levels in the country.

Nine out of ten entrepreneurs in the region who felt they had missed opportunities pinned the blame on a lack of available finance at the time, compared to a national average of 75 per cent.

Twenty seven per cent blamed a lack of experience and technical expertise to translate opportunities into sales. Other reasons cited were insufficient people, production capacity and business contacts.

The research also indicated the impact of these missed opportunities on the bottom line could be severe, with 20 per cent believing they could have generated additional sales revenue of between £100,000 and £500,000.

Markus Clavin, director of Clearlybusiness, said: "As one of the powerhouses of the UK small business economy, it is vital that businesses in the South-East are more proactive in exploring how they work with each other to plug their resource and capability gaps, particularly in the areas of finance and technical expertise.

"A quick and easy way of doing this is by using the listing, communities and business marketplaces on the internet.

"More broadly, there is a strong economic argument for ensuring that sufficient Government resources are focused on helping existing businesses bridge these resource and capability gaps rather than on stimulating a large number of new business start-ups."