Background <p>The effectiveness and sustainability of workplace health promotion (WHP) depend critically on needs-based program design. This study develops an empirically grounded typology of employees in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) based on their needs regarding structural and behavioral prevention topics.</p> Methods <p>An anonymous cross-sectional online survey (December 2024–April 2025) was conducted among employees from nine SMEs, assessing their needs for WHP measures across 14&#xa0;behavioral and structural prevention topics. Due to limited clusterability, dimensionality reduction of the 14&#xa0;topic-related variables was performed using multiple correspondence analysis (MCA), followed by hierarchical cluster analysis according to Ward’s method. The optimal number of clusters was determined using common quality criteria (semi-partial&#xa0;R², pseudo‑F, pseudo‑T², silhouette analysis). Significant topic areas and their over- or underrepresentation in each cluster were identified using Fisher’s exact test (α = 0.05) and t‑tests. Finally, the employee types were characterized based on sociodemographic, health-related, and work-related variables.</p> Results <p>Analyses were based on 158 fully completed questionnaires (70.3% women). Five employee types were identified: a&#xa0;WHP-willing type, a&#xa0;structurally oriented type, a&#xa0;back-focused type, a&#xa0;team-oriented type, and a&#xa0;WHP-distant type. These differ in aspects such as age, occupational field, and perceived workload.</p> Conclusion <p>The typology provides SMEs with a&#xa0;practice-oriented tool for targeted communication, needs-based planning, and resource allocation in the context of WHP. Validation in intervention studies with larger samples and broader SME representation is recommended.</p>