Growing Your Business Online: Small-Business Strategies for Working the World Wide Web - Softcover

Hise, Phaedra

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0805047387 ISBN 13: 9780805047387

Publisher: Owlet, 1996

Synopsis

Explains how to use Internet marketing techniques to advertise and sell over the World Wide Web

About this title

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The following text is an excerpt from chapter 7 called, Do Drop In: Publicizing the Site and Attracting Visitors

Smart companies set goals in their business plans and marketing strategies. Say a catalog company rents a particular mailing list. The company hopes for a 3 percent return on the highly-qualified, expensive list. If the list doesn't deliver the desired return on their investment, the company won't make the same bad investment twice. Every company should do the same thing with its Web page. Once the costs of setting up a site are known, it's time to establish a hoped-for return. There are three elements to setting a goal for the Web site: What kind of return is desired? How will it be measured? And over what time period?

The type of return doesn't have to be just financial, in the form of a certain percentage of total sales by a particular date. It could be to gather a certain number of names for a mailing list, or to cut company mailing or telephone expenses by a certain amount after handing over some customer service functions to the Web site. Perhaps the company hopes to cut marketing expenses, while still posting the same sales growth percentages. Whatever it is, the return should be set up to measure whatever is the main focus of the Web site. For example, you probably wouldn't want to focus on hiring a certain percentage of employees from Web site applications if it's a catalog site. It would be more to the point to measure sales instead. In the beginning, choose one main aspect to measure. If that goes well, it's easy enough to add more areas to evaluate later.

Once the type of return is established, make sure there is a way to measure it and that systems are in place to do it. Web sales can easily be measured at a site that handles online transactions. But how would you measure the portion of decreased mailing expenses attributable to the Web site? How would you decide if customer service functions are successful on the Web (perhaps by looking for decreased telephone costs, or a certain number of existing customers signing up for online support packages)? It's important to take the time up front to establish clear guidelines for measuring the site's success or failure,so that there can be no question once the site goes live. (Chapter 8 discusses how to measure traffic at a Web site.)

When the site opens, that's when it's time to start measuring how well it's doing. But when to stop? Some companies consider a Web site to be a long-term investment, worth sticking with for several years before evaluating whether it's a success or failure. Others can't afford to funnel funds into a non-moneymaking endeavor for more than a few months. Whatever the time frame, be realistic. It's unlikely that any Web site will be pulling down 50 percent of a company's sales in a few months. Talk to other companies who have had sites up for a while, and ask how they evaluate their sites.

From Library Journal

Hise, the technology editor of Inc. magazine, has written an outstanding guide for businesses wanting to use the World Wide Web. She offers case studies of small businesses already using the web to show what the web is, how to get your business on it, and what the web can do for you. After giving a brief but thorough explanation of the Internet and the World Wide Web, Hise discusses the different types of Internet providers that offer web sites for businesses. She then talks about the design of sites and the differences between designing and maintaining a site in-house or having it outsourced. She also discusses several web site models and what a business can do on the web. A business can use the web to sell products in an online store or cybermail, do promotion, maintain customer support, or network internally for employee policies and news. A wonderful appendix of sources includes Internet providers, software and hardware dealers, and publications. An extremely helpful and timely work for general readers.?Joel Jones, Kansas City P.L., Mo.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Owlet
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0805047387
• ISBN 13: 9780805047387
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 235