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Small Businesses Venture into E-Commerce

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WASHINGTON, D.C.— Electronic commerce—the marketing, promotion, buying, and selling of goods and services electronically, particularly via the Internet—is experiencing unprecedented growth, according to a report recently released by the Office of Advocacy. E-Commerce: Small Businesses Venture Online uses existing research and provides an overview of small businesses’ use of e-commerce and identifies a number of issues in the expansion to e-commerce.

As many as 35 percent of small businesses maintain their own Web site. While e-commerce is used for customer identification, advertising, consumer sales, business-to-business transactions, and some business-to-consumer point of sale transactions, small firms encounter several barriers to e-commerce. Barriers include initial startup costs, difficulty attracting and keeping technologically-skilled personnel to service the site and customers, security of a small business’s (or its customers’) data, and consumer trust.

"The use of e-commerce opens a universe of new venues for small businesses and consumers to exchange information, goods, and services," said the SBA’s Chief Counsel for Advocacy Jere W. Glover. "Consumers are on the Internet because of the price and choice available to them there. Small businesses built Main Street, and they will likely lead the way in the future to a virtual market square."

Seventy-eight percent of small business owners with a Web site declared the ability to reach new and potential customers as their main reason for having one. Businesses are more likely to be online to identify customers and promote product and services before the point of sale. How use of the Internet helps small firms is unclear, but research shows that small businesses that utilize the Web have higher annual revenues, averaging $3.79 million in 1998, compared with $2.72 million for all small businesses.

Online sales currently account for less than 1 percent of total retail sales in the U.S.; however, online retail marketing is experiencing about 200 percent annual growth, with online traffic doubling every 100 days. Small businesses earned $3.5 billion in e-commerce sales in 1997, and projections for online sales for the beginning of the next decade range widely — from $25 billion to over $300 billion — depending on the source.

Small Businesses Primed for New Growth Opportunities Through E-Commerce

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New International Survey Provides Insights Into U.S. and European Small Businesses Perceptions of Internet and E-Commerce

IRVINE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Optimistic about the potential of online avenues for business growth, 65 percent of

America's small businesses say they expect e-commerce will open up new markets and opportunities for their businesses. A solid 50 percent of those surveyed believe that selling online will result in increased sales for their business.

Specific to e-commerce, more than half (53 percent) of U.S.-based small and medium-sized businesses believe that all their products and services are suitable for sale over the Internet. Indicating action in this area, 40 percent of those businesses surveyed plan to add an e-commerce solution in the next 12 months.

These results are among the key findings from the Small Business E-Commerce Survey commissioned by Sage Software, Inc., and Peachtree Software, Inc., leading providers of business management and accounting software solutions. Survey questions were asked of 200 U.S. small business executives, as well as business leaders in the United Kingdom, Germany and France.

The survey also compared attitudes between U.S. and European entrepreneurs, showing surprisingly similar attitudes on a variety of Internet-related issues.

"Clearly, small businesses are recognizing the importance and benefit of Internet and e-commerce capabilities," said Paul Stobart, chief operating officer, The Sage Group plc. "Savvy businesses realize it's not enough to simply have a Web presence. Effective use of the Internet to increase revenue is the key to success, as shown by their favor of e-commerce."

Entering the Mainstream With Small Businesses
Further indicating a strong openness to conducting business on the Web, 64 percent of small businesses reported that they are no longer put off by the day-to-day language of e-commerce. Only 41 percent of U.S. small businesses say they are still worried about security of data issues, compared with 53 percent of French small businesses with similar concerns.

However, not all businesses are rushing to hop on the Internet bandwagon. Forty-two percent of small businesses still believe e-commerce has no relevance to their particular business. Another 45 percent say they don't have the time to devote to getting their business into e-commerce, a figure in sharp contrast to German small businesses of which only 13 percent share the same attitude.

Where Small Businesses Go For Advice

Much to the dismay of information technology professionals everywhere, a recent survey found that 72 percent of the nation's small and medium-sized businesses would go to friends for advice on Internet or e-commerce strategy.

Survey respondents' second choice for Internet and e-commerce guidance was family -- chosen by 54 percent of respondents, followed by independent IT consultants who came in third, selected by a modest 52 percent of those businesses surveyed.

Image is Everything
Among America's small businesses, 63 percent believe being recognized as an e-business will be good for their image, and 55 percent of small businesses are in agreement that failing to adopt the potential offered by the Internet will be a commercial mistake.

Despite small businesses' increasing knowledge and acceptance of the Internet and other emerging technologies, nearly two-thirds (62 percent) of those U.S. small businesses surveyed claim their children have a better understanding of the Internet than they do. In the United Kingdom, 74 percent of small businesses tip their hats to the younger generation.

About The Survey

Accounting for more than 99 percent of employers in the United States, small business is the nation's largest employer group. The Sage Small Business E-Commerce Survey is based on telephone responses from the (titles) of (xxx) companies across the U.S., U.K., Germany and France ranging from (1 to 250) employees and was conducted in March 2000.

Dazzle Your Visitors With A Dynamic Home Page

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From the moment a visitor arrives, your front page conveys a feeling to your visitor. From the look of your site, the wording, and the colors you use, your home page projects a message to your potential customer about who you are. First impressions are lasting. It's very important for your site to project an image of professionalism and invite the visitor to want to know more by gaining the reader's attention, capturing their interest, creating desire, and calling them to action.

Here are the key elements to creating a dynamic front page:

Professional Graphics
Company Logo
Motto
Draw them in with leading questions
Show how your product meets those needs
Build trust with testimonials
Tease visitors with goodies
Follow with your guarantee
Call them to action

Professional Graphics

When people shop in a store, the music, the décor, and the display create an inviting atmosphere for your business. Recreate this experience on your web site with graphics, pictures and visual imagery in your sales copy.

Web site graphics play a big role in projecting a professional image to your visitor. Not only can graphics visually please a visitor, but they can also provide a sense of security. If your graphics are of shoddy do-it-yourself variety, customers may question your business' integrity, be leery to buy your products, or wonder if your order page is secure.

Perhaps you're ready to take your existing site to the next level with a web site makeover. For minimal cost, professional graphics can literally transform an ordinary site into something truly exciting. Try to match the color scheme and graphics of your site to your business culture. Are you casual and friendly? Are you high tech? Are you corporate? Pick a logo and color scheme that reflects this to your customer.

Other Graphic Tips:

Quick Loading - As a rule, your home page should be under 80KB in size, and take no longer than 20 seconds to download with a 56k modem.
Cross Browser Compatibility- Test your site with several different browsers and at various screen resolutions.
Complement, Don’t Distract - Your graphics should not distract from the site's content. If you are using a colored or tiled background or excessive animation it can makes it hard for visitors to read your text.

Company Logo
Your logo is a distinguishing mark for your company. A strong logo will create a lasting image which clearly identifies you, differentiate you from the competition, and conveys a sense of professionalism and reliability. Place your logo predominantly at the top of the home page so visitors can immediately identify that they have arrive at your company web site.

Motto
Think of a motto or slogan as a headline for your web site. This tells visitors WHO you are, HOW your product will benefit them, and WHY you are the best. For example: Providing the highest quality coffees for private label

Draw Them In With Leading Questions
Sales copy needs to GRAB your visitor's attention, create an INTEREST, and call them to ACT. So how do you grab their attention? Create questions related to benefits your customers might realize from your product. Think about WHY someone would want to buy your product and HOW it helps him or her. This will hook them.

For example here are some leading questions:

Would you like to bring your business online?
Need to add some pizzazz to your existing web site?
Are you looking for reliable web hosting?
Want to drive traffic to your web site?

Show How Your Product Meets Those Needs
Follow the leading questions up by telling them how your business will GIVE them those benefits. You've caught their interest; this will reel them in.

See example below.

If you answered "YES!" to any of these questions and you're serious about business on the net, call me at (888) 212-3255 to learn how KCD web development, hosting, and promotional consulting services can help you achieve success!

Build Trust With Testimonials
Now tell them WHY they should buy. Sprinkling your sales copy with testimonials will break up your sales copy and add interest. There's nothing more powerful than the words of a satisfied customer to build trust in you and your products.

Here's an example of a small testimonial used as a teaser to the full testimonial page:

My home page says "#1 Rated Design Firm by Brian Hogan of Adventures in Advertising, Click Here to find out why" This is linked to my testimonial page.

Tease Visitors With Goodies
Think of your home page as the cover of a book. You've got to make it exciting enough to make them want to open the book and read. Tell visitors a little about your company, newsletter, and any articles, resources, tips, or free reports your site has to offer. This will draw visitors DEEPER within your site.

Follow With Your Guarantee
Reduce the risk of purchase by offering a product guarantee. This will do two things: it will show the customer that you believe in your product, and it will build trust thus making them more likely to purchase.

Here's an example of a guarantee:

Unconditional No-Questions-Asked Guarantee You have my personal guarantee, that the Widget will do X, Y, and Z for you, that we back your purchase with a no-hassle, 100% money-back guarantee.

Call Them To Action
It's time to close the deal and ASK for the order! What is the next step you want the visitor to take? Should they call for information? Do they click here to order? Place the link to your secure order page in a VERY VISIBLE place. Remind them that it's a SECURE order page. Time sensitive offers (and if you order by midnight tonight, you'll receive a special bonus) can entice visitors to act now.

Offer visitors your contact information. Include your phone number, fax, address, and spell out your email address (make your email link clickable). It is crucial to put your contact information on the home page so people don 't have to hunt for it.

Motivate visitors to take that next step by offering a free consultation, a discount or piling on the bonuses. If you don't have a bonus, create a joint venture! Find a company whose services complement yours and agree to cross promote each other. Then make a bonus swap! Not only will you gain giveaways such as ebooks and free reports, but you'll also get lots of exposure.

Other Quick Tips
Here's some other web design tips to keep in mind:

Check your spelling and grammar. Let someone else proof your site too! They'll catch things you've missed.
Keep navigation simple. In addition to your top or side buttons, add a set of text links to the bottom of the page.
Frequently test your links.
http://www.netmechanic.com and http://websitegarage.netscape.com offer this service for FREE!
Make your page easy to scan. Use headers to break up your text into digestible chunks. This way if a visitor scans you page, he can grasp a quick sense of what your site is about. Similarly, using bullet points will lead the visitor's eye down the page.

Summary
Take the time to ensure your web site incorporates quality graphics, good sales copy, and a strong call to action. And remember to periodically reevaluate your front page to see if it still measures up. After all, you've just got one shot to grab your visitors attention or else "CLICK". they're gone.

Internet Security: Backups

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A vital part of any security scheme is backup. No matter how tight your security is, you always have the chance that a virus or hacker or even your 5 year old kid is going to slip through your defenses and damage your system and your vital data files. If you don't back up your data regularly you will be out of luck. And anyone who has been there knows how horrible it is to realize that your computer is destroyed and there is no way to get the files back.

In order to back up your system, you will need a backup device. Some people use Zip or Jazz drives, others use tape drives, write able CD drives, or other removable cartridge systems. I know it sounds expensive, but compared with the cost of losing your valuable data forever, each of these is cheap.

I've found that the best all-around product for backup is Backup Exec. This product requires a tape drive, as do most other third-party backup solutions. Backup Exec is preferred because it can be made totally automatic and is one of the top-rated products industry-wide. If you want to back up to other media, though, you'll do best to stick with the backup software that comes with the media.

An important fact that I've noticed about backup is that you have to make it a part of your normal routine. Even if you have automated backups set up and working perfectly, you must check them constantly. If you don't you will find yourself without a backup when you need it most! My advice is to try restoring files from your backup occasionally when you don't need it so you are ready and are sure you have good backups when you do need them.

Be careful when choosing backup mediums for longer range storage. There is nothing more frustrating then to need a backup, go to it and find that the file that you need cannot be retrieved because the media is corrupt! For critical data I usually make sure I have backups on several different media (perhaps tape and zip disk), and for the really important stuff I tend to rotate through half a dozen different medias. I mean, think about it, is the data for your entire company worth a few dollars for some hardware and media? Don't risk all of your years of hard work trying to save a few dollars on media.

Backup Disaster - A True Story
Not having a good backup can be a disaster of epic proportions. In one instance I've seen the lack of a backup turn a situation which was uncomfortable into a complete disaster.

I knew a guy who was working on an older Macintosh computer. Our entire company switched to PCs except for him, because he didn't have the time. The Macintosh was old and unbeknownst to anyone it had been outfitted with an old RAID drive (mirrored) from a manufacturer that no longer existed.

This guy believed he was doing backups every day. Someone showed him how to do it and he followed those instructions to the letter, even to the point of ignoring the error that it produced each and every time it ran. That was actually in the instructions.

One day his hard disk started making strange sounds so he called us. We tried to boot it up but no go. We asked him if he was doing backups and he handed us his zip disks, which were blank! He had been faithfully doing backups for over two years, and not one of them worked.

We had to send the disk out to a disk repair shop, and they managed to recover about 20% of the data at a cost of over $6,000! It took the poor guy almost six months with two temps to get all of the data hand-typed back into the computer!

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