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Determining the Reasons to be on the Web

The Web is proving to be an indispensable tool for global executives, as a pair of joint studies conducted by Survey.com for Forbes.com and GartnerG2 indicate. The September 2003 study points to the Web as the preferred medium, with 51 percent of executives naming it as the most important business information resource. 20 Reasons

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The report includes interviews with more than 2,800 respondents, including 1,721 presidents, CEOs, and board members; 236 vice presidents; and 154 other C-level executives, to determine their key issues. According to the responses, Web usage is taking a bite out of other types of media. Relative to the amount of time spent on the Web - not including e-mail - most of the survey participants noted that their time with newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, and trade publications has lessened.

1. Establish Your Presence
Approximately 750 million people worldwide have access to the World Wide Web. No matter what your business is, you can't ignore 750 million people. To be a part of that community and show that you are interested in serving them, you need to be on the WEB for them. You know your competitors will. Return to Top

2. To Network with Other Businesses
Business is all about connecting with people. It's not what you know, it's who you know. Passing out your business card is part of every good meeting and every business person can tell more than one story how a chance meeting turned into the big deal. The Internet allows you to pass out your business card to millions of customers and clients. Saying this is what I do and if you are ever in need of my services, this is how you can reach me. You can, 24 hours a day, inexpensively and simply, on the WEB. Return to Top

3. Provide Business Information 24/7
What is basic business information? Think of a Yellow Pages ad. What are your hours? What do you do? How can someone contact you? What methods of payment do you take? Where are you located at? Now think of a Yellow Pages ad where you have instant communication. What is today's special? Today's interest rate? Next week's release of information? If you could keep your customer and client informed of every reason why they should do business with you, don't you think you could do more business? You can on the WEB. Return to Top

4. Serve Your Customers and Clients
Making business information available is one of the most important ways to serve your customers. But if you look at serving the customer, you'll find even more ways to use WEB technology. How about making forms available to pre-qualify for loans, or have your staff do a search for that classic jazz record your customer is looking for, without tying up your staff on the phone to take down the information? Allow your customer to punch in requests against a database that tells him what he needs to know? All this can be done, simply and quickly, on the WEB. Return to Top

5. Boost Public Interest
You won't get Newsweek magazine to write up your local business opening, but you might get them to write up your Website address if it is something new and interesting. Even if Newsweek would write about your local business opening, you wouldn't benefit from someone in a distant city reading about it, unless of course, they were coming to your town sometime soon. With Web page information, anybody anywhere who can access the Web and hears about you is a potential visitor to your Web site and a potential customer for your information there. Return to Top

6. Release Time Sensitive Materials & Information
What if your materials need to be released no earlier than midnight? The quarterly earnings statement, the press kit for the much anticipated film, the merger news? Well, you sent out the materials to the press with "The-do-not-release-before-such-and-such-time" statement and hope for the best. Now the information can be made available at midnight or any time you specify, with all related materials such as photographs, bios, etc. released at exactly the same time. Imagine the anticipation of "All materials will be made available on our Web site at 12:01 AM". The scoop goes to those that wait for the information to be posted, not the one who releases your information early. Return to Top

7. Sell Products & Services
Many people think that this is the number 1 thing to do with the World Wide Web, but we made it number seven to make it clear that we think you should consider selling things on the Internet and the World Wide Web after you have done all the things above and maybe even after doing quite a few more things from this list. Why? Well, the answer is complex but the best way to put it is, do you consider the telephone the best place to sell things? Probably not. You probably consider the telephone a tool that allows you to communicate with your customer, which in turn helps you sell things. Well, that's how we think you should consider the WEB. The technology is different, of course, but before people decide to become customers, they want to know about you, what you do and what you can do for them. Which you can do easily and inexpensively on the WEB. Then you might be able to turn them into customers. Return to Top

8. Make available Flash Movies, Photographs, Sound and Video files
What if your widget is great, but people would really love it if they could see it in action? The CD is great but with no airplay, nobody knows that it sounds great? A picture is worth a thousand words, but you don't have the space for a thousand words? The WEB allows you to add sound, pictures and video/movie files to your company's info if that will serve your potential customers. No brochure will do that. Return to Top

9. Reach a Highly Desirable Demographic Markets
The demographic of the WEB user is probably the highest mass-market demographic available. Mostly college-educated or enrolled in college, making a high salary or soon to make a high salary, it's no wonder that Wired magazine, the magazine of choice to the Internet community, has no problem getting Lexus and other high-end marketers advertising. Even with the addition of the commercial on-line community, the demographic will remain high for many years to come. Return to Top

10. Answer Frequently Asked Questions
Whoever answers the phones in your organization can tell you, their time is usually spent answering the same questions over and over again. These are the questions customers and potential customers want to know the answer to before they deal with you. Post them on a WEB page and you will have removed another barrier to doing business with you and freed up some time for that harried phone operator. Update as often as necessary. Return to Top

11. Stay In Contact With Associates
Your employees on the road may need up-to-the-minute information that will help them make the sale or pull together the deal. If you know what that information is, you can keep it posted in complete privacy on the on your password directory. A quick local phone call can keep your staff supplied with the most detailed information, without long distance phone bills and tying up the staff at the home office. Return to Top

12. Open New International Markets
You may not be able to make sense of the mail, phone and regulation systems in all your potential international markets, but with a Website, you can open up a dialogue with international markets as easily as with the company across the street. As a matter-of-fact, before you go onto the Web, you should decide how you want to handle the international business that will come your way, because your postings are certain to bring international opportunities your way, whether it is part of your plan or not. Another added benefit; if your company has offices overseas, they can access the home offices information for the price of a local phone call. Return to Top

13. Provide a 24 Hour Service
If you've ever remembered too late or too early to call the opposite coast, you know the hassle. We're not all on the same schedule. Business is worldwide but your office hours aren't. Trying to reach Asia or Europe is even more frustrating. But Web pages serve the client, customer and partner 24 hours a day, seven days a week. No overtime either. It can customize information to match needs and collect important information that will put you ahead of the competition, even before they get into the office. Return to Top

14. Make Changing Information Available Quickly
Sometimes, information changes before it gets off the press. Now you have a pile of expensive, worthless paper. Electronic publishing changes with your needs. No paper, no ink, no printers bill. You can even attach your Web page to a database which customizes the page's output to a database you can change as many times in a day as you need. No printed piece can match that flexibility. Return to Top

15. Receive Feedback From Customers & Clients
You pass out the brochure, the catalog, the booklet. But it doesn't work. No sales, no calls, no leads. What went wrong? Wrong color, wrong price, and wrong market? Keep testing, the marketing books say, and you'll eventually find out what went wrong. That's great for the big boys with deep pockets, but who is paying the bills? You are and you don't have the time nor the money to wait for the answer. With a Web page, you can ask for feedback and get it instantaneously with no extra cost. An instant e-mail response can be built into Web pages and can get the answer while it's fresh in your customers mind, without the cost and lack of response of business reply mail. Return to Top

16. Test Market New Services and Products
Tied into the reason above, we all know the cost of rolling out a new product. Advertising, advertising, advertising, PR and advertising. Expensive, expensive, expensive. Once you have been on the Web and know what to expect from those who are seeing your page, they are the least expensive market for you to reach. They will also let you know what they think of your product faster, easier and much less expensively than any other market you may reach. For the cost of a page or two of Web programming, you can have a crystal ball into where to position your product or service in the marketplace. Amazing. Return to Top

17. Reach The Media
Every kind of business needs the exposure that the media can bring, as we touched on in reason #5 "Boost Public Interest", but what if your business is reaching the media, as a news wire, a publicist or a public policy group. The media is the most wired profession today, since their main product is information and they can get it more quickly, cheaply and easily on-line. On-line press kits are becoming more and more common, since they work with the digital environment of more and more pressrooms. Digital images can be put in place without the stripping and shooting of the old pressrooms and digital text can be edited and outputted on tight deadlines. All these can be made available on a Web page. Return to Top

18. Reach The Education and Youth Market
If your market is education, consider that most universities already offer Internet access to their students and most K-12's will be on the Internet within the next few years. Books, athletic shoes, study courses, youth fashion and anything else that would want to reach these overlapping markets needs to be on the Web. Even with the coming of the commercial on-line services and their somewhat older populations there will be nothing but growth in the percentage of the under 25 market that will be on-line. Return to Top

19. Reach the Specialized Markets
Sell special services, art, and a unique device? You may think that the Web is not a good place to be. Well, think again. The Web isn't just computer science students anymore. With the 700 million and growing users of the WEB, even the most narrowly defined interest group will be represented in large numbers. Since the Web has several very good search programs, Google, Yahoo, your interest group will be able to find you, or your competitors. Return to Top

20. Serve Your Local Market
We've talked about the power to serve the world with a Web page. How about your city? If you are located in San Francisco Bay Area, the Los Angeles area, Orange County or New York, there is probably enough local customers with Web access to make it worth your while to consider Web marketing. A local Beverly Hills, CA wine shop even takes special same-day orders through the Web! But no matter where you are, the big client has Web access, and so should you.

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Reason for business Web and web design
Reason for business Web and web design
Reason for business Web and web design
Reason for business Web and web design
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