3 Secrets to "Striking it Rich" in Cyberspace

In the few seconds it takes you to read this another domainname gets registered at www.NetworkSolutions.com, theInternet's oldest and largest domain name registrar.Everyone from industrial giants to corner flower shopscurrently wants to stake a profitable claim in cyberspace.The lure of low startup costs compared to brick-and-mortaroperations and the promise of high rewards draws an ever-swelling crowd of merchants to the online marketplace.Yet despite the optimism statistics tell us that 80% ofthese "e" businesses will fail within their first 12 monthsof operation.People from all over the country ask me what it takes tosucceed in the e-commerce world once they've completed thebasic steps for getting online.The following three keys virtually *guarantee success* forany online enterprise.The First Key:A Quality product or service with highly evident and readilyunderstood benefits for consumers.If your product or service does not represent the highestquality and value possible, and if consumers don'tunderstand exactly why they should buy from you, the speedof the Internet will just expose your shortcomings to themarketplace that much quicker.In the offline world a product's benefits, not the features,cause consumers to make buying decisions.A man doesn't buy a car with a 5 liter engine because of thehorsepower, he buys it for the feeling of supremacy andcontrol he thinks it will give him.Kids don't want a 1000mHz computer for computing power indoing homework, they want to play the latest games.The Internet magnifies this "what's in it for me" benefits-driven evaluation by consumers.Products or services presented with readily understood,self-serving benefits for consumers sell best online (andoff).The Second Key:An excellent website that loads fast, provides pertinentinformation to targeted consumers, and allows them to makeonline purchases quickly and securely.Your website should: · Load fast by making conservative useof graphics. (Go to yahoo.com for an excellent example.)· Provide exactly the information your potential customerswant and need.· Make it extremely easy for surfers to navigate your siteand find exactly what they want.· Look good on both the Netscape and Internet Explorer webbrowsers at various screen resolutions (640x480, 800x600,etc.).The Third Key:Consistent, targeted website traffic by consumers capable ofbuying your product or service.Imagine buying a 50 foot billboard and, instead of puttingit out by the highway, you hid it in your basement.Nobody would see it!The same thing happens if you don't actively andcontinuously promote your website to attract visitors.With its incredible speed and communications power, theInternet acts as a magnifying glass for any organization'sstrengths and weaknesses. E-commerce, e-mail, and a websitewon't do the job of marketing, selling, and customer servicefor any company.They will, however, help every organization perform all ofthose business functions better, faster, and lessexpensively with the real and tangible result of "strikingit rich" in cyberspace!