Business and the Internet:
Putting the World In Touch with Your Business.

Introduction: Getting Beyond the Hype

It's hard to pick up a magazine or stop by the water cooler without hearing about the Internet - and for good reason. Even after you filter out the hype, clearly the Internet is a genuine phenomenon. It's certainly one of the fastest growing places on the planet. More than 30 million people count themselves as Internet users, and that number has been doubling each year since the late 1980s. From sales and marketing to customer service and research, millions of businesses and their customers are coming to rely on the Internet as a critical communications pathway. Everyone from the HBO to the corner flower shop, it seems, has a home page on the World Wide Web.

What are the Internet and the World Wide Web, and what can they do for your business? How can the people at Digital Interactive Research help you launch your business onto the Internet?

A World-Wide Business Highway

Like the interstate highway system in the U.S., the Internet started out as a military project that outgrew its Cold War roots to become a cornerstone of business and commerce. Where the highway system was originally designed to transport tanks and weapons, the Internet was intended to provide a bomb-proof communications network. Reliability was paramount, so if one communications pathway from Los Angeles to Washington was blocked, for example, a message would simply travel an alternate route.

The Internet today is a mature technology that continues to provide reliable data communications. Highly decentralized, the Internet is not a single business entity, but a collection of more than 50,000 interconnected federal, regional, local and international computer networks.

Two events helped transform the Internet into a world-wide business highway: the development of the World Wide Web in 1991, and the introduction of graphical web browsers like the one you are using now, two years later.

The World Wide Web, sometimes referred to as the WWW, is an area of the Internet where documents and files are connected via hypertext links, and documents can include sound, graphics and video as well as text. Graphical browsers make it possible to navigate through these linked documents by clicking on a highlighted word or phrase. Together, these two developments allow even people who are new at using a computer to find their way to a wide range of information resources on the Internet.

The ready access to web information has encouraged more and more businesses, organizations and agencies to become information providers. At the same time, having more data online encourages more people to turn to the Internet when they need information. As a result of this spiral, the Internet has experienced exponential growth. According to Matrix Information and Directory Services (MIDS), there were 6.7 million host computers on the Internet in July 1995 - up from 4.8 million just six months earlier. In a November 1994 survey by MIDS and Texas Internet Consulting it was found that 7.8 million people are equipped to provide information services on the web, 13.5 million can access this information, and 27.5 can use the net for electronic mail and file transfers.

Doing Business on the Internet

The Internet and the World Wide Web offer a relatively inexpensive way to electronically connect your business to business partners, suppliers and customers around the world. Large and small, businesses are flocking to the Internet because it delivers cost-effective new avenues for marketing, sales, service and support, communications and research.

• Marketing. Setting up a web site allows your business to run an information server that reaches a global audience 24 hours a day and can be quickly and easily updated. Along with offering background on your company and its products, you can post news releases, describe customer successes, run contests, set up games - anything that projects the image you want and entices customers to return to your site frequently. With a minimal investment, a small or home-based business can look like a large one, with a corporate presence that's every bit as sophisticated as that of a Fortune 100 company.
  
• Sales. Customers can order electronically from your web site, and emerging standards for secure online credit transactions are making electronic commerce (e-commerce) easier.
• Service and support. World Wide Web support will not replace your telephone hot-line, but it can reduce the number of calls and increase the level of customer satisfaction. Your web site might include items such as product tips, troubleshooting information, answers to the most often asked hotline questions and an e-mail drop box where customers can offer feedback or request information or a call back.
• Communications. In addition to projecting your messages outward, the Internet offers a low-cost way to get information back from your customers. From your web site, you can provide online fill-out forms or invite visitors to leave you an e-mail message. Data can be routed automatically to an analysis program, providing a valuable source of customer information.
• Research. Web search engines make it fast and easy to track down up-do-date information, from a search for grant information to ordering pizza! Of course, you are also free to visit your competitors' web sites.

In short, as Forrester Research, Inc., puts it:

"The net eliminates business friction. Obstacles between company and customer are blasted out of the buying process. Faxes, phone calls, mailed brochures, paper order forms, and visits from salespeople are replaced by instant access to web pages. Business is no longer restricted by time zones, business hours, geography, or location. This frictionless state will: 1) create new marketing channels, 2) expand customer service, and 3) increase sales."

Can Your Company Profit from a Web Site?

The answer is likely to be yes if your company meets one or more of the following conditions:

• You advertise your products
• You provide a service
• You sell via catalogs or direct marketing
• You sell or would like to sell worldwide
• You need to provide 24 hour a day service or support
• You support customers nationwide or worldwide
• You benefit from customer feedback
• You manage a number of suppliers

Where Do I Start?

Establishing a presence on the Internet is a relatively straightforward process. The first step is to plan the information content of your web site - a task that should involve input from the marketing, sales and customer support functions of your company. Once you have planned the content of your web site, DIR can host your Web site on our Internet Web Server.

Our staff also includes commercial artists and Web page authors that can consult with you to help you plan your web site and develop eye-catching content if you do not want to handle it in-house.

What Will It Cost?

Our standard monthly rate for basic service is $49.95 per month. Please visit our Services page for detailed pricing information or use our Online Information Request form for additional information.

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