Though web success stories still occur today, the www market has settled down compared to 10 years ago when it seemed like any web idea was a lottery ticket to financial freedom.   After the bubble popped, the market crashed then stabilized. Technologies got more sophisticated and the web development industry matured, so building a proper site became more expensive.

The result? There is a lot more competition than in the past. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for new ideas, there is just less vacancy than there used to be.   With more competition out there, there is more of a chance to get eaten by the big fish of the sea.  That’s why, after all of the time and effort it takes to build a quality website, a lot of e-business ideas can go bust.

So this means that developing an e-business today is pretty much the same as developing a conventional business in terms of time, money, and effort. You need to build it up orgranically, over time, with a real clientel base.

Avoid the abstract

While dealing with the abstract will get you far as an artist, it can be disasterous in the practical world of business. One of the most common mistakes of websites that flop is that they do not have a concrete target market.   They are not talking to real people. Their owners simply had this great global idea, thought they would put it online, and that as soon as the site was launched, the entire web community would flock to check it out.  Well guess what? They open the doors and nobody comes? Why? Not because they have a bad idea necessarily, but because nobody knows it’s there.

On the other hand, a local community centre may post a new section on their site with half the graphics and no cool multimedia, but that section alone may get quadruple the traffic. Success! And it’s because the community centre is addressing real people who already know the organization.

This holds true even with blogs. If you have a blog, don’t blindly post articles based on the possibility that passers-by may read, maybe they will. But if you want sustainability, you need to talk to real people; you need to build a community.

Leave the abstract for art critics of the Louvre.

Word of Mouth

After all the technology and means of advertising options at our disposal today, word of mouth is still hands down the best marketing tool. But how does word of mouth translate to the internet?

The answers is blogs, forums, email, and recommendations by satisfied customers via these internet means.

Join a blog or a forum community and discuss the matters related to your area of business. Make e-buddies and refer to content on your site here and there (in a non-soliciting manner) to prove the point of your arguments.

With word of mouth comes respect for you as a person and your e-business. You end up building community roots. And you’re not just a faceless company, but a person who has something to say with a reputable opinion.

When you build your site organically, it’s not a quick ticket to the top, but it will make your e-business sustainable, and this will pay off over time.  It’s kind of like an investment in real estate or an RRSP.