Riding the information superhighway: the Internet is great for retrieving information, but can it help businesses drum up clients and boost sales?

Black Enterprise, March, 1996 by Patrick Henry Bass

STEPHEN JACKSON'S FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH THE information superhighway is typical of most entrepreneurs'. It was five years ago, when he started Jackson & Jackson Management Plus Inc., a company that leased full-time employees to technical and professional firms (i.e., doctors, lawyers and accountants). Initially, Jackson and his staff used online services to send e-mail messages to each other.

In 1993, Jackson created an electronic library allowing clients to access information over the Net, which helped trim the fat off of paper, postage and fax costs. "So, at the time, the Internet was a way for me to save on overhead costs, not to make sales," says the 39-year-old Jackson.

Then Jackson caught the wave and started surfing the Net for business prospects. Last year, his $4.75 million firm started offering Internet training, marketing courses and Web page development. He shut down the employee leasing component of the firm to focus solely on doing business via the Net.

In the first eight months, over 800 people signed up for the courses. The training seminar ($129) essentially provides hands-on exercises in using the Internet, while the marketing course ($250) teaches participants how to sell their products or services effectively over the Net. In addition to having his own Web site, Jackson has created sites for some 11 small businesses looking to sell everything from T-shirts to newspapers online.

"Companies that conquer the Internet today, will be in a stronger position to capture the consumer market tomorrow," says Jackson.

But is the Information highway all it's cracked up to be, or is it mostly hype? In other words, are thousands of entrepreneurs hitching their wagons to a false star? It's too early to tell, but there are strong views on both sides.

"We're in a climate of fear," says Allen James, executive director of Harlem-based Playing to Win (ptwinc@iqc.apc. worg), a nonprofit organization that provides computer access information to inner-city youth and adults. James fears that the Internet may be raising false hopes, scaring people into thinking that if they're not on the Net, they'll be in trouble.

"The media has thrust the information superhighway on us, but we have yet to understand what the phenomenon is."

Even Jackson warns "the Internet isn't for everyone." He cautions that to do well online businesses must carefully research their markets. "If you weren't running your business adequately before you get on the Net, don't expect magic overnight once you are on it."

Jackson's site (http:/www.tnp.cm/~joker) consists of an overview of the company, registration information on the courses, past articles he has written for trade publications and a small business resource directory. In the first eight months, the Web site received more than 130,000 hits (the number of times it was accessed) and generated over $600,000 in revenues.

Many insiders retain their unbridled enthusiasm and discount warnings against being stampeded onto the Information Highway. They believe that African American businesses may miss out on a golden opportunity if they ignore the Net.

"The resistance [to using the Net] is the same that we heard when Ford developed the automobile," says Ollie Morgan, former president of the National Black Data Processing Associates (BDPA pc@aol.com), a national organization with nearly 3,000 members. "'How will it work?' 'What will it cost?' 'How can we trust it?' It's the horse-and-buggy mentality all over again."

Morgan and other boosters of the Net argue that as the number of online users increases, computing via the Internet no longer will be viewed as an exception but as the rule of doing business.

While others argue, Karen Pugh, owner of KP Studio in Brooklyn, NY, is in the process of finding out. And she is proceeding carefully. A former creative director for world-renowned designer Ralph Lauren, Pugh is looking to sell her fashion line over the Net.

By doing some old fashioned comparison shopping, Pugh found that it would be cheaper to produce a catalog of her designs on the World Wide Web instead of taking the more traditional print approach. Creative work, paper, postage, and other production expenses could cost upwards of $12,000 a page to produce a paper catalog, and that overhead, personnel and costs of material would have been almost five times that amount. In contrast, she could post a six-to-10 page catalog on the Net for about $500 a page (includes the cost to upgrade the page regularly).

Pugh is planning ahead to keep pace and possibly outrun the competition. Pugh, whose business plan now includes a section covering the cost and market analysis for a Web site, says she sees the Internet as a way to efficiently expand the business. "My market is primarily professional women who don't always have time to shop in big department stores," says Pugh who initially did custom fashion designs for individuals and consulting for small black-owned clothing stores, such as Spike's Joint, owned by film director Spike Lee.