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

The 35-year-old entrepreneur believes that in the ultra-competitive fashion business she must do something to stand out from her fellow designers. SO, instead of draping her clothes on stick-figured models and have them sashay down a runway next fall, Pugh's designs will be coasting down the information superhighway--to an audience some claim to be as big as the population of Rhode Island.

Among the advantages Pugh hopes for from being online is access to a global market. "On the Net, companies can offer services or products around the world," says Roosevelt Roby, president of the Santa Monica, Calif.-based World Business Exchange, which he has dubbed "WBE-NET" (http://www.wbenet. com). The service is an online bulletin board on which small businesses can post their products and services for an annual fee of $450. "An automobile parts store in Ohio can sell its products globally, shipping them via UPS and Fed Ex," says Roby.

As important, the Internet gives entrepreneurs equal opportunity in reaching wider markets. On the World Wide Web, the playing field is level. A small African American company can create a site that is as deep and meaningful as that of a Fortune 500 firm. "What's great about the Internet is that no one owns it. It's there for the taking," says Jackson.

But unlike traditional media, such as newspapers, magazines and television, there is no reliable way to know how many people a Web site reaches. Everything is guesswork.

The figures that exist are often produced by people who have a vested interest in hyping the market. Even numbers released by the respected Nielsen Media Research, a unit of Dun & Bradstreet, are being questioned by some: Nielsen's latest data show that more than 24 million affluent adults in the U.S. and Canada have access to the Internet. Of those, 2.4 million purchased goods and services through the Net in 1994, Nielsen says. But those figures have been challenged by Vanderbilt University professor Donna L. Hoffman, who estimates that there are only about 10 million Internet users.

Clearly, not everyone is hooked into the Internet. According to a 1993 Census Bureau study of 55,000 households, 37.5% of whites were using computers at home, work or libraries compared with 25% for African Americans. But just as clearly, use of the Internet will increase. How it will be used and by whom--and how anyone will make money on it--remain open questions.

A Vanderbilt University report in 1994 indicated that about 22% of all companies on the Internet earned profits or broke even. Although online shopping revenue doubled to $500 million in 1995, that figure accounts for less than 1% of total retail sales, according to Jupiter Communications, a New York-based research firm. The problem, however, is that inquiries about products or services tend to be counted as sales.

Even without hard statistics many will want to take the plunge into doing business on the Internet. The question remains: How do I make any money? Some are using the Internet primarily as a means of direct selling. Others hope to make money by offering the equivalent of advertising space on their Web sites. Some want to use it merely to create an image, while still others are conducting surveys or seeking consumer input.