Webonomics
Webonomics, by Evan I. Schwartz, is a practical, strategic tool for positioning and growing your business in the today's exploding World Wide Web economy. Schwartz addresses the unique problems and rewards businesses can expect to encounter when conducting business in cyberspace. He also dispels some of the most common misconceptions about doing business on the Web. More importantly, Schwartz targets the key to business success on the Web: understanding consumer behaviors and expectations. From scores of case studies, Schwartz has formulated nine guidelines for growing your business on the Web. Schwartz's analysis of these cases clearly explains why some businesses thrive and others fail miserably on the Web. To illustrate Schwartz's nine principles of Webonomics, this synopsis includes only a handful of his case studies. To apply his nine principles, Schwartz warns that we must first understand the motivations behind four main groups involved in the Web economy: The consumers, the content creators, the marketers, and the infrastructure companies (3). The consumers are in the driver's seat. They expect to make the Web a place of their own, a place of customized information and relationships. The con
To illustrate the importance of a quality experience, Schwartz contrasts two adult Web sites: Playboy and Bianca's Smut Shack. Given its well-known brand name, it is easy to understand how Playboy's site has as many as 100,000 visitors daily. In contrast, Smut Shack attracts only a quarter of the number of daily visitors experienced by Playboy's site. But numbers do not necessarily equate to success or quality! With all of these forces against marketers, how do they tell the world about their Web site? Schwartz states four main ways to promote a Web site. First, mention the Web site in newspapers, magazines, TV ads, brochures, mailings, and other promotional materials. This invites consumers who are already receiving your marketing message to interact further with your company. Second, try to get attention in the press. If you cannot catch the media's attention, hire a PR firm to spread the word. Third, you could trade hyperlinks with other sites on the Web. If someone from the other site really likes your Website, they may place your hyperlink on their site without asking for anything in return. The fourth, and most complicated, is purchasing banner advertising and hyperlinks on the most popular sites. In the early days of the Web, this was a popular means of advertising a Website, but is now considered only one of the many promotional tools available to marketers. Like a human salesperson, a marketer's web site must achieve results-by learning about a customer's preferences, providing service, retaining loyalty, and ultimately landing future sales (71). Principle 2: Marketers Shouldn't Be on the Web for Exposure, but for Results Web surfers base the quality of their experience on the total experience of visiting a Web site. The visitor to a site wants a place where he or she can identify and communicate with others who have similar interests. Schwartz refers to this as "community." The goal is to offer something that causes visitors to return repeatedly to your site; something that grabs and keeps their attention. Here are some of the reasons: The average Playboy visitor spends eight to ten minutes at the site, while the average Smut Shack visitor returns ten times per month and spends an average of an hour each time (25). However, it is unknown how many of Playboy's daily hits are repeat visitors because of information not disclosed by Playboy Enterprises. Essentially, Playboy's site has very few interactive features that allow visitor participation and the site is only updated an average of twice monthly. The Website, which allows visitors to view a few photos from its magazine, is mainly an advertisement for its print edition.
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Approximate Word count = 4822
Approximate Pages = 19 (250 words per page double spaced)
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