Success Strategies for the Internet

"give me a place to stand and a lever long enough
and I will move the world" - Archimedes

Table of Contents

Overview of this Manual

CHAPTER 1   -  Understanding the Internet

1.1 The Internet: The Media for the Millennia

1.2 Demographics of the Internet

1.2.1 The Average Internet User

1.2.2 The Top Internet/intranet trends of 1996.

1.3 How to Advertise on the Internet

1.3.1 A Public Relations Example

1.3.2 Find A Place To Stand

CHAPTER 2   -   How to Get The Word Out

2.0 Publicizing You Web Site

2.1. USENET Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

CHAPTER 3

Seven Steps To avoid Being Fleeced During the Internet Gold Rush

  1. How to use the Internet to become a knowledgeable buyer.
  2. Planning your Success Strategy for the Internet
  3. What does all this Techno-Babble really mean?
  4. How can you calculate a Return on Investment with the Internet
  5. Learn From Others. The Mistakes to avoid on the Internet.
  6. Six case studies of successful Internet strategies
  7. Once you have them how do you get them to keep coming back
We are currently collecting information for this Chapter. We would greatly appreciate your input.

If you have a success story you would like to share please send it to Tell us a success story from the Internet

If you have a horror story to relate please send it to Tell us a horror story from the Internet.

Overview - The mission of this document

The goal of this manual is twofold:

  1. Provide you with important information about creating a presence on the Internet while also demonstrating the capabilities of Hyperlinked documents.

    This document contains Hyperlinks to information locations off this site such as the Nielsen Internet survey - certainly more satisfying than a dry footnote.

    It contains FTP links to demonstrate how your site could be used to download large files automatically.

    It contains action hyperlinks which will invoke "mailto:" which in turn will demonstrate our mailbot capabilities.

    It contains a variety of Navigational hyperlinks to allow you to move around the manual within a chapter and from one chapter to another.

  2. It is also designed to be an ongoing useful tool for enhancing your Internet Presence.

    For instance Chapter 2 discusses how to publicize your Internet Presence both on the Internet and off of the Internet. The Internet is chaotic. Imagine that you have just entered the Library of Congress (BTW a good site) after it has been ravaged by Attila The Hun!

    Attila and his band of cutthroats have not removed a single piece of paper. All of the information is still there but it is completely unorganized. The computers are not functioning, the good old "Card Catalog" is strewn about and useless. Knowledge of the Dewey Decimal System is of no help to you. You Need a Guide!

    Chapter 2 will not only tell you about the various guides (Search Engines) but we will show you how to register your WWW pages and other Internet Presences with them. It also contains direct links to the appropriate pages for registration.

CHAPTER 1 - Understanding the Internet

1.1 The Internet: The Media for the Millennia

To say that the Internet has become a "hot" topic is like saying the Grand Canyon is a hole in the ground. Today the phrase "Internet" is in every newspaper and magazine. Why we even see it referenced daily in Comic Strips, and TV shows. Virtually every newscast you hear is relating something pertinent to "The Information Super Highway".

In the years to come, it will revolutionize commerce. What the steam engine was to the Industrial Revolution, what the airplane was to transportation, what the computer chip was to the Information Revolution, the Internet will be to commerce in the years ahead.

Business Week claimed that the Internet "will become one of the busiest business districts the world has ever known."

The Internet, once the haven of academics and computer professionals, is now used by many diverse groups. The number of Internet users has suddenly, this year, reached a critical mass. The number of users has grown to over 30 million and businesses are now just tapping its potential. The Information Superhighway has become part of everyone's vocabulary. Everyone has been sold on the excitement of the Internet - and most don't have any idea of what it truly is.

The Internet is an inexpensive way for you to communicate ideas and information to other businesses and to your customers . Conventional media such as print, radio, and television are expensive methods of delivering knowledge and information. For small businesses advertising on a continual basis nationally is simply out of reach. The audience a small business can reach has been limited by its advertising budget and the company's geographic reach. Now it is feasible and practical for a small business to advertise nationally or even globally. The Internet provides this inexpensive means of communication for businesses or anyone who has a personal computer and some basic skills.

The Internet is " The New Media. " It's important to learn how it works, and understand its potential for your business. Business people approach advertising in the local newspaper differently from advertising on radio and differently again on TV. Each medium has its own idiosyncrasies. You wouldn't run the sound track of a TV commercial as a radio spot, nor would you show people recording a radio commercial as a television commercial. Yet far too many companies wind up with Internet presences that are merely echoes of their printed brochures. Then they wonder why the results are mediocre. Perhaps the results match the creativity used in creating their Internet Presence!

1.2 Demographics of the Internet


According to a recent Nielsen Internet Survey about 24 million people in the US used the Internet in the 3 month period from 6/95 to 8/95. The Internet is growing by leaps and bounds. In January, 1988, Internet traffic consisted of 85 million packets. In December, 1994, Internet traffic had grown to more than 86 billion packets -- an increase of 1000 percent in 7 years. For the first time ever, in 1995, more email messages were delivered in the US than regular postal messages - ten billion more!

On December 31, 1994 there where 29,000 commercial organizations on the Internet in the US. By January 5th 1996 the number had grown to over 170,000! A year to year increase of over 586%! On 4/12/96 the number of commercial organizations had grown to 276,400 an increase of 61.7% in three months! Some conservative estimates place over 1,000,000 businesses on the Internet by the year 2000, Goldman-Sachs estimates the Internet market will grow tenfold from 1994 to 1998.

According to a report(4/29/96) by Jupiter Communications, a media research group, the number of American homes online will more than triple to 35.2 million by the year 2000, or a third of households in the United States.

The company's 1996 Consumer Online Services Report,estimates that industry revenues, which totaled $2.2 billion in 1995, are expected to reach $14.2 billion by the year 2000.

According to the         4th GVU Internet Usage Study from Georgia Institute of Technology taken between Oct. 10th, 1995 and Nov. 10, 1995:

  • Average age of US Internet users is 33.2
  • 32.5% of US users are women up from 5%% in 1994
  • Internet users are an educated group, 55% have a college degree or better.
  • 44.2% of US users are married.
  • Average median US user income is $64.700
  • 46% of US users are between the ages of 31-55 - the prime buying years

The Internet Business Center made the following data available collected from the 10th Annual Software Publishing Association Conference

  • 33 percent of U.S. households currently have PCs.
  • It is estimated that 60 percent of U.S. households will have PCs by 1998.
  • 12 percent of households have modems.
  • 6 percent of households subscribe to online Internet service.
  • 20 percent of online subscribers use more than one online service.
  • The Internet is growing between 6 and 10 percent per month.
  • There are more than 4.8 million servers.
  • There are an estimated 30 million Internet users.
  • There are Internet sites in 137 countries.
  • The cost of subscribing to the Internet is declining.
  • Many major businesses (226 of the 490 largest companies) already have a presence on the Internet.
  • 39 percent of all communication companies are already on the Internet.
  • 24 percent of information technology firms are already on the Internet.
  • The start up cost for a WWW service can be less than $20,000. (Ed. Note - Many Web Site designers will give you an excellent site for under $10,000.00)
  • WWW traffic increased 1800 percent last year.
  • Sprint Internet traffic increased 700 percent last year and they expect at least 800 percent increase this year.

Top Internet/Intranet Trends of 1996

According to the industry- acclaimed Network World 500 Internet study of the top 500 Internet/intranet using companies released April 3, 1996,:

  1. 89% have or will implement an intranet strategy for their company in the next 12 months

  2. 85% have Web servers in their organizations for Internet applications; 73% for intranet

  3. 28% use Internet/intranet applications for making transactions (electronic commerce) with customers, while 48% plan to in the next 12 months

  4. 69% have remote access to the LAN (local area network) for over 200 employees

  5. 88% said public network carriers, such as long-distance and local carriers, will become more important to their enterprise network strategy as the carriers provide new services

  6. 83% use the Internet for communications -- email and file sharing

  7. 78% use the Internet for research -- accessing electronic information

(Source: 1996 Network World 500 study)

"The Network World 500 study clearly indicates that the Internet/intranets will revolutionize our lives. It will be driven as businesses integrate Internet technologies into their corporate networks. As networking enters the cyber age it will create new electronic commerce opportunities on the Internet, increasing general acceptance and demand," said Colin Ungaro, Network World's President and CEO.

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Last Modified September 28, 1998