June 1997 Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Electronic Commerce and More

Those were just some of the questions posed during a seminar held at the 1997 Spring Decision Makers Conference in Atlanta. The two-day event, designed to teach better negotiating skills, financial solutions and effective uses of the Internet, was sponsored by the Committee for Certified Public Accountants.


Benefits of Having a Website
Larry Street, Tom Thirkell and Brian Ekberg spoke about doing business on the Internet and the future of this new medium.

Street is an attorney/partner with Morris, Manning and Martin, an Atlanta-based law firm. A computer lawyer representing many Internet companies, Street's firm was among the first in Atlanta to have a website.

Despite the success the law firm has had with its site, the decision to create one was not made overnight. Street said he had several questions in mind before the page was constructed.

"We thought, 'Should we spend the money that some people spend? Is it worth it from a business point of view?" Street said, adding that he eventually came up with three reasons why his firm should have a web page.

• Source of information. Street said he wanted potential clients to be able to contact the firm.
• Capabilities. In addition to creating corporate exposure, having a web page can portray a company's ability and experience with technology.
• Contact. Street wanted to be in the position of contacting visitors and potential clients constantly.

Once the webpage was up and running, Street found there were several issues facing the world of electronic commerce. They included: how to pay for items, security and how to contract.

"Security has been solved from a technical point of view for sometime with encryption," Street said, adding that while it has helped security, encryption is not a fool-proof method mainly because it is not universally accepted.

"How to pay is still a problem," he said. With no universal standard, customers still have several choices including e-cash and credit cards.


"Working" your Website
Customers are the focal point of Thomas Thirkell's web page. For more than two years, his company, Value Music Concepts, has operated Music For a Song, an electronic music store which offers music from Elton John to Led Zeppelin. His approach in operating the site has been purely from a retail Led Zeppelin. His approach in operating the site has been purely from a retail point of view.

"As a retailer, we needed to say, 'What can we add?'" he said. "One of the things we did when we went online was ask ourselves, 'What do we do well?'"

With this in mind, he offered tips to maintaining a successful web page.

1. Have someone on staff whose sole responsibility is responding to e-mail.
2. Be prepared to receive both positive and negative comments about your products and your site.
3. Keep your web page fresh, and keep it working.
4. Work together.

"The Internet has become very cooperative primarily in terms of linking to one another," Thirkell said. "If you want to be successful, then you've got to play that game.


The future of Electronic Commerce
Brian Ekberg is the associate editor of i. TechSouth and Consumer Technology magazines, produced by Jaye Communications Inc.

Ekberg said he believes that while the current status of electronic commerce is strong, the future cannot be predicted.

"For the most part, nobody knows for sure what will happen in the next five years with Internet commerce," he said. "What can be positively stated about Web and electronic commerce is that there is no proven business model, no cookie-cutter Holy Grail that a business can follow step-by-step in order to guarantee success."

Without blue prints or an across-the-board owner's manual to electronic commerce, it's difficult to estimate how much companies can expect to earn doing business over the Internet. And these estimates, said Ekberg, may seem like a lot but relatively speaking aren't that promising.

So, how does a company succeed on the web? According to Ekberg, Amazon.com, an online bookstore, is one example of a company whose online service consists of the best of both worlds.

"Amazon.com seems to be the model by which all electronic commerce retail is measured," he said. "It's a good example of a company that not only has an attractive interface, its site is easy to get around and they have excellent service." Ekberg advises companies to avoid the traditional "bells and whistles" of many sites, and instead offer competitive prices.