By Curtis Pierce, CEO of Kurant Corporation
[March 7th, 2001]

See Also   Why You Need an Add URL Page   A Tale Of Two Sites   Don't Duplicate...Differentiate!   The Continuing Battle Against Online Fraud   Taking Care of the Pennies   How To Recession-Proof Your Business   Your Fulfillment Choices   The Silent Thief - How to Get Rid of TopText   A Checklist for Accepting Credit Cards Online   Five Questions That Will Help YOU Succeed Online   Back To "E" Basics   Beyond SET: Enhanced Security for Online Transactions   Just How Serious is Online Fraud?   Your Direct Channel to Customer Service   Online Customer Service: Best (and Worst) Practices   How to Survive the Dot.Com Shakeout   Step-by-Step to Your Own Profitable Web Business   Where Do Average People Find Business Success?   What's REALLY Required To Start An Online Home Business?   CRM in SmallBiz: Disappointing Misconceptions

The epitaph on last year's collective, high profile e-business failures might well read:

Big surprise.

The problem, however, wasn't in the technologies employed or the markets targeted. The problem was in the fact that just about every e-business start-up seemed to expect that a mature industry would develop the moment their product launch press release crossed the “wire.”

The reality is that virtually every successful large enterprise in every significant industry, ranging from automobiles to aircraft and from banking to baseball, all started as small businesses. If we take the time to study what went wrong with so many e-businesses - both B2C and B2B - last year's big e-business fiascos just may pave the way for small e-business opportunities this year like never before.

I predict that 2001 will become the year of true small e-business legitimacy. My forecast is based on the confluence of four fundamental Internet tenets:

1. Throw a long shadow - Forget the concept of Davids and Goliaths. On the Internet there are no big guys and no little guys. The key to small e-business success is in appearing to be on the same footing, with the same e-business capabilities, as anyone else out there. Around the world, ISPs focusing on small business customers are offering the tools today for a small business to set-up e-commerce storefronts for less than the cost of a Razor scooter. This includes access to must-have e-commerce applications such as instant on-line store-creation, secure transaction processing, inventory and supply management, and on-line sales lead tracking.

2. Run From Mass Mediocrity - A handful of large e-players can (maybe) make money by distributing books, dog food or consumer electronics. Trust me, you're not one of them. The success of new e-businesses will come only from identifying a niche that you can serve better than the average aggregator whose only benefit is to deliver the lowest possible price. I am a huge believer that e-commerce offers significant business opportunities in almost every segment of our economy. E-business history, short though it may be, has proven that most enterprises attempting to corner a commodity market will fail.

3. Stay Lean and Mean - Do not spend large amounts of money on e-business systems, software or services. If you're a small e-business that's bought into the “I've got to spend a million to make a million” concept you're already doomed. The big-ticket, IT-lineaged companies like Oracle, IBM, and SAP, and even some of the newer, well-regarded e-commerce infrastructure players like iPlanet and BroadVision, may be the right choice for Bank of America or General Electric, that doesn't make them right for you. My advice is that every small business entrepreneur should think of these solutions like die-hard Superbowl fans think of the halftime show - avoid it. If we learned anything last year it's that, eventually, every business has to make a profit.

4. Customer is King - If you're a small business looking to become a real e-business player then you've probably already taken care of the items that you think are most critical to your success: identifying your Web host and designing your Web site. Truth is, if you haven't thought about customer service, then don't expect to be in business for very long. Nowhere is customer service more important than on the Web. In fact, on the Web there's even more opportunity to screw up. Ignore your customer and you're left wondering why the saying “If you build it, they will come,” didn't apply to you. If you're going to build it, then build it right, with customer-centric features like 1:1 marketing, customer recognition, order tracking, and returns.

Learn from the past. Remember that history is always written by the winners.

Curtis Pierce is co-founder and CEO of Kurant Corporation, providers of ISP-based e-commerce solutions for small businesses. Curtis can be reached at curtis@kurant.com.