Looking back, it's interesting to see how business on the Internet has changed. Back in 1992, the official company line was "what's a web?". A year later, this reaction had evolved to a polite "well, no one uses the 'web' to buy products". And about two years after that, there was a sudden, insatiable demand for website designers -- a sort of backdraft before the explosion, as some of us who were getting sucked in began to realise. Bang! The Internet gold rush was on, and almost overnight our quiet network was transformed into a teaming marketplace of entrepreneurs and seasoned corporations, each hungry for a piece of the digital pie. Corporate influx was so intense, the state of the entire Internet seemed to shift every month.

In 1997, the dust began to settle -- and I wasn't sure I liked what I saw. On one hand, the Internet was now enormous, and brimming with multimedia marvels that just hadn't been possible before big business took a big interest. Still, some of the expansion was rather forced -- instead of adapting themselves to fit the Internet, big companies simply hurled several thousand dollars at it each day until they began to get reasonable sales. Since big businesses tend to rumble when they do things, the small businesses took notice, and many of them adopted the same strategy: they treated the web like it was interactive television. While this made sense at the time, their site designers forgot to mention that it was similar to treating TV like "a radio with pictures" -- completely wrong!

We can't really blame the designers, it's hard to think properly when someone's throwing large amounts of money directly at you. But the web was something entirely new, and the tactics of many companies... weren't. If you came across a plethora of individual business crammed into tiny stalls, each loudly hawking their wares -- would you call it "a new paradigm of digital commerce" or "an open market bazaar"? Then, as now, a business' typical reaction to the cacophony was to "yell" louder, vying for attention with massive graphics, flashing banners, and other gimmickry. The online result was (as I noted worriedly on my '97 homepage) virtual chaos.

Let me clarify my own position: I adore Internet commerce. These days, I rarely make a "big ticket" purchase without researching the product on the web, a process that invariably leads to detailed reviews, high & low price quotes, and comments from regular Joes who actually own that product. It's a wonder, and like I said last week, it's a tremendous resource to people in a community like Powell River... it opens doors that simply didn't exist before.

As more and more local businesses take their first steps online, this doorway is moving traffic both ways: we can buy things that aren't available here (I shop locally, but not for Japanese gadgets), and we can sell things that have an enormous outside appeal. West Coast products are hot items on the other side of this fair earth, and Europeans need just one glance at the unspoiled forests all around our town... one glance and they're on their way. This may sound like an exaggeration, but for some people it's certainly true... statistics do not lie, they just present the truth in ways that makes us stop and think. Or in my case, write articles.

Many people have asked me how to promote products on the web. The big business response is to take traditional marketing knowledge and add word "online" wherever it fits: "you should take out a bunch of online advertising, and make sure your product is mentioned in online reviews". Now really, that's sort of silly. I prefer my answer, all two words of it: Be there. Your customer will search the web using one of 400 'search engines' -- be in all of them. He will come to your site with questions -- give him answers, not flashy banner things. He will come secretly wishing for quick access, beautiful graphics, and a way to contact you -- all within the first minute. Internet surfers have the attention span of a stressed-out gnat, so they're not going to hang around long. Be there completely. Okay, three words. Still, you have to admit it's a simple premise -- and it doesn't require web-based advertising.

There's a bunch of other secrets involved in making a killer website, but if I gave them all away, people might stop throwing money at me. That would be unfortunate. My primary point is simply this: as the businesses of Powell River get themselves online one after another, they should consider what advantages are inherently theirs, right out of the box. Our town is not large, our waters are not toxic, our way of life isn't all that hectic. By transposing just a bit of that feeling onto your website, you can compete with -- and completely thwart -- corporate sites built in some anonymous Chicago office block. No matter how many dollars are thrown, consumers will always gravitate towards the places they feel most comfortable with. That "comfort zone" is not a sales floor, a virtual strip-mall, or an automated warehouse, no: the way I see it, that place is a lot like here.