Fly on the E-Commerce Cyberwall

The Internet is not your business
I recently picked up the last interview that Internet marketing pioneer Cory Rudl did before his death, a 2-1/2 hour discussion between him and direct marketing expert Dan Kennedy. The CDs are part of a package called the Ultimate Internet Entrepreneur. I'll review it once I've had a chance to study the whole package, but one comment on it really struck home while I was listening to it in my car.

Dan Kennedy commented that the thing that holds a lot of Internet businesses back is the fact that they see the Internet as something magical that makes money for them. But, in reality, the Internet is nothing more than a medium that enables you to reach potential customers. What you do with those potential customers, the relationships you build with them, is your business. The Internet is merely a medium that, at the moment, is extremely inexpensive in terms of low cost of putting you in touch with people.

Now, for someone like me who focuses on helping people start a business online, that's a kind of chilling thought. But he's right: there's nothing magical about the Internet itself that produces money. Business is about developing relationships, whether online, in a store, or through personal contact.

And while there are principles and techniques that currently work extremely well online, it's essential never to lose sight of the interpersonal nature of business. That never changes, even as the effectiveness of various media grow or diminish over time.
Jeff