Getting businesses online

One of the best ways to create new jobs in your region is to make sure the businesses that are already in the community have access to good advice, including advice and guidance on technical matters.

The traditional role of the economic developer in the Manufacturing Economy was to recruit jobs from other parts of the country. But that has not been an effective primary strategy for many years. In a global economy, many traditional manufacturing jobs have moved offshore, and no amount of tax incentives are going to change that.

A diversified economic development strategy would put more time and resources into helping existing businesses grow. And there is plenty of simple and effective things that can be done. For example, I still find many businesses have poorly designed Web sites. Why not use some ED funds to pay for Web site critiques and reviews of business Web sites? This could be done on a 50% match basis to ensure that the businesses are likely to take the advice seriously.

As an example of how bad things could be, I just found a business with this statement on their "Contact Us" page:

To email us, order a free catalog, check on an order, etc., please call 1-800-829-xxxx.

I'm not making this up--to email the company, you have to call them first! Here is a business that has apparently been asleep for the past ten years, and still does not recognize that current and potential customers may want to email the company. I find that the majority of small businesses are still not taking the Web seriously, largely because they simply don't know what to do.

Part of the problem is not their fault. Too many businesses have been burned badly with bad advice. There are basically two ways to get help with a business Web site.

• You can go to a Web design shop. These outfits are often expert at building the Web site, but don't always have in-house expertise to help with marketing and business integration issues. So businesses end up with costly Web sites that don't actually have any impact on the business.
• You can go to a traditional marketing/advertising firm, but these outfits often cost more. They'll either do the Web design in-house or farm it out; either way, there's a middleman that drives costs up. And too often, these firms have some of the same blind spots that the Web shops have--making the Web work often means rethinking the way you do business.

Rethinking the way a company does business is not always costly or time-consuming. Like the clueless company in the example above, it sometimes means asking simple questions, like "Who is going to answer the email?"

Economic developers, acting as coaches, can really make a difference with local companies that need help, not just on the Web, but with marketing, advertising, business management, accounting, and the whole range of services that companies need. And the ED staffs don't have to be expert in all these areas--it could be that you once you have identified what a business needs help with, you help them find a qualified firm. That alone can be a big help for a small businessperson who can't find enough hours in the day to do everything that needs to be done.