Community Approaches to Electronic Commerce

Highlights from a presentation on June 3, 1999 to the Southwest Region Economic Development Administration Annual Conference in Dallas, Texas

by John Niles, Global Telematics, Seattle

http://www.globaltelematics.com

E Commerce by the Numbers

Electronic commerce is growing, and small businesses in small towns can do it.

Example: Iron Works in Stockbridge, Michigan (www.topgrill.com) which sells high-end gas barbecue grills.

Example: The Public WebMarket from Center for Civic Networking (www.webmarket.org). This is a cooperative web building effort by community-based organizations and microenterprises.

The numbers above show that e-commerce also works for business-to-business, as seen in the example of Milpro (www.milpro.com), a site that aggregates the offerings of machine tool parts producers.

E-Commerce Recommendations for Smaller Communities

1. Align e-commerce with all other underway economic development strategies.

2. Connect existing local skills & products to worldwide markets.

3. Build local familiarity & skill with web commerce: Go Online -- Build Websites.

4. Promote a local electronic storefront standard.

5. Build a community Internet portal that focuses on local businesses.

6. Establish walk-up Internet access for anybody, for example, at the library.

7. Motivate new telecom infrastructure investment with growth in local e-commerce applications using existing infrastructure.

8. Goal for infrastructure: Megabit (fast), full-time Internet access connections for local homes and businesses.

9. Learn, change, persist.

Questions? Call John Niles at 206-781-4475