As the election approaches, there’s bound to be another round of discussion about politics and politicians online – the role of You Tube, Facebook, newspaper blogs, online polls, political bloggers, etc.
But as I was squashing a cockroach in my kitchen this morning, I was thinking about the apparent failures of Australian small business in the online environment.
You see, the cockroach problem grew to unignorable proportions a few days ago. So on Monday I looked up non-toxic pest control in the Yellow Pages online. I found a company which describes itself as “environmental” and covers our area. I took down their mobile number and called – it went to voicemail. I left a message. They haven’t called back.
I’m disappointed but not really surprised. This is just the most recent in a line of online contacts which fail to return calls and emails.
Two weeks ago we received a flyer through our letterbox for garden landscapers. Looking for business, you’d think. We have a longstanding problem with a tree stump and collapsing wall. I looked at this company’s extensive and professional-looking website – they seemed to fit the bill. I sent them an email, including our phone number, asking for their advertised free quote visit. They haven’t replied to the email. Nada.
About six months ago, in the long drawn-out process of thinking about renovating, I looked up attic-conversion companies on the Web. I found two which specialise in what we’re after. I sent one an email and left a telephone message with the other. No reply from either.
Is it just me? Is this just an unlucky series of non-contacts? Or are all these businesses so overwhelmed with demand that they can afford to ignore my custom?
I love to do business online – I regularly deal with Amazon, I’ve bought clothes, flowers, gifts, CDs and more from online companies in the US and Britain. Years ago, I did manage to buy some nice objets from a Web-only Australian company which has since gone out of business. But my online luck with Australian domestic businesses isn’t good.
Spot on, Suz. Email works well for organising everything else in my life so it’s a strange disappointment how difficult it is to get satisfactory correspondence working with businesses. I have had similar experiences with removalists, the gas company, the manufacturer of a spare part I need for my stove, a small appliance repair firm, and of the six companies I emailed requesting a quote for replacing the roof only one even managed to reply and that was ten days later.
I wonder if retail isn’t a partial exception to this. I got our blinds through a website – the company is on the NSW south coast – and they were perfectly made and there were no hitches in any part of the process. In Australia, second hand booksellers are generally pretty good at doing business over the internet.
I’ve had a pretty good run with email – caterers, academic regalia hirers, custom drumkit manufacturers, studio audio gear retailers – in the last couple of months. Prior to that a bunch of just what you’re talking about.
It’s like they think “we’ve got to get one of them website things, everyone’s doing it” but they simply don’t check their email. I reckon web developers routinely assume there will be someone whose job it is to field online enquiries, to they set up a salesATblahDOTcom address as well as personal ones for the staff. Then everyone just checks their personal ones because there’s only two people working at the company.
It’s like they think “we’ve got to get one of them website things, everyone’s doing it� but they simply don’t check their email.
That has to be it.
Surely there’s got to be a tipping point when enough small businesses will realise how easy email and the Web could make their lives.
I have dealt with an electrician who made appointments and sent invoices via email (I found him through a non-online gay business directory) and who asked for payment to be lodged electronically in his bank. Now that was a good way to do business.
Don’t buy any books from Amazon until you check out The Book Depository in the UK. Cheaper than Amazon, waaaay cheaper than any bookshop in Oz and they send the books by express airmail free-of-charge.
And a bonus: you can often get hardcover editions that were never made available in Australia at a price less than the paperback edition.
An example: I recently bought five different music books by an Aussie author from TBD. In Australia they cost $45 + $5 postage each. From TBD AU$33 + free air express saving $85.
In the future, we will be made increasingly aware of the carbon costs of goods ordered online and shipped from overseas. As an island, Australia is at a disadvantage in regard to the environmental costs of transport.
Is there much difference, in terms of energy expended, between ordering something online and having it shipped here, and buying something in person which has been imported from overseas from a local shop? Just curious.
Bulk purchases by shops are probably more efficient and save on carbon release just a little. We won’t know positively until environmental audits are done on each product. While these audits are becoming more popular, the smaller traders do not have the resources to perform them.
An interesting question. I suppose that products which are wholesaled in Australia are more likely to be sea-freighted whereas your typical Amazon-like store product is more likely to be air-freighted, and surely seafreight is going to be less carbon-intensive on a per kilogram basis. But then maybe you’d have to control for the extra land transport that is presumably involved in sea-freigted products (ie. one trip from the dock to the warehouse plus one trip to the retailer vs. one trip from the airport).
On the responsiveness question, I reckon the underlying reason is strong demand. A lot of these small businesses are just run off their feet answering phone calls, let alone emails. Few businesses that are operating at the margins are going to ignore email inquries.
BBB
Yes it’s a sad story. My experience is similar.
I continue to be amazed by the lack of knowledge about technology and the web among people who should know better. And I am not just talking about the over 50’s – some of whom are more up-to-date than their children.
There seems to be a cohort – perhaps in the 25-45 age group who seem to have almost no knowledge – the web seems to have passed them by. These seem to be the same folks who are running small businesses out of their second bedroom or ute and who are colloquially known as “trades people”.
If I was a conspiracy theorist then I would see this as the result of a dark plot by the Libs to keep our children ignorant, compliant and conservative voting. Couldn’t be – could it?
Couldn’t have anything to do with the sort of publicity online transactions get could it?
Any current affairs show worth its salt does regular stories on identity theft, email scams, spyware, false advertising in and around the internet porn and corrupting our children ones.
If people are not encouraged to shop online why would business go out of its way to sell online?
Could be a partial explanation anyway.
Similar story with us trying to buy a tent online. A couple of camping shops had what we want. Tried to order from one place and the said they didn’t in fact stock this tent. Followed up an other business with a flash website, placed an order but no response. Rang the company after a week and was told “they do the orders out the back, they’ll probably get onto it next week”. A week later, another email, no response (that was a month ago).
Finaly brought it from someone with a camping shop in Brisbane who doesn’t really do on line business but was very helpful and efficient.
My take – a website does not turn a bad business person in to a good one, rather it highlights how bad they were in the first place.
And some businesses are just not made for the web.
I’m trying to organise builders/contractors to rig up a big home studio/rehearsal space (soundproofing, baffling, etc.) and had absolutely no luck using teh intertoobs at all. I found all the actual information about the engineering principles involved, materials, etc. But I just couldn’t contact a business to do the job. So in the end I trawled around the stores that sold the sound isolation gear and asked for references and now I’ve got a stack of contacts.
Which got me to thinking that (a) my assumption that I should be able to source everything via a laptop was probably naive – though based on the fact that I do damn near everythign else this way; and (b) there are businesses that just don’t seem geared to electronic communication and could make an absolute packet by marketing themselves better this way.
PS – what custom drumkit manufacterer? I’m drooling over this one. I just love the DW site that lets you build custom kits.
We’ve been trying to get an online facility set up to handle subscriptions – probably several transactions a week and we wanted it onsite rather than on eBay, for example.
The saga so far:
-existing ISP offers package that runs into the thousands.
-have an Online Payment Facilitator suggested to us. Great help and very reasonable
-decide to switch over to the Bendigo Bank while we’re at it.
-find out the OPF can’t work with Bendigo.
-try Commonwealth and after a few days of trying to get in touch with somone who knows what’s going on and the usual komedy kapers of being told to speak to the person you just spoke to only to find out that we can’t get a facility because “we haven’t had a year long relationship with the bank.”
-decide to stick with Westpac , who were actually pretty helpful but have told us that our URL needs to be the same as our trading name.
I’m sure all of this can be resolved but I can see why more than a few businesses wouldn’t bother with this amount of headbanging.
Anthony, I know what you mean.
My joint (very small group) set up a shopping cart, did the back-end programming, hooked up the right databases, etc. (all based on open source of course, tested everything thoroughly and sorted any bugs out … then immediately ran into a world of pain dealing with the financial bollocks from every bank and credit union we talked to.
Suz wrote:
“businesses so overwhelmed with demand that they can afford to ignore my custom?”
A considered assumption would be that the businesses you are dealing with are actually overwhelmed by either a lack of systems or inadequate systems in need of review.
Whether they be hard systems (such as having the right tools on hand), soft systems (policies and procedures) or information systems (such as data collection and analysis).
Author Michael E. Gerber has written a number of books based on the theme “The E Myth” that advises small businesses how to mature, not just grow.
An example of “the need to mature, not just grow” was highlighted by my Direct Marketing teacher who pointed out to his students how so many small business people act too busy making sales to collect potentially valuable data on the customer that could result in an ongoing customer relationship.
I’m particularly interested in the concept of “systems development”, not only because in provides insight into how to mature a small business but also because it probably does offer insight into the building of a career, whether you go into business for yourself or not.
Go into any big corporation and you’ll no doubt have full-time systems analysts employed there.
…From Justin
Jobby – Sleishman.
Aussie-made, custom only. And properly customised – totally up to you – shell depth, shell circumference, timber type, laminating method, finish. They make the drums with absolutely nothing fixed to the shell walls – see the site for how this works. They sound sublime, unless you’re after a detuned bottom head; can’t be done with their design.
Anthony – a good mate of mine makes a living from business websites, and setting up secure billing etc. Let me know if you want a ref.
I’m pretty sure you know another friend of mine by the way. Food writer, PR guy, runs the Feast Perth show each year? Name withheld for personal reasons.
Oh and been meaning to point out this cute techy solution to the environmental costs of global transport from treehugger
Cheers FDB, we’re just in ‘fack me what else does it take to get a one item eshop going‘ stasis at the moment but another straw and I might well be in need of the ref.
So yeah please send it through just in case.
I think I know who you mean – 19th centuryish name?
Yes, you could say that. Let’s call him B.V.?
I’ll email you at your blog with the ref.
Hmm no I was thinking S.W. – I’ll rack my mind
Thanks!
And yeah Jobby, it’s the banks that are the real source of bollocks.
Seems that many businesses I’ve delt with have had problems with:
1) Banks (as Anthony details above) who are stuck in the stone-ages when it comes to dealing with any sort of business other than “the markets or mortgages”.
2) Rapacious “Service/Website providers” who seem to specialise in ripping off people who are inexperienced in this area. A common theme is the “I didn’t know we had to pay to change the website later on”…even for such basic things as product/price.
3) Hideously slow websites that are NOT checked for rudimentry errors by the business itself. The number of times I’ve tried looking at some industrial supplies sites to find a phone number and address 2 years out-of-date…after looking through several “splash” pages of graphics.
Unfortunately I think “survival of the fittest” is occurring at the moment. The only thing a business owner can really do is try to find a willing/able IT company and/or grad. student and knowing from the start what they want. Then having that specified in the contract! As for the banks, etc, I haven’t the faintest idea – they don’t generally change anything unless there are $ x 6 involved.
My favourite sites have the products listed, at least a rough price estimate (no I am NOT a bulk account customer!), and an order line (even a comments type box with good follow-up). I note that wineries seem to get it right most of the time, or that just might be me
I have received a call every week or so for the last 6 FUCKING YEARS for this guy Mark who works as a building and infrastructure consultant. I’ve given up emailing them about it, and their website still has the wrong number on the contacts page.
Can I just spit in the general direction of the endless masses of small business websites that pay no attention to the needs of disabled users (in gross violation of the 1992 Disability Discrimination Act), often unleashed on the public pretty recently but built using practices that were considered to be beyond the pale at least 6 years ago, and usually proudly proclaim their support for IE 4?
Nick, I know exactly what you mean. I actually had to point this out to a client the other day whose current website has been built by some nong using CSS but then still choosing to lay out the info using tables. Great.
I too have come to realise that small businesses with websites won’t necessarily be all that responsive to ‘contact’ enquiries, so I always look for a phone number, which is often frustratingly difficult to find, (especially with government departments). Next to google, for finding the business, the online white/yellow pages for finding their phone numbers is still my best resource. Its cumbersome, but speaking to someone still seems to be the most direct route to getting a price, having an enqiury answered, or placing an order.
I think FDB has hit the nail on the head. People have websites and then after the initial flush, forget about them. Possibly such businesses have had so few enquiries via their websites in the initial stages, they’ve all but given up on them. In which case they ought to display their phone numbers much more prominently with a RING US message. They’re probably too understaffed and overwhelmed with day to day business operations to find it worthwhile spending much time online.
Just like that other half of the population who cannot for the life of them understand why anyone would read blogs, let alone write blog posts, there will always be people (or for our lifetimes anyway) who simply hate using computers.
So many issues, so many issues….
1. Poor integration of virtual marketing forms into business structures.
2. Poor understanding by web designers of ACTUAL customer service practice
3. Poor understanding by small businesses as to what a web site does & what it can potentially do
4. Ridiculously primitive integration of ISP, host roles, design templates & customer functionality
5. Particularly for service providers, open source web programmes which do not require hosting, can be up & running in about an hour. Easy to edit, & their very basic nature prevents the page from being horribly visually cluttered as so many web pages are.
Tig tog .. tables are fine for tabular information!
Even major websites are completely retarded for disabled users, I could name a few, or even in terms of page size / loading speed / coherence of design.
I believe the worst things are the ISPs. Frequently they only want to support flat-HTML on their basic plans which is a nightmare to maintain; at best it’s PHP and maybe mysql. If you’re a small business who wants to do something slightly more advanced (and what about backing the database up?!) it’s often hard to get something done at a reasonable price.
I’ve recently bought stuff off http://www.oo.com.au (2 groovy little remote control helicopters), qubooks.com.au (textbook) from Toowong and bookware.com.au (N Sydney). All straightforward processes, goods arrived inside a week. Umartonline.com.au (Milton and 8 mile plains) is also great for cheap computer gear.
So I suppose it’s the general problem with economic changes. Some people invest the time and undergo the unpleasantness of mastering something new. They get the benefits. Others try to grab the benefits without changing their mindsets. They don’ t any benefit and then write it all off as hype.
Yairs, but these nongs hadn’t seemed to realise that you don’t need tables to lay out a sidebar.
I’ve recently bought stuff off
Buying stuff on the Australian Web isn’t a major problem. Buying services/skills online does seem to be a problem. Very few tradespeople or small businesses appear to be using email or websites in a committed way.
The small business online packages are really clunky and difficult to use, web hosts little help also. My partner has spent much money and received completely inconsistent advice from her ISP on setting up her bookshop site.