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Brick and Mortar Businesses and the Internet: Expansion, Survival or Extinction?

I want to share with you what happened this week when speaking to a small group of brick-and-mortar business owners and employees at lunch.

As everyone talked about what they did, there was a feeling that this is what it must have been like at a meeting of blacksmiths right at the time cars were first making their appearance.

Denial for some. Business as usual.

Others exploring the options for changing their businesses to reflect that horses would no longer play a key role in transportation…

…and yet another subset knowing that changes needed to be made but not what to do.

The Internet is doing that to brick-and-mortar biz. As you’ve seen, competition is no longer the guy across the street. The entrepreneur in South Africa, Singapore, or India is just chomping at the bit to take your customers.

And where there is fear and uncertainty, con artists move in and pluck the money from the ignorant. For example, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) just nailed some hucksters who were selling web services franchises.

You can find my take on franchises versus licensing in these two blog posts:

“Licensing Agreements Can Grow Your Business” and

“Franchises - Consider Doing Something Different For Your Business“

Ten years ago, virtual mall scams were the rage. Some things don’t change. Business owners who don’t know their way around the Internet are easy prey.

On the other hand, technology opens up a global market of potential customers that you never had before, i.e. there’s greater opportunity too.

Whatever you do, don’t be the blacksmith who has the narrow focus on how to capture a larger share of the dwindling market of horses to shoe within trotting distance of your shop.

Get out there and compete. If there’s a way to do it online, then do it.

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About the Author

With an advanced international law degree from Georgetown University and more than 14 years of real world legal experience, Attorney Mike Young shows entrepreneurs how to protect and grow their businesses online. He's the author of Internet Marketing Legal Secrets Revealed. Not just a lawyer who focuses exclusively on Internet and marketing law, Mike’s been working with computers for more than 27 years (his first computer was an Atari 400 with 8 KiB RAM) and started representing Internet businesses back in 1996.