"You're looking the wrong way, Darling"

Of course, the online picture is not universally rosy. Some online retailers like Zavvi for example had to suspend operations because of supply problems. I have also been very aware in my market of the number of small businesses who "made-do" with the creations of small business web designers during the good times - only to find in the harsher markets of the present, that the designer's lack of understanding of search optimisation and internet marketing has left them with a "brochure" that nobody knows about. And they're now coming to me for help.

On the other hand (and more typically) an acquaintance told me last month that he became very conscious - running a retail store in the UK - that he was paying his cashier an eight-hour-a-day wage for about an hour's actual work during the day and that too few customers were coming into the shop to make it worth while. He resolved instead to close the store and sell the stock on eBay (which he managed successfully).

And this is the point, isn't it?

It isn't that my aquaintance's stock wouldn't sell. It simply wouldn't sell in the physical world.

The £13 billion online sales at Christmas was not even "hundreds of millions" back in 2000 and was "nothing at all" just four years prior to that.

So why are we spending taxpayers money to shore-up inefficient businesses in over-supplied markets when we should be investing in growth industries that are not yet even in recession? Aren't we looking the wrong way, Darling?

About the Author: Richard Martin of Briquesetclics is a Certified Management Consultant and Accredited Internet Marketing Consultant of 20 years experience in IT. Briquesetclics offers exquisite eBusiness solutions, website design and Internet Marketing with English to French Translation to expat and French Comunities in Southwest France. He serves the Limousin, Poitou-Charentes and Aquitaine regions and the cities of Limoges, Poitiers, Bergerac, Perigueux, Angouleme, Cognac, Bordeaux, Niort.

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