article: BN 3/26 AOL, Infoseek, Others Target Business Users: Money on the Net
AOL, Infoseek, Others Target Business Users: Money on the Net
Far Hills, New Jersey, March 26 (Bloomberg) -- Laura Wrong
Hobby is a whiz at zip codes -- now that she's connected to the
Internet.
''It definitely saves time,'' said the Far Hills, New
Jersey, florist. Before her store hooked up to the Web in
January, Hobby spent hours poring through a thick book to get the
postal codes needed to order and deliver her flowers.
Hobby and others who tap the Internet at work are heading
online faster than any group, convincing America Online Inc. and
rivals to add more business fare. AOL is working on customized
services tailored to a company's news and products while Infoseek
Corp., EarthLink Network Inc. and others let workers make travel
plans, check headlines and get information on competitors.
''In the last 10 years, the game has been who can win the
home-consumer market. Now, it's at work,'' said CIBC Oppenheimer
analyst Henry Blodget.
Not only are more people using the Internet at their jobs,
they're spending more time online there than at home, according
to Media Metrix, which tracks Internet use. The average person at
work surfed the Net about 6 hours in February, almost double the
3.4 hours for his counterpart sitting at home.
What's more, some 90 percent of employees at large companies
will be online by 2002, up from about 29 percent now, said
Forrester Research analyst Waverly Deutsch.
''That tripling is faster than consumers getting online at
home,'' Deutsch said. About 59 percent of U.S. households will be
online by 2002, up from 29 percent today, Forrester predicts.
Beginnings
That's a far cry from the way many online companies got
their start. AOL catered to consumers who logged in to chat,
check their e-mail and stock portfolios and peruse the latest
entertainment.
After fueling a boom that saw Internet use surge more than
40 percent a year, time spent cruising the Web at home dropped
slightly last month from the year earlier.
Yahoo! Inc., the site visited most by business users, early
on saw the potential of the corporate market. It features free e-
mail and business news to make the site more alluring.
''The business group is what brought Yahoo! to the fore. AOL
is waking up to that,'' said analyst Blodget.
America Online plans a big push for its AOL Enterprise, a
custom service that carries a company's news, menus and the like
and lets employees communicate instantly with each other, said
Myer Berlow, AOL senior vice president of interactive marketing.
It also lets employees dial into the service from any location.
AOL also is touting its newly acquired CompuServe service,
which is popular with business users because of features like Dun
& Bradstreet Corp.'s financial information and discussion groups
specific to technology and business issues.
''CompuServe has a real niche, and they're going to try to
grow that,'' said CIBC's Blodget.
AOL also has an agreement with Bloomberg LP, owner of
Bloomberg News, which will provide the online service with
business and financial news.
More Business
Web sites that simply helped people search the Internet are
adding new features to attract business customers and keep them
coming back. Infoseek offers Microsoft Corp.'s Expedia service,
which lets users book travel plans online. It added a real estate
service last month.
HotBot, run by Wired Ventures Inc., helps workers sort
through news from top newspapers. ''People want the ability to
track competitors,'' said spokesman Andrew de Vries.
Pasadena, California-based EarthLink has an arrangement with
Blue Cross for the health-insurance company to market the online
service to its 100,000 workers. EarthLink provides a custom Web
page that features the company's information.
PointCast Inc. serves up company profiles from Hoover's Inc.
and this summer will add analyst research on public companies
from Thomson Corp.'s First Call.
Pointcast also is working with Hewlett-Packard Co. to create
an online news service for the big computer maker, said Jaleh
Bisharat, senior vice president of marketing at PointCast.
When Nobody's Looking
With so much clicking going on in the office, fingers are
bound to stray.
Some 38 percent of people at work surf the Net to do
personal tasks like check their stock portfolios and shop online,
according to Forrester Research. That compares with 31 percent
who look up information on competitors.
That's causing some companies to crack down.
''Corporate guys are clamping down on personal use, and not
just adult entertainment sites,'' said Michael Parekh, an analyst
at Goldman Sachs.
Lucent Technologies Inc., for one, monitors Internet use,
said spokesman Bill Price. Employees get a gentle reminder that
they're being watched when a message pops up each time they turn
on their computers
''The use of the Internet for non-business purposes is
unacceptable,'' Price said.
Still, many managers look the other way when they see an
employee checking the latest baseball scores.
''It's no different than when someone is reading the New
York Times business section and picks up the sports page,'' said
Douglas McFarland, senior vice president at Media Metrix.
That's true of florist Hobby. While cruising the Net for the
day's zip codes, she can't help taking a detour.
''The Grateful Dead Web page -- I've got to check in with
that every day,'' she said.
--Aimee Picchi in Boston (617) 426-6918 through the Princeton newsroom (609) 279-4000/gcr |
