Click here to subscribe today or Login.
By PAMELA C. TURFA pamt@leader.net
Sunday, January 30, 2000 Page: 1D
WILKES-BARRE – There are as many paths to opening an Internet business as
there are Web sites.
Mike Libenson’s started with a downtown Wilkes-Barre retail store. It was
helped by major surgery and changes in his industry.
Last year, Libenson made a choice. He locked his store to walk-in trade,
deciding to concentrate his business selling books to customers across the
United States and around the world – all without creating his own Web site.
To understand how much his business has changed, go back to the beginning.
Libenson opened Mike’s Library, a used-book store, in 1995. The idea was
simple: He would buy and sell interesting used hardcover books from a small
shop on the second block of South Main Street.
The Internet was just getting started. An industry conference he attended
as he was opening his store had one session on the Internet.
In those days, sales to outside customers were brokered largely through an
industry magazine. Book sellers would take out an advertisement listing books
their customers requested.
Each week, Libenson would go through the advertisements of other sellers
looking for requests for books he owned. He would send postcards to the
sellers whose requests he could fulfill and wait – hopefully – for a return
order and a check.
The entire process could take as long as six weeks.
The demand was small enough he could handle his mail-order business while
tending to customers browsing his stacks.
But during his first year in business, he had joined a customer service
bureau that provided a dial-in connection to a computer data base. As a
seller, he listed the books he had for sale and paid to check the listings of
other sellers when his customers had a special request.
The dial-up service evolved into listing his holdings on three computer
services. And instead of having to wait for a magazine to arrive, Libenson
could instantly check the availability of a book to fulfill a customer’s
request.
When he had surgery to replace a heart valve early last year, he was forced
the make a decision.
The Internet business “was growing and growing. The more you’re on the
‘Net, the more you grow. … The (retail shop and Web business) didn’t work
together absent employees, and I decided I didn’t want any.”
So, he locked the door behind him and hung a sign outside saying the shop
was closed to walk-ins.
Going with the flow
These days, the book shelves remain, but the aisles where customers browsed
are filled with storage boxes. Books are arranged not by subject but according
to a code that allows Libenson to fill requests quickly. Some books are stored
offsite.
A cabinet along one wall has been converted into a mail-order center with
packing supplies – corrugated boxes, tape and giant roll of bubble wrap.
The Internet is changing the way people shop and why they are shopping,
Libenson says.
There is a national marketplace on virtually every product, and regional
prices are being eroded.
States with large influxes of residents are particularly demanding of old
products like his. “People are looking to recreate their childhood, and
they’re in places where there’s not a lot of stuff.”
Residents of rural areas and people who are very busy also depend on the
Internet.
He advises would-be Internet entrepreneurs to be flexible. “Everything you
think you know about how it’s done will change so rapidly. … If you are the
kind that gets upset with a pattern being changed, this is not the business
for you.
“It’s very Zen-like the way you have to dance.”
He also advises would-be entrepreneurs to:
“Be very specialized. Know your niche. … Unless you’ve got millions,
you can’t be all things to all people.”
“Know your target audience.”
“Be in a position to handle credit-card accounts or have a third party
handle it for you.”
Finally, he suggests that would-be Internet sellers test their ideas by
selling through another site such as Amazon.com’s Z-shops (sellers set fixed
prices) or e-Bay (sellers take bids) before spending money and time setting up
their own site.
Although he has set up a preliminary site of his own
(http://mikeslibrary.homestead.com/), Libenson hasn’t made the commitment to
making the site a major part of his business.
“Is it worth hosting an Internet site? No, unless I’m willing to spend
time and money to generate traffic.
“Building it is the least important part of the Web site. … (Generating)
traffic is everything. … You have to constantly feed it and water it.”
Call Turfa at 829-7177.