Telephone Joins Internet: Offers Retailers New Source For Reaching Customers
Latina-owned firms are becoming increasingly prominent as business owners in the United States. Business increased five times as fast for firms owned by Hispanic women than the national average.
So said a study jointly released Sept. 26 by the Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group National Foundation for Women Business Owners and Wells Fargo & Co.
The study also showed Latina entrepreneurs are not newcomers. Two-thirds of the business owners were born in the United States, while the rest are immigrants who have lived here for an average of 30 years. The women had been in business for 12 years on the average, said Nina McLemore, NFWBO chair.
The study, “The Spirit of Enterprise: Latina Entrepreneurs in the United States,” showed that Latinas represent a wide variety of fields, including construction, accounting, engineering and manufacturing. Only 4 percent worked in service industries such as hotels, restaurants and bars, she said.
McLemore also pointed to trends showing that the 382,400 Latina-owned firms in the United States in 1996 generated sales of $67.3 billion , a 534 percent increase since 1987, compared to a 120 percent increase for all businesses.
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Get E-Tail Patrons Over The Phone: If you’re a retailer, you may at some point have considered expanding into telephone orders. But with the cost of phone operators and call centers rising 18.5 percent last year, that might seem a bit out of reach.
A Boca Raton, Fla.-based firm found a way to cut costs for phone sales orders by as much as 84 percent, by using voice-enabled Internet E-business technology.
NetByTel allows E-businesses to easily extend their Internet-based operations to offline customers with any telephone , without changing their existing IT infrastructure. NetByTel clients include Priceline.com, Office Depot, BigStar.com and Flooz.com.
Paul Robinson, NetByTel co-founder and president, cited Office Depot’s experience. Customers calling 1-888-GO-DEPOT can order a catalog, locate a store, or even buy products over the phone, all through a voice-enabled interface to the Web site that costs about 84 percent less than routing calls to live customer service operators, he said.
NetByTel’s system brings new opportunities for sellers, said Bill Meisel, analyst with Tarzana-based TMA Associates.
“The system NetByTel has developed for Office Depot is an example of translating the efficiencies of the Web to the telephone using speech recognition. Customers have long been comfortable with ordering by phone. Now that process can be inexpensive for sellers,” he said.
Since just about everyone has a telephone, NetByTel will be a valuable tool for retail businesses to extend the Internet even further, Robinson said.
Students + Internships = Success: A Vista man is helping Southern California teens find valuable employment, while at the same time helping himself. As a fourth-generation carpenter/cabinetmaker, he’s passing on his years of knowledge and experience through internships.
Venezuela-born Ricardo Alcantara built his woodworking enterprise from a humble garage shop 14 years ago into a company with annual revenues of $2.5 million and prestigious clients like Qualcomm Inc., Sony Electronics Inc. and Cox Communications.
But the founder and CEO of Vista-based R.A. International, Inc. soon discovered there weren’t enough employees with the expertise he needed to grow his business still further, said Nevada Smith, spokeswoman for R.A. International.
“I only succeed when my employees succeed. My company is only as good as my team,” Alcantara said. “My only wish is to find more qualified team members, but I cannot find them.”
So, in the ancient tradition of tradesmen, Alcantara has found a way to provide opportunities for apprentice carpenters to join his team. This will not only to secure the future of his company, but to also create opportunities in the specialized woodworking industry, Smith said.
Alcantara was named Aug. 22 as executive director of Woodlinks USA, a technical vocational program working with schools to provide teachers with hands-on, practical woodworking curriculum applicable to the real world, she said.
Through internships, students will go into work places to learn the tricks of the trade. Woodlinks USA currently has pilot sites in several cities, including Los Angeles, and Alcantara is bringing it to San Diego, Smith said.
Alcantara said the program works because it gives students a firm grounding in the tools they’ll need after graduation , including sophisticated programs like computer-aided drafting and design.
“I have one student who started as an apprentice and now he is my lead man in our engineering department,” he said. “Students learning how to make a rocking chair in a woodworking class are not going to get anywhere in the real world. But programs like Woodlinks give younger individuals the practical knowledge they need to be a success.”
Send small business and retail news to Lee Zion at lzion@sdbj.com.
