The information age has companies scrambling to put up their shingles on the World Wide Web. Some do it because the competition is doing it. Others are lured by the promise of cheap, easy access to a huge customer base they could not reach by conventional means. Others, though, see the true power of having a Web site. They realize that the Web isanother tool to augment their existing customer relations, not replace them.
Associations are no different.
The Web gives associations, both large and small, the ability to reach out to their memberships and various publics with sections specifically tailored to different types of visitors. Good Web sites allow their visitors to pinpoint, or aleast narrow down, what types of products and services they need. For USA Rice, that means directing food editors and armchair chefs to recipes, researchers to research, members to organizational information, and so on. People who come to a Web site are looking for something, and if they don't find it, they probably will not come back. If what they find is out of date, they will not come back.