A more recent example is Intuit's success with Quicken, which can partly be attributed to the software's ability to make electronic bookkeeping feel similar, visually and procedurally, to balancing a checkbook. Breakthrough innovations must evoke a sense of the familiar if they are to successfully overcome inertia. If you have a widget store then set your website up like a widget store to some degree. Add some unique Internet twists but try and cast everything in familiar language and concepts. Remember, this medium is still brand new and you don't want to scare would-be customers and clients away because of strangeness.
Participation is better than isolation.
In our very first marketing newsletter, we gave some basic statistical and demographic information about the Internet. There are now an estimated 42 million users on the Net and things haven't slowed. Based on the Internet Society's IETF model, the projected growth for hosts by the year 2000 will be 100,000,000 or more. The conclusion is that more businesses and more consumers are getting on-line everyday. No one is as smart as everyone, so the old cliche goes.