M'sian SMEs told to beware of false e-consultants

This was the advice meted out by the National Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia (NCCIM) senior director Zaid Ismail in a recent press conference in conjunction with the e-Business Ownership Campaign 2001 (eBOC2001).

The campaign is jointly-organized by NCCIM and eOneNet.com and will run from July 31 to August 2. eBOC2001 is touted to be the first ever Internet marketing conference held in Malaysia.

Zaid said there were many people in the Web space claiming to be experts on e-commerce and Internet trading and hence, SMEs should do their homework first to avoid the risk of getting conned by unscrupulous quarters.

"SMEs are still behind when it comes to using the Internet to help them increase their returns on investments (ROI)," he said adding many NCCIM members for instance, gave up on their Web sites after two or three years.

""From what we gather, most of our members are aware of the pros and cons of e-commerce. Unfortunately, many of them do not know how to fully utilize their Web sites to increase their revenue," Zaid added.

SMEs, he said, must learn from the experience of others who have been in the Net world longer.

eBOC2001 will see a host of speakers including chief executive officer of SearchKing, Inc Robert Massa, managing director of Yahoo! Asia Pacific Maury Zeff, senior business development manager of AsiaTravelMart.com Aida Lim and chief executive officer of MSC Venture Corporation Sarina Karim.

The theme for the conference this year is "The Ultimate Secrets to Increase Revenue and Survive Online".