By Dianne Gouliquer
An e-commerce survey commissioned earlier this year by the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce has produced "impressive" results, chamber of commerce president Mary Long-Irwin says.
Under the leadership of economist Graham Clayton, the director of Confederation College's Institute for Global Entrepreneurship and Electronic Commerce, the survey examined the local business community's use of e-commerce, from e-mail to exporting and identified upcoming trends in e-commerce.
A total of 205 member firms and agencies, or about 20 per cent, completed the six-page mail-back questionnaire, says Long-Irwin.
The survey was funded by the chamber of commerce, FedNor, the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development and Trade and Human Resources Development Canada.
Results show the majority of member businesses are confident in their computer skills. Over 61 per cent rated their overall computer skills as being good or very good, a further 14.4 per cent felt their skill level was excellent, and less than 25 per cent said their computer skills were either poor or fair.
Almost all respondents, 92 per cent, reported having Internet access; about 55 per cent of these firms said they use the Internet for 10 hours or less per week, while almost 16 per cent of respondents use the Internet for more than 30 hours per week.
"The survey questionnaire included questions aimed at indicating the uses the firms were making of the Internet and the frequency of such uses," Clayton adds. "Conversely, such questions also revealed areas of relatively high levels of non-uses. Competitor intelligence gathering was one such area, while online sourcing and purchasing was another.
Two-thirds of respondents ranked the importance of e-commerce to their businesses over the past 12 months as not important (34.2 per cent) or somewhat important (31.2 per cent). When asked how important e-commerce would be to their firms over the nest 12 months, however, "the not important or somewhat important combined responses shrank to a total of 52 per cent," Clayton says.
A more detailed final report containing more in-depth analysis is still on the way.
