Honours Project: - Napier University

Gregory Huet
Honours Project
99034735 Dr. William Buchanan
impossible to propose a paying service on the Internet because the concurrence will analyse
the product and create the same with more functionality to kill the first one. That’s why this
product will be completely free for the users.
A representative example of free services can be made through the use of software like
Sonique 5 which is a direct concurrent of Winamp, free as well. The first version was
developed three years ago and gave a full acceptance of the users. A few months ago, the
copyright was bought by Lycos to become a sub-corporation. This method allows Sonique
Corporation to earn money through advertising of Lycos 6 .
Also see:
• http://www.freewarefiles.com/
• http://www.freewarehome.com/
• http://freeware.intrastar.net/
2.1.2 Why a free access
In the earlier days of the web, it was thought that the provider of online content would be able
to charge the user directly. Some corporations like newspapers, for example, started to put
their content on Internet for free, which allowed them to build an audience. Since, a user can
find a free information or pays for it, but the success of sites come from the aspect of
marketing useful information and good services available. In fact, no one wanted to pay
(except professionals).
2.1.3 How to make money
The first aim of this application is to become a real professional tool, it means acquire the
respect of the users. This could be modelled by increasing traffic on the web site. The goal of
this financial approach is to favour the maximum audience possible and so receive money
from advertising by using banners.
Another source of revenue will come from sponsorship. By using links or advertising on a
web site, it is possible to make some money from the revenue generated by these links to
other corporations (the price of the advertisements is proportional to the traffic existing in the
web site hosting it). For example, if the database directly receives information from a
corporation about its products. The user selects the source of interest in his/her profile and
each time he/she will use the information to go to the partners’ sites, this corporation will pay
a commission.
2.2 Web site advertising
Still with a financial aspect in mind, the way to advertise a web site is very important to create
traffics and them earning money and win notoriety from the users.
2.2.1 Banners
Banner advertisements are still the most popular way to promote services on the Internet.
Evaluations of the response rate might be as low as 0.6 per cent but when they are working
the result is impressive because they are very powerful.
5 Sonique Corporation web site : http://www.sonique.com visited on the 14/01/2001
6 Lycos search engine : http://www.lycos.co.uk visited on the 14/01/2001
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