Surfing the Internet for business data

By Hendarsyah Tarmizi The Jakarta Post

With the power of the Internet, you can access information on thousands of companies around the world in almost all business fields in a matter of seconds.

Online business directories offer more advantages than paper directories. They are much more up-to-date. Unlike paper directories, which are published every one to two years, the online variety can be updated instantly.

In the developed world, online business directories have become more popular with the business community. With the online directories, readers can find the information they are looking for much more easily. The data contained in the directories is also presented in a user-friendly format, thus eliminating time- consuming searches.

The directories are divided into three categories: The first type is the global business directory, which lists global companies with activities in more than two countries.

The second type is the regional directory listing global companies with activities in more than two countries, while finally there are country business directories, which list companies in a particular country.

There are hundreds of websites that offer such complete business references.

Multinational data provider Kompass Group, for example, offers online directories, which give access to information on 1.6 million companies, 23 million key product and service references, 3.2 million executive names and 744,000 trade and brand names available in over 70 countries.

In the third quarter of last year alone, 30 million pages were being offered on Kompass.com.

In Indonesia, online business directories are still less popular than the paper ones. But the trend toward using online directories is growing with the increase in the number of online directory providers in the country.

In terms of services, the local online directories are still relatively limited, only containing certain categories of companies.

Below are some of the website addresses of local online directory providers, which mostly offer information on companies operating in certain fields.

Export-Import Indonesia's www.export-import-indonesia.com offers a database of exporters, importers and foreign forwarders.

Travelmart Indonesia's www.travelmart.co.id gives access to information on the country's travel companies.

Indonesia-Product's www.indonesia-product.com provides directories on Indonesian industrial products.

Indonesia Furniture Inc's www.indonesia-furniture.com offers directories of furniture companies in Indonesia.

Indonesia Yellow Pages' www.yellowpages.co.id offers information on Indonesian companies.

Indonesia Companies' Indonesiacompanies.com gives access to directories of local companies.

Indonesia Export's www.Indonesianexport.com offers a business to business directory.

Trade Indonesia's www.tradeindonesia.com features a directory of trade-related resources, events, travel and regional information.

Indonesian Capital Market Links' www. indonesianmarketlinks.net provides information on Indonesian companies and links to the Indonesian capital markets.

Indonesia Net Exchange's indoexchange.com, offers information on stock trading and directories of publicly listed companies.

Most of us are interested in the use of search engines to track down websites. Knowing how to use them is a handy skill and should be an important part of your business.

Here are some tips provided by Kompass.com on how to effectively use online directories. 1. Know the difference between a search engine and a directory.

Pure search engines - such as Alta Vista (http://www.av.com - create an instant index of the web: visitors can search through this by typing in keywords that describe what they are looking for. The search engine will then find matching web sites.

Search engines such as yahoo which operate as directories are different from Alta Vista because they are generally compiled through submissions by site owners. All sites are cataloged by topic, and visitors "drill down" to find their topic of interest. 2. Learn how to use key words and phrases effectively.

Before beginning your search think about what you are looking for. These will be your "keywords" or "phrases".

For example, if you're sourcing "plastic bolts", "CPVC" will narrow the list very effectively. 3. Use boolean terms to refine your search.

Learn how to use boolean terms (and, nit) to help fine tune your search. You can shorten these to + or - in many search engines such as Alta Vista. Using these will narrow your results down significantly.

For example:+plastic+bolts+europe-nylon (NB:put space between words) instructs the search engine to find all pages that include "plastic" "bolts" and "europe" but do not contain the word "nylon." 4. Use the results to hone your search further

If the selection offered is too broad, you need to add more terms to make it more specific and vice versa. Also, sift through at least 50 results before starting another search.