During the fifth year of operation, sales from the company had tripled. Kamani was now ready to expand her business. She did not want to limit herself to just the Oakland area but possibly go nationwide.
Someone suggested the Internet. The concept of going on-line was a new phenomenon for her. She did not even have an e-mail account, because her business was local.
Most of her clients came to her office, or she would go to their place of business to discuss designing or printing needs. Nevertheless, after careful examination, she knew conducting business in cyberspace was the way to go if she were going to broaden her horizons and increase revenues.
Kamani's computer came with a modem and an Internet Service Provider program. She opened an e-mail account and signed on for complete access to the World Wide Web.
While surfing the Internet, she found several sites on which to advertise her company. Soon, she received many inquiries and signed on three clients from the Greater East Bay area. For the next several months, her ads were pulling in orders from as far away as Australia.
In her spare time, Kamani would go on-line to seek out other business opportunities and noticed rotating banners advertising dating sites. She was amazed that so many of these services were on-line. She would see ads for dating and matchmaking services in printed newspapers and singles' publications but never realized the Internet held so many possibilities for meeting someone. With numerous choices, she was baffled as to which sites to check.
She was like a kid in the candy store and thought, If only I had known about these places years ago, I might have met a suitable mate right on the World Wide Web. She made up her mind to start searching for love and romance and believed there was a reason why she went on-line in the first place: It was not to get more customers but to find a soul mate.
Kismet was working in her favor, she thought. After probing through a myriad of dating sites, she found a service, which targeted the forty plus singles. She put together a short profile and uploaded it along with her photo:
44-year-old single female is seeking a genuine, loving, and caring single male who is interested in a committed relationship, leading to marriage. Age is unimportant. I operate a successful business, own my own home and enjoy shopping, attending yard sales, and dinning out, just to name a few. For more details, contact me.
For the next couple of weeks, Kamani was browsing through some of the men's profiles, but none of the ads appealed to her. She knew it would take time to find that out-of-the-ordinary man. After all, it had been years since she was in a serious relationship. Therefore, there was no rush to meet anyone.