Taking Advice and Prospering From It

When Chip Meyers launched a university telephone business, he needed professional advice on recruitment, marketing and legal matters. But because it was a new venture, he just couldn’t afford it.

That predicament gave him the idea for America’s Brightest (https://americasbrightest.com), a World Wide Web site where visitors can query consultants who specialize in career and small- business issues.

“For a small business or an individual, there are a lot of services out there that are expensive and just not accessible,” said Meyers, 29, who has since sold the phone business and now devotes himself full-time to the 7-month-old Internet venture, which is based in Santa Monica. “I wanted to create something that put them all in one place.”

He’s not the only one. As Web sites find themselves in an increasingly fierce battle to win the attention of fickle Net surfers, several are betting that professional consultants will help draw “hits.”

America’s Brightest’s lineup includes “Job Swami” (a career and job-hunting expert), “Uncle Sammy” (a tax and personal accounting specialist) and “Lucy Lawyer” (an expert on career-related legal issues), among others. Subscribers who pay $49.95 a month can pose questions by e-mail and are guaranteed a response.

Entrepreneur Magazine’s 3-week-old Web site (https://www.entrepreneurmag.com) allows visitors to interact with a variety of consultants in a series of daily chat sessions. The free sessions--they have titles such as “Power Leadership” and “Sizzling Sales Secrets”--have been attracting 15 people apiece each day.

The resident consultant at CCH Business Owners Toolkit (https://www.toolkit.cch.com) is Alice Magos, a 35-year veteran of small businesses who is based near Chicago. She answers most visitors’ questions herself but will consult with specialists when necessary.

“We did have a question a couple weeks ago from a gentleman who had an offer from a large company that wanted to buy his emerging little high-tech firm,” said Magos, whose online moniker is Go Ask Alice. “I drew in some people from our team with finance and legal backgrounds.”

The emergence of low-cost and no-cost consultants online is motivated largely by business considerations.

“We need to attract and retain an audience by offering services and valuable information,” said Chuck Fuller, Entrepreneur’s new media manager. “The more of an audience we can attract, the more advertising we can attract.”

Nor is it exactly a selfless endeavor for the consultants.

“This is a good way for them to promote themselves and possibly pick up some new business,” Meyers said.

But just as with other Internet denizens, there is no guarantee that an online consultant will be exactly who he or she claims.

“Users should know that it’s really up to them to check the reliability of the consultants,” said Stan Berliner, director of the Consultants Network trade group in New York.

Any professional should be able to provide credentials and references to prove they ‘are legitimate, and many Web sites make bios available with the click of a mouse.

Despite the risks, Berliner is enthusiastic about the cyber-consulting trend.

“It’s really very responsive--you can click on a little icon, send e-mail and often get an answer back on the same day,” he said. “I think this is the media of the future.”