What are Internet Portals?

What are Internet Portals?

The word Portal is a term that has become very fashionable in both social and business talks. People used to use the term "Internet page" to refer to the site where their company is published, but it seems that the concept of Portal is becoming more attractive, even though the most appropriate term to refer to the sites we find published On the Internet it should be the Website.

What then is a Portal?

Portal is a new term, commonly synonymous with port, which is used to refer to a Website that serves as a starting point to start our Internet browsing activity, which we visit frequently and which we generally designate as the home page in our browser, Google.com for example.

There are generic and specialized portals, the latter known as niche portals. Some of the best-known portals are that of Yahoo!, Google, Excite, Netscape, Lycos, CNET, Microsoft Network, and America Online, recently ventured into our country.

The most important Internet access providers also offer their own users Portals to access the Web, as is the case with Prodigy. Most of the Portals have adopted the style of Yahoo! Organize the directory of Internet Web sites by categories, with text-rich quick access pages that are simple to use for most visitors.

The services that these Portals commonly offer include a directory of Websites, facilities for locating sites, news, weather information, mailboxes, stock information, telephone directories and maps, and on some occasions discussion forums with topics of general interest.

The companies that have this type of Portals for access to the Web are of great interest to investors in the stock market because the Portals create a significant influence over time on large audiences that receive advertising strategies.

The term Portal refers to a site that is a starting point for Internet browsing, not our destination site. Even for specialized Portals, there are requirements to be met to receive the Portal name, which is not limited to simply having a robust Website.

What is the business of the Portals? The business scheme is similar to that of television, press or radio, whose profits come from the sale of advertising space. In the case of the Portals, your profits come from the sale of advertising space through various graphic images, with or without animation, which are displayed on the Web pages together with the information you request, to directly suggest the acquisition of a good or service, or that you visit the commercial website of a company with just a click. As in other market niches, the different companies that maintain Internet Portals strive to become leaders. Being number one on the Internet really means great profits. But, what can these companies do to achieve leadership in a niche market where practically all information services are free? Beyond the cost for the access service, it does not cost you a penny to obtain information on the Internet.

Constant pressure on the Portals

The constant pressure that leading portals like Yahoo! it doesn't just come from your competition. Financial analysts predict that the Portals, which currently attract more visitors than any other type of Website, will be victims of the market, as has been the case with open television, which every day loses more followers who opt for cable service. .

The problem with these predictions is that they go against common sense. There are no signs at the moment that Web browsers are using the Portals on a smaller scale than they had been doing a year ago. Conversely, as the Internet grows, the need for reliable methods of browsing becomes more palpable.

Portals are still quite popular. Studies show that 80% of Internet browsers have used search engines to find Web sites in the last month. More than any other method. The study reflected that Internet users use an average of seven different ways to locate sites, with Portals and direct advice from friends being the most widely used methods. Other methods that follow closely in this list are entering the memory address and using online directories or search functions.