Business Plan for GoAshburn.com

(we still own AshburnDirectory.com)
a division of HomeTown On-Line, LLC (in process)

 

Our Mission
Build and Promote a friendly, practical, accurate, complete and current web site of Ashburn Area ( Phase I ) Centers and businesses to satisfy the business and service searching by the affluent residents of Ashburn Area of Northern Virginia to reducing their gas, money, and time commitment. All three participates win: residents, by saving time and money; businesses, and Home Town On-Line, by making money.

Our Guiding Principles
We celebrate in bringing people together, Ashburn Area residents, the Shopping Centers, the Retailers, Professional Services, and the GoAshburn.com team by adhering to the following Principles:

Quality…
in every decision regarding services, accuracy, and business transaction…every action, every day.

Courtesy...
by showing respect and providing caring service to Visitors and Businesses.

Pride…
in our work and in our relationships with businesses and visitors to contribute to the success of our Site.

Teamwork...
by supporting one another and valuing our individual contributions to meet every visitor’s needs.

Innovation...
with an empowered "can do" spirit to continuously improve the exemplary services and quality links on GoAshburn.com.

 

Our Values
Based on our experience in the marketing, sales, technical, business, and support arenas we understand the values that are needed to make a successful business. They are simple but they work and they are:

Compliance with Technical Usability Standard Recommendations
In every enhancement and every addition, every time, every day.

Excellence and Continuous Learning
We do it right, then, we improve to do it better.

Honesty, Trust and Integrity
In all actions with one another, our Visitors and our Centers and Businesses.

Respectful Communication and Constructive Disagreement
To get to the best results, we work together, We do not pass the buck, We strive to resolve.

 

The Ashburn Area

Ashburn Area Demographics
Loudoun County is the second fastest growing county in the country, the third wealthiest county nationwide, fifth largest job growth in the country where the average household income is $120,000+. The Ashburn Area is approximately 5 miles wide and 7 miles long. The boundaries are the Potomac river on the North, Goose Creek on the West, Brambleton boarder on the South and Rt. 28 on the East. The population is approximately 73,000 out of the Loudoun County 223,000, or almost 1/3 of the Loudoun County total population. The Ashburn area is one of the fastest growing and highest income areas in Loudoun County and in the United States today. This fast growth is causing frustration and confusion with traffic and finding new businesses and needed services for the residents in the Ashburn Area. For so many years they’ve needed to travel too many miles to shop and eat or they just settled for a fast food dinner one more time. Time is extremely important for affluent families and the growth of the Centers along with AshburnDriectory.com is the perfect solution for this problem.

 

Our Actions

The GoAshburn.com Business Purpose
We have two groups to provide service to…the Centers and the Businesses in the Ashburn Area. We research the Ashburn Area to find, list, and keep current the new plans, groundbreaking and openings of ALL Centers and Businesses. It won’t be long before it will be the standard for any Ashburn Area new business to make connections with GoAshburn.com prior to their openings. Then, as new home growth continues, the new residents will need to know where to shop and GoAshburn.com will be the place for them to go.

Keep it Simple
A few clicks is all you need. Search by area, Center, Category, Trade Name, Business Name, or just plain alpha. The web pages are not loaded with block advertisements that confuse or distract visitors. There is not a ratings or feedback system on businesses. But we will take feedback on businesses that do not live up to the standards in the area, laws and local regulations and we will take action. We all have different tastes so restaurant feedback usually is not accurate nor are many other opinions. Some websites in the area "fake" the surveys to push businesses. That is not us! GoAshburn.com is map and search driven. Attractiveness is a high priority as well.

Completeness & Accuracy
GoAshburn.com is unique because it will contain EVERY Center and Business, whether Retail or Service, in the Ashburn Area! No other provider of this type of on-line service is even close. We will provide confidence to the visitors that they will be able to find EVERY business (and other service needs) that are in the Ashburn Area.

Planning and Under Construction
We Keep close tabs on future Center and Business planning and construction. We provide this information to our visitors as well to promote those businesses and Centers. This provides incentive for visitors to return to the site on a regular basis to see "What’s New!"

Technology
Utilizing "Mapping" as our current modern technology base we can provide an easy, fast and accurate search and display method for visitors. We also will be providing mobile web site capabilities in the near future to access GoAshburn.com by cell phones or handheld computers.

 

Marketing to Ashburn Area Visitors
We proactively pursue the affluent current and new residents who have a desire to not only save their time but to support local Centers and businesses in the Ashburn Area. We accomplished this task through:

Advertising

Media promotion

Sponsoring local events

Using Loudoun County Economic Development office

Sponsoring and participating in charitable events

Web promotions

Teaming with professional athletes headquartered in Ashburn

Utilizing the "Magic" promotion cards for giving away FREE dinner meals for families!

Drawings, coupons, and other contests such as "The Menu Hunt" are promoted on GoAshburn.com as well.

The Ashburn Area has very close and friendly neighborhoods which encourages "word-of-mouth" promotion.

We are working with the Home Owners Associations.

Much of the marketing concepts are based on experience (IBM sales experience) the books "the Tipping Point" and "The Millionaires Mind." (i.e. What triggers success and what is important to affluent families)

Expansion Goals
Our intent is to expand GoAshburn.com to LoudounDirectory.com within the year. We realize two important factors:

1. That the area is not that large in miles but the congested roads are improving every year;

2. That there will be 1,000’s of businesses in the Loudoun County area and some are so unique they worth the drive.

Hard Work
We take pride in doing the difficult but creative tasks to provide services that save our Visitors time, money and gas. By providing this renowned offering of quality, accuracy and completeness it makes our Web Site preeminent in the area.

Fun
The GoAshburn.com team members are positive people who celebrate success, learn from mistakes and enjoy our work. We love the satisfaction GoAshburn.com brings to our visitors of the Ashburn Area and to the increased revenue for the Ashburn Area Businesses and Centers.

Integrity
We expect Businesses to have integrity! In some cases we will ask them to provide licenses, certifications etc. if required by the state or county. We do not do background checks or any other type of investigaions. If a businesses has done what appears to an illegal or unethical act we encourage the residents to contact us by email to report it or report it to the appropriate community association or government agency. We do not try to be a screener for the area but to have appropriate concern for the residents.

Profits
We sustain the pursuit of a reasonable profit to support the growth and improvement of the Ashburn Area, the Centers, the Businesses, and our own GoAshburn.com. There are two potential paying clients for GoAshburn.com. The first is the Center property management companies. They have the choice to promote their own Center and to help pay for their client - businesses at their Centers on GoAshburn.com. The second is the individual businesses or a stand-alone. Many of the new Centers in progress are interested because they think it will give instant access to the potential 75,000 + potential Ashburn Area customers, which it will. The fees are simple and inexpensive for the area. We know that businesses pay up to $270 for one flyer for one month in a coupon envelope mailed to 10,000 residents of which most are tossed into the waste basket!. On GoAshburn.com the business pays our small fee with a potential 75,000 resident customers.

We have two additional fee services for businesses. First, businesses with a physical location in the Ashburn Area may place "Help Wanted" ads on our site at a very reasonable fee (coming soon). Second, a fee to have a listed business logo or image rotate in the banner of the home page.

 

GoAshburn's Stats...
Check  Out  the  Stats  Page

 Get Listed...

If you own a business in the Ashburn Area and would like to be listed on GoAshburn, email us at:  GoAshburn@gmail.com

BTW, We read this page every week...it helps to remind us to stay on tract, not be greedy and keep our focus on the Residents & Businesses!