Orange County Register

Chat rooms and forums may serve a purpose, but it’s not to boost the small-business bottom line. That’s what a whopping 72 percent of owners told Discover credit card’s Small Business Watch, a monthly random survey of 1,000 entrepreneurs with fewer than five employees.

Other findings:

• 67 percent like to network in person at trade shows, business meetings or chambers of commerce
• 6 percent use e-mail for networking
• 55 percent wouldn’t consider using a service or small business they heard about on a social or business networking Web site.

The anti-online bias is age related: 41 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds are members of online networking communities, while older owners are much less likely to join.

If you have a resource or tip to help small-business owners, send it to me at jnorman@ocregister.com. If I use it, I’ll use your name, company and Web site.

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