Working in the Uncharted Technology Frontier: Characteristics of Women Web Entrepreneurs

The numbers of women choosing to become entrepreneurs has been steadily increasing for the past two decades. Recently, the Internet has provided a new venue for business that may be especially appealing for women. This study was conducted to explore gender- and business-related characteristics of women who own Internet businesses. Two hundred and eight women web entrepreneurs responded to an on-line survey. The results indicated that the types of businesses participants owned could be differentiated based on characteristics of the women web entrepreneurs. Specifically, women owning retail businesses reported less familiarity with computers and geared their Internet businesses more to women. In addition, participants defined the success of their Internet businesses in multiple ways that reflected their current life roles.This research was partially funded by an Initiatives for Women Grant from the University at Albany. A previous version of this article was presented at the Association for Women in Psychology conference in 2003.