How to Investigate A Business Online

Not all businesses are legitimate, but luckily the Internet makes determining that fact a lot easier.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Internet connection

1. It's As Easy As BBB - Start with the Better Business Bureau (bbb.org). You can search by website, phone number or company name. If they are listed you will be able to see how many complaints they have and if they have resolved them.

2. WHO IS On Second - Check out the website on WHOIS.net to see how long it has been online, when it will expire and the administrator's contact info.

3. If I Only Had a Stat Brain - StatBrain.com will tell you how many visits the site gets per day.

4. Map It Up - Use a satellite map (like google or bing.com) to see if the street address is a building, a house, an empty lot or a postal drop.

5. Search It Out - Use a search engine like google, yahoo, altavista or alltheweb.com to check out the info (phone, address, website, email, name of boss, etc) you've gathered. You may find that other people have investigated too.

Tips & Warnings

• Trust Your Gut - In the end all the research in the world can't make the final decision for you.
• Help Others - Once you find out all you can then you can help others by writing your own review on google or yelp.com.
• Not Necessarily Bad - Remember that even if a company has complaints it doesn't mean they are shady. It's how well they have resolved those issues that will give you a good idea on how they deal with customers and clients.