Name Connor MacLeod NetID Cmac375 Group Number: 274 QW4 http://infosys110groupxxx.blogspot.co.nz/ Tutorial Details Tutor: Day: Time: Yvonne Hong Thursday 10am Time Spent on Assignment: Word Count: 1627
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2 STUDENT SHOPWISE APP INTRODUCTION Students worldwide are struggling to maintain a healthy, fulfilling lifestyle as the rising prices of study means that students are lacking in other facets of their lives such as food, electronic devices and clothing. This has major effects on students through health problems, lack of connection to study and increased depression rates. (Eisenberg et al, 2007). The solution to this ever growing problem is that Student ShopWise will create an app, Student Savings, which would combine information from the websites of major clothing retailers, supermarkets, technology retailers and alcohol vendors to notify the student when there is a sale on in their area or online. 3. BUSINESS SECTION 3.1 Vision To create simplistic, affordable and innovative software to help university students around the world experience life. 3.2 Industry Analysis: Mobile Budgeting Application Industry
Force: High/Low: Justification: Buyer power: High There are multiple different apps who concern themselves with budgeting and keeping track of cash inflows and outflows over a period such as Expense Tracker 2.0 and Budget Planner (Apple, 2014) Supplier power: Low There are six major providers of hosting services which all have access to a large amount of users
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3 respectively. (North Carolina State University, 2014). Meaning that if one supplier attempts to control the price or raise the fees of hosting the app, Student Shopwise can remove the app from their marketplace and transfer it to another without decreasing the amount of target customers greatly. Threat of new entrants: High There are low barriers to entry. It only costs $99 USD to become an app developer and submit to the Apple App Store and the Windows Marketplace, whilst it is free to submit applications to the Google Play Store (Google, 2014) Threat of substitutes: High There are many substitutes for budgeting software such as an accountant, computer based budgeting software or a cash flow record. (Sorted, 2014) Rivalry among existing competitors: High There are currently over 500 free and paid iPhone (Apple, 2014) applications which relate to budgeting and saving, with similar amounts in the Google Play Store yet far less in the Windows Marketplace . Overall attractiveness of the industry: Using Porters Five Forces model, it is clear that the mobile budgeting application industry is a very competitive market in which it would be hard to succeed due to the multiple negative outcomes during the analysis. It will be hard to gain market share in the existing app market.
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4 3.3 Customers and Thei r Needs The customers of Student ShopWises app, Student Savings would be university students with smartphones. The need is to save money where possible - decreasing expenses and outflows of cash. In doing so, saving for the future and decreasing student loans, moving against the negative trend (Statistics New Zealand, 2012). Students currently desire the ability to see sales in their area in order to access them whilst budgeting their cash and credit inflows and outflows. Student Savings will fulfil these needs. 3.4 The Product and Service As commented on previously, Student Savings will allow students to see the sales occurring in the alcohol, clothing, electronics and food sectors in their area and online through aggregating sales data from the major retailers in each sector and mapping where the sales are occuring. Furthermore, Student Savings will allow students to monitor their cash flow through cash tracking functionalities. 3.5 Suppliers and Partners A supplier of Student ShopWise would be the App Stores who would host the Student Savings app on their marketplaces for purchase. These suppliers would be companies such as Apple, or Google. The companies supply Student ShopWise with the ability to market and sell the application to the consumers. Another supplier would be the app developer. The developer, i.e. App La Carte or App That, would create a fully functioning app for a fee, which customers would use to find the sales in their area or online. One partner of the firm would be the retail stores whose sales we would advertise such as Cotton on, Super Liquor or Countdown. We would partner with the retailers as there would be mutual benefit for both parties, for the retailers through higher sales and revenue, Student ShopWise though having data to create competitive advantage against other applications.
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5 A partner of Student ShopWise could be the electronic payment companies such as PayPal. We would partner with such firms as they would allow the customer to purchase the app- a benefit for Student ShopWise - whilst taking a fee for their revenue a benefit for the partners. 3.6 Strategy: Focussed Low Cost The competitive scope of Student ShopWise would be a narrow market as it is targeting university students. The pricing strategy would be low cost as Student ShopWise would offer the app for free as it would negate the purpose of the app if students had to pay for the application. Further, many other budgeting applications are free so paying for the app would decrease competitive advantage. The firm would make profits through in-app advertising. 3.7 Value Chain Activity: Service after Sale A key value chain activity of Student ShopWise is services after sale as this would allow Student Savings to be a sustainable name in the budgeting application market. As Student Savings has groundbreaking features, there may be bugs in the application. Because of this, it is important for feedback to be timely and relevant thus customer support functions must be reliable, ensuring simplicity of use and convenience for university students. This no frills customer service area would be beautiful yet simplistic, further enabling the low cost strategy. 3.8 Business Processes 3.8.1. CUSTOMER FEEDBACK This process is of paramount importance to Student ShopWise as it provides an avenue for the customers to correspond with the firm concerning the development of the application. This would start with the in app prompt for the user to rank and provide feedback for the application. The feedback processing system would analyse the feedback, searching for pseudo-code or predetermined buzzwords for relevance. If relevant, the process would proceed to categorise and collate the information for simplicity. There would
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6 then be a further analysis to decide if the data is technical based, if so, it would be sent to the external developers. If not, it would be sent to the relevant department for response. This would be directly related to the service after the sale as it is concerned with the customer facing aspects, and also ensures innovation through this customer consultation
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7 process. 3.8.2. APPLI CATI ON MAINTENECE PROCESS The maintenance process is extremely important to Student ShopWise as the continued innovation of the application means that the software needs to be updated regularly and this update would need to be checked for bugs to ensure the application is of the highest level post-purchase. The process would begin at receiving the relevant feedback from the students. If there was feedback regarding bugs, it would trigger the software maintenance system to check the system for whether it is fully operational. If it is, the feedback would be filed. If not, the system would check the coding to find the bug. If this bug is easy to fix, the coding software system would fix and subsequently update the code. This would then proceed to check the code and if it functions, it will be updated on the marketplace. If this fix doesnt work then the code will be updated and check until it functions. If the code is hard to fix, the code would be sent to the development department to fix. The internalisation of maintenance would keep costs down, ensuring a low cost product.
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8 3.9 Functionalities 3.9.1. CUSTOMER FEEDBACK PROCESS Analysing feedback for relevance Prompting the feedback and ranking 3.9.2. APPLI CATI ON MAINTENANCE PROCESS Detecting errors in code Checking systems are fully operational 3.10 Systems
3.10. 1. FEEDBACK PROCESSING SYSTEM: This system is of paramount importance to the key functionality of analysing feedback for relevance. This is because the system would would analyse the feedback, searching for pseudo-code or predetermined buzz words so as to filter the relevant feedback from those whose aim is to create conflict. The feedback processing system would be a bridge between university students and Student ShopWise, ensuring the innovation of the product going forward. 3.10. 2. OPERATIONS FUNCTIONALI TY SYSTEM: This system is key to running the systems check with the direct purpose of finding a bug. Through this system, the app, student savings is able to be fully operational, guaranteeing the university students a simple yet elegant application for budgeting. 3.10. 3. APPLICATION OPERATI ON SYSTEM: The application operation system enables the key functionality of checking systems are operational. This system would be located in the area of the maintenance process where the code has been updated and is being checked for quality. This would allow Student ShopWise to continue developing an innovative app which is fully operational for all students to use.
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9 3.11. Summary Table:
Value Chain Activity Processes Functionalities Specific Information System(s) Broad Information System(s)
Service After Sales 1. Customer Feedback Process
1. Analyse feedback for relevance 2. Prompting the feedback and ranking Feedback Processing System Customer Relationship Management 2. Application Maintenance Process 1. Detection of the Bug 2. Check systems are fully operational
Operations Functionality System
Application Operation System Transaction Processing System Transaction Processing System
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10 CONCLUSION The solution to the problem of students lack of ability to save, is for Student Savings to develop a simple and innovative application whereby students are given access to sales in their area and online in multiple different retail industries. Information systems create a huge value for Student ShopWise as it has allowed the platform for the application to operate on whilst simplifying and streamlining the processes of development, marketing, maintenance and customer feedback. Further, this leads to the sustained innovation of the application leading to a highly demanded application. REFERENCES Apple. (2014, May 8th). Apple App Store : Finance. Retrieved from Itunes: https://itunes.apple.com/nz/genre/ios-finance/id6015?mt=8 Eisenberg, D., Gollust, S. E., Golberstein, E., & Hefner, J. L. (2007). Prevalence and Correlates of Depression, Anxiety, and Suicidality Among University Students. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 534-542. Google. (2014, May 8). Andriod Developers. Retrieved from Andriod: http://developer.android.com/distribute/googleplay/publish/register.html North Carolina State University. (2014, May 8). Mobile Operating Systems. Retrieved from Mobile Operating Systems: http://www.csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/csc563/notes/ch-06.pdf Sorted. (2014, May 8). Sorted Budgeting. Retrieved from Sorted: https://www.sorted.org.nz/a-z- guides/budgeting Statistics New Zealand. (2012). Student Loans and Allowances. Statistics New Zealand. Retrieved from http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/education_and_training/Tertiary%20education/StudentL oansandAllowances_HOTP12.aspx Major Depressive Episodes (2011) Retrieved from (http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1741-7015-9- 90.pdf Dunedin Flats (2014). Retrieved from http://www.3news.co.nz/Damp-Dunedin-flats-Could-this-be-the- worst/tabid/817/articleID/337213/Default.aspx Empty Wallets, Empty Stomachs (2014) Retrieved from http://www.morningsun.net/article/20140323/NEWS/140329890/2134/NEWS
S.110 Business Systems: Deliverable 2: Business Section 2014 Name Marthalena Heather Netid Group Number: Website Link: Tutorial Details Tutor: Day: Time: Time Spent On Assignment: Word Count: 1641