Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
ON
ONLINE BUSINESS ORGANIZATION WORKING IN
INDIA
Under the guidance of
(Mr.Sandeep singh)
(Chief Technical Head, InTecco Services)
A report submitted to Ishan Institute of Management & Technology, Greater Noida as a partial
fulfillment of full time post graduate diploma in business management
Submitted To:
Submitted By:
Dr.D.K.Garg,
Chairman,
IIMT,Gr. Noida
Batch: 16th
CERTIFICATE
This is to certify that the project work done on Comparative study of Online Business
Organisation Working in India submitted to Ishan Institute of Management and Technology,
Greater Noida by Prakash Kumar Singh MM-5009(PGDMM) In partial fulfilment of the
requirement for the award of degree of PG Diploma in Management, is a bonafide work carried out
by him under my supervision and guidance. This project work is the original one and has not been
submitted anywhere else for any other degree/diploma.
Date :
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I am glade to bring out this project report. I realized my duty of healthy thanks to all
those who helped me in bringing about this project and convey my heartiest gratitude towards all
of them.
I am extremely gratified to my faculty for their kind supervision and guidance as well as their
cooperation to complete this project in the best way. I pay my gratitude to our Chairman Sir
Dr .D.K. Garg & DEAN-Mr. M .K .Verma sir of my college for giving me a nice opportunity
as well as their kind attitude towards this work. I also want to thank my guide Mr.Sandeep
singh (Chief Technical Head) who helped me directly or indirectly. I am obliged & pay regards
to my institution for giving me such a kind opportunity to make this project to present my talent
before the world.
At last but not the least I would like to thanks my PARENTS in the absence of whom this
work could never be possible.
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DECLARATION
I PRAKASH KUMAR SINGH S/o DHANANJAY SINGH hereby declare that this project
report titled ONLINE BUSINESS ORGANIZATION WORKING IN INDIA , is an authentic
work done by me as complementary part of PGDM program from ISHAN INSTITUTE OF
MANAGEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY. Not it is not a duplicate work of readymade assignment
of others.
The content of this report is based on the information collected by me during my tenure of training.
This is the property of the institute and use of the report without prior permission of the institute will
be considered illegal and actionable.
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
E-commerce is booming! Broadband Internet access has finally become mass market in scale.
Access by broadband methods, including DSL, cable modem and satellite, has reached critical mass.
Tens of millions of American homes now have broadband access. Meanwhile, broadband access to
the Internet has become standard at most businesses and offices. Cable modem and DSL are battling
fiercely for market share.
On the wireless side, Wi-Fi is enjoying steady growth, with tens of thousands of public Wi-Fi
hotspots now in operation across the U.S. Bluetooth has gained wide acceptance for wireless
connection of networks to appliances such as printers. Meanwhile, WiMax, with its low cost and
range of up to 30 miles, threatens to revolutionize wireless access to the Internet. Sprint Nextel,
Motorola and Intel have recently announced massive investments in WiMax.
The booking of travel online is perhaps the most successful niche of all of the world's e-commerce
efforts. Consumers use the Internet to become better informed and to seek bargains. Online sites like
Expedia, Priceline and Orbitz steer millions of consumers toward specific airlines and hotels in a
manner that lowers prices and improves satisfaction among consumers.
Meanwhile, retailers of many types are enjoying soaring sales via the Internet, and most national
retail chains have carefully developed bricks and clicks strategies that integrate their online efforts
with their stores and catalogs. At the same time, many online-only retailers are finding that their
revenues are growing rapidly as more and more consumers begin to rely on the convenience of
shopping online.
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This carefully-researched data is a complete e-commerce and Internet market research and
competitive intelligence tool-- everything you need to know about the business of online access,
broadband, wireless and Wi-Fi, Internet retailing, online payment processing, technologies, webbased businesses and networks and more, including:
1. Market research, competitive intelligence and business analysis for all Internet and ecommerce business sectors
2. Analysis of major e-commerce, Internet and online access trends and developments
3. Wi-Fi, WiMax and other wireless access methods, including Bluetooth
4. Broadband Internet access analysis and trends, including access at home and at work via
DSL and cable modem
5. Retailing on the Internet, bricks and clicks strategies, including major online retailers such as
Amazon.com
6. E-commerce trends in the travel business, including online booking, ticket sales and research
as well as profiles of leading online travel companies such as Expedia and Orbitz
7. Internet and e-commerce consultants
8. Networking equipment, IP software and hardware manufacturers, distributors and trends.
9. FTTP (Fiber to the premises) and FTTH (Fiber to the home) trends.
10. Web-based businesses, SAAS (Software as a Service) and ISPs (Internet Service Providers)
11. Internet based telephone (VOIP), voice over the Internet
12. Convergence of voice, video, data, entertainment over the Internet
Whether you purchase the printed almanac or buy a subscription to the online edition, you will find a
complete overview, industry analysis and market research tool in one superb, value-priced package.
We provide you with our famous industry trends analysis, statistical tables, and a glossary, along
with a database of industry contacts including associations and professional societies. And you
receive our proprietary, in-depth profiles of hundreds of leading companies in all facets of this
industrypublic and private companies, U.S. and non-U.S. based.
PREFACE
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There are number of forces that make marketing an endlessly changing activity. The constantly
changing activity sociological, psychological and political environment may represent the
uncontrollable marketing factors. As a student of management, apart from theoretical studies we
need to get a deeper insight into the practical aspects of those theories by working on various
projects. So these projects have high importance in management studies to enhance the knowledge
and skills.
Management in India is heading towards a better profession as compared to other professions. The
demand for professional managers is increasing day by day. Working on this project has been an
enriching experience. This project will help us a lot in the professional growth. It has given us the
confidence to prepare for ourselves as fully fledged international marketing professional in the
eminent future. A comprehensive understanding of the principle will increases the decision-making
ability and sharpens the tools for this purpose.
The demand for professional managers is increasing day by day. To achieve profession competence,
manager ought to be fully occupied with theory and practical exposure of management.
A comprehensive Understanding of the principle will increases their Decision making ability and
sharpening their tools for this purpose. The scope of the work under taken by us includes
introduction to basic & major things about the impact of textile products on the customer and also
their own future aspects.
TABLE OF CONTENT
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01
09- 46
02
47- 69
03
70-83
04
84126
05
Legal Aspect
127-151
06
152-187
(b) To Business
07
188-210
08
Future Prospective
211-236
09
SWOT Analysis
237-258
(a) Strength
(b) Weakness
(c) Opportunities
(d) Threats
10
259-268
Conclusion
Bibliography
Word of Thanks
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CHAPTER: -01
HISTORICAL PROSPECTIVE OF
ONLINE BUSINESS
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In the 50s and early 60s, prior to the widespread inter-networking that led to the Internet, most
communication networks were limited by their nature to only allow communications between the
stations on the network. Some networks had gateways or bridges between them, but these bridges
were often limited or built specifically for a single use. One prevalent computer networking method
was based on the central mainframe method, simply allowing its terminals to be connected via long
leased lines. This method was used in the 1950s by Project RAND to support researchers such as
Herbert Simon, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, when collaborating across the continent with
researchers in Santa Monica, California, on automated theorem proving and artificial intelligence.
The Internet system was developed and ready in the Late 1980s, but The Cold War held up
the progress. When it ended in 1992, the internet slowly became main stream. By the end of the
decade, millions were using it for business, education and pleasure.
Internet marketing also referred to as i-marketing, web-marketing, online-marketing or e-Marketing,
is the marketing of products or services over the Internet.
The Internet has brought media to a global audience. The interactive nature of Internet marketing in
terms of providing instant responses and eliciting responses are the unique qualities of the medium.
Internet marketing is sometimes considered to be broad in scope because it not only refers to
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marketing on the Internet, but also includes marketing done via e-mail and wireless media.
Management of digital customer data and electronic customer relationship management (ECRM)
systems are also often grouped together under internet marketing. Internet marketing ties together
creative and technical aspects of the Internet, including: design, development, advertising, and sales.
Internet marketing also refers to the placement of media along many different stages of the customer
engagement cycle through search engine marketing (SEM), search engine optimization (SEO),
banner ads on specific websites, e-mail marketing, and Web 2.0 strategies. In 2008, The New York
Times - working with comScore - published an initial estimate to quantify the user data collected by
large Internet-based companies. Counting four types of interactions with company websites in
addition to the hits from advertisements served from advertising networks, the authors found the
potential for collecting data upward of 2,500 times on average per user per month. In this section, we
introduce the marketing concept, and then consider its relationship to more recent concepts such as
Internet marketing, e-commerce and e-business. The word marketing has two distinct meanings in
modern management practice. It describes:
The range of specialist marketing functions carried out within many organizations. Such
functions include market research, brand/product management, public relations and customer
service.
An approach or concept that can be used as the guiding philosophy for all functions and activities
of an organisation. Such a philosophy encompasses all aspects of a business. Business strategy is
guided by an organisations market and competitor focus and everyone in an organization should be
required to have a customer focus in their job.
The modern marketing concept (Houston, 1986) unites these two meanings and stresses that
marketing encompasses the range of organizational functions and processes that seek to determine
the needs of target markets and deliver products and services to customers and other key
stakeholders such as employees and financial institutions. Increasingly the importance of marketing
is being recognized both as a vital function and as a guiding management philosophy within
organizations. Marketing has to be seen as the essential focus of all activities within an organization
(Valentin, 1996). The marketing concept should lie at the heart of the organization, and the actions of
directors, managers and employees should be guided by its philosophy. Modern marketing requires
organizations to be committed to a market/customer orientation (Jaworski and Kohli, 1993). All parts
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of the organization should co-ordinate activities to ensure that customer needs are met efficiently,
effectively and profitably. Marketing encompasses activities traditionally seen as the sole domain of
accountants, production, human resources management (HRM) and information technology (IT).
Many of these functions had little regard for customer considerations. Increasingly such functions
are being reorientated, evidenced by the importance of initiatives such as Total Quality Management
(TQM), Business Process Reengineering, Just in Time (JIT) and supply chain management.
Individuals functional roles are undergoing change, from being solely functional to having a greater
emphasis on process. Individuals are therefore being encouraged to become part-time marketers.
Processes have a significant impact on an organisation s ability to service its customers needs.
1) The client uses the web browsers on the local terminal to connect to the e-commerce site via
the internet/intranet.
2) The site presents the client with the products/ services offered . usually a smart website
flashes some new product in their website so that consumers or visitors have a access to it.
The site provides with various option, important option which buyer have is search as they
can search the product which they want and can a pleasure of accessing the site. Whereas for
seller there is option known as click to sell to sell their product.
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3. The client chooses to make online transaction, and the e-Commerce sire
requests
4. The E-commerce site (also called the server), requests personal and financial
information from the client that is relevant to the authentication and validation of the
transaction in process. This is sent for validation to a transaction server connected to
all database of all the supporting financial institution. (foe E.g. , the authentication
database of Mastercard, American Express or Visa), or the internal authentication
database of an internet. Depending on the values returned to the transaction server by
the authentication database, the clients transaction process is further processed.
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E-business really means the extension of business systems and providing an easy to use interface
between the external world and the organization, while increasing reach. Where one can complete
the transaction online and integrate the supply into transaction management process.
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The Internet can be applied by companies as an integral part of the modern marketing concept since:
It can be used to support the full range of organisational functions and processes that deliver
products and services to customers and other key stakeholders.
It is a powerful communications medium that can act as a corporate glue that integrates the
different functional parts of the organisation.
It facilitates information management, which is now increasingly recognised as a critical
marketing support tool to strategy formulation and implementation.
The future role of the Internet should form part of the vision of a company since its future impact
will be significant to most businesses.
Without adequate information, organisations are at a disadvantage with respect to competitors and
the external environment. Up-to-date, timely and accessible information about the industry, markets,
new technology, competitors and customers is a critical factor in an organisation s ability to plan
and compete in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
The Internet was designed in part to provide a communications network that would work even if
some of the sites were destroyed by nuclear attack. If the most direct route was not available, routers
would direct traffic around the network via alternate routes. The early Internet was used by computer
experts, engineers, scientists, and librarians. There was nothing friendly about it. There were
no home or office personal computers in those days, and anyone who used it, whether a computer
professional or an engineer or scientist or librarian, had to learn to use a very complex system.
Internet marketing, also known as digital marketing, web marketing, online marketing, search
marketing or e-marketing, is the marketing (generally promotion) of products or services over the
Internet.
Internet marketing is considered to be broad in scope because it not only refers to marketing on the
Internet, but also includes marketing done via e-mail and wireless media. Digital customer data and
electronic customer relationship management (ECRM) systems are also often grouped together
under internet marketing.
Internet marketing ties together the creative and technical aspects of the Internet, including design,
development, advertising, and sales Internet marketing also refers to the placement of media along
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many different stages of the customer engagement cycle through search engine marketing (SEM),
search engine optimization (SEO), banner ads on specific websites, email marketing, and Web 2.0
strategies.
In 2008, The New York Times, working with ComScore, published an initial estimate to quantify the
user data collected by large Internet-based companies. Counting four types of interactions with
company websites in addition to the hits from advertisements served from advertising networks, the
authors found that the potential for collecting data was up to 2,500 times per user per month.
Internet marketing defined Internet marketing The application of the Internet and related digital
technologies in conjunction with traditional communications to achieve marketing objectives.
Internet marketing or Internet-based marketing can be defined as the use of the Internet and related
digital technologies to achieve marketing objectives and support the modern marketing concept.
These technologies include the Internet media and other digital media such as wireless mobile
media, cable and satellite. In practice, Internet marketing will include the use of a company web site
in conjunction with online promotional techniques such as search engines, banner advertising, direct
e-mail and links or services from other web sites to acquire new customers and provide services to
existing customers that help develop the customer relationship. However, for Internet marketing to
be successful there is a necessity of integration with traditional media such as Print and TV
E-marketing defined Achieving marketing objectives through use of electronic communications
technology 6
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The term Internet marketing tends to refer to an external perspective of how the Internet can be
used in conjunction with traditional media to acquire and deliver services to customers. An
alternative term is e-marketing or electronic marketing (see for example McDonald and Wilson,
1999 and Smith and Chaffey, 2001) that can be considered to have a broader scope since this refers
to the Internet, interactive digital TV and mobile marketing together with other technology
approaches such as database marketing and electronic customer relationship management (CRM) to
achieve marketing objectives. It has both an internal and external perspective considering how
internal and external marketing processes and communications can be improved through information
and communications technology. As with many terms with the e prefix, we need to return to an
original definition of the topic to more fully understand what e-marketing involves. The definition of
marketing by the Chartered Institute of Marketing (www.cim.co.uk) is: Marketing is the
management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements
profitability This definition emphasises the focus of marketing on the customer, while at the same
time implying a need to link to other business operations to achieve this profitability. Smith and
Chaffey (2001) note that Internet technology can be used to support these aims as follows:
Identifying the Internet be used for marketing research to find out customers needs and wants.
Anticipating the Internet provides an additional channel by which customers can access
information and make purchases understanding this demand is key to governing resource
allocation to e-marketing.
Satisfying a key success factor in e-marketing is achieving customer satisfaction through the
electronic channel, this raises issues such as is the site easy to use, does it perform adequately, what
is the standard of associated customer service and how are physical products dispatched?
A broader definition of marketing has been developed by Dibb, Simkin, Pride and Ferrell (Dibb et
al., 2000): Marketing consists of individual and organisational activities that facilitate and expedite
satisfying exchange relationships in a dynamic environment through the creation, distribution,
promotion and pricing of goods, services and ideas. This definition is useful since it highlights
different marketing activities necessary to achieve the exchange relationship , namely product
development, pricing, promotion and distribution. Since the Internet has now become a primary tool
for the delivery of information, businesses of all sizes are using online marketing to increase
awareness of their company's goods and services.
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One-to-one approach: In a one-to-one approach, marketers target a user browsing the Internet alone
and so that the marketers' messages reach the user personally. This approach is used in search
marketing, for which the advertisements are based on search engine keywords entered by the users.
This approach usually works under the pay per click (PPC) method.
Appeal to specific interests: When appealing to specific interests, marketers place an emphasis on
appealing to a specific behavior or interest, rather than reaching out to a broadly defined
demographic. These marketers typically segment their markets according to age group, gender,
geography, and other general factors.
Niche Marketing: Niche and hyper-niche internet marketing put further emphasis on creating
destinations for web users and consumers on specific topics and products. Niche marketers differ
from traditional Internet marketers as they have a more specialized topic knowledge. For example,
whereas in traditional Internet marketing a website would be created and promoted on a high-level
topic such as kitchen appliances, niche marketing would focus on more specific topics such as 4slice toasters.
Niche marketing provides end users of such sites very targeted information, and allows the creators
to establish themselves as authorities on the topic or product.
Geo-targeting : In Internet marketing, geo targeting and geo marketing are the methods of
determining the geolocation of a website visitor with geolocation software, and delivering different
content to that visitor based on his or her location, such as latitude and longitude, country, region or
state, city, metro code or zip code, organization, Internet Protocol (IP) address, ISP, and other
criteria.
Display Advertising: Display advertising involves the use of web banners or banner ads placed on a
third-party website to drive traffic to a company's own website and increase product awareness.
Email Marketing: Companies that use email marketing send promotional emails directly to
customers. However, it can often be hard to distinguish between spam and legitimate email
marketing messages.
Interactive Advertising: Interactive advertising involves the use of animations and other graphic
techniques to create ads that engage the viewer and invite participation.
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Search Engine Marketing: Search Engine Optimization (SEO), paid placement, and paid inclusion
are search engine marketing techniques that companies can use to increase their visibility in the
search engine page results from Google and its competitors.
Viral Marketing: Viral marketing is a technique is which companies encourage customers to pass
along information about their products or services. Company websites that let visitors email
interactive games or funny video clips to their friends are an example of a viral marketing effort.
Advantages and Limitations of Internet marketing
Advantages
Internet marketing is inexpensive when examining the ratio of cost to the reach of the target
audience. Companies can reach a wide audience for a small fraction of traditional advertising
budgets. The nature of the medium allows consumers to research and to purchase products and
services conveniently. Therefore, businesses have the advantage of appealing to consumers in a
medium that can bring results quickly. The strategy and overall effectiveness of marketing
campaigns depend on business goals and cost-volume-profit (CVP) analysis.
Internet marketers also have the advantage of measuring statistics easily and inexpensively; almost
all aspects of an Internet marketing campaign can be traced, measured, and tested. The advertisers
can use a variety of methods, such as pay per impression, pay per click, pay per play, and pay per
action. Therefore, marketers can determine which messages or offerings are more appealing to the
audience. The results of campaigns can be measured and tracked immediately because online
marketing initiatives usually require users to click on an advertisement, to visit a website, and to
perform a targeted action.
Limitations
However, from the buyer's perspective, the inability of shoppers to touch, to smell, to taste, and "to
try on" tangible goods before making an online purchase can be limiting. However, there is an
industry standard for e-commerce vendors to reassure customers by having liberal return policies as
well as providing in-store pick-up services.
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Security concerns: Information security is important both to companies and consumers that
participate in online business. Many consumers are hesitant to purchase items over the Internet
because they do not believe that their personal information will remain private. Some companies that
purchase customer information offer the option for individuals to have their information removed
from the database, also known as opting out. However, many customers are unaware if and when
their information is being shared, and are unable to stop the transfer of their information between
companies if such activity occurs.
Another major security concern that consumers have with e-commerce merchants is whether or not
they will receive exactly what they purchase. Online merchants have attempted to address this
concern by investing in and building strong consumer brands (e.g., Amazon.com, eBay, and
Overstock.com), and by leveraging merchant and feedback rating systems and e-commerce bonding
solutions. All these solutions attempt to assure consumers that their transactions will be free of
problems because the merchants can be trusted to provide reliable products and services.
Additionally, several major online payment mechanisms (credit cards, PayPal, Google Checkout,
etc.) have provided back-end buyer protection systems to address problems if they occur.
Usage trends: Technological advancements in the telecommunications industry have dramatically
affected online advertising techniques. Many firms are embracing a paradigm that is shifting the
focus of advertising methodology from traditional text and image advertisements to those containing
more recent technologies like JavaScript and Adobe Flash. As a result, advertisers can more
effectively engage and connect their audience with their campaigns that seek to shape consumer
attitudes and feelings towards specific products and services.
Effects on industries: The number of banks offering the ability to perform banking tasks over the
internet has increased. Online banking appeals to customers because it is often faster and considered
more convenient than visiting bank branches.
Internet auctions: Internet auctions have become a multi-billion dollar business. Unique items that
could only previously be found at flea markets are now being sold on Internet auction websites such
as eBay. Specialized e-stores sell a vast amount of items like antiques, movie props, clothing,
gadgets, and so on.
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As the premier online reselling platform, eBay is often used as a price-basis for specialized items.
Buyers and sellers often look at prices on the website before going to flea markets; the price shown
on eBay often becomes the item's selling price.
Advertising industry
In addition to the major effect internet marketing has had on the technology industry, the effect on
the advertising industry itself has been profound. In just a few years, online advertising has grown to
be worth tens of billions of dollars annually. PricewaterhouseCoopers reported that US$16.9 billion
was spent on Online marketing in the U.S. in 2006.
This has caused a growing impact on the United States' electoral process. In 2008, candidates for
President heavily utilized Internet marketing strategies to reach constituents. During the 2007
primaries candidates added, on average, over 500 social network supporters per day to help spread
their message. President Barack Obama raised over US$1 million in one day during his extensive
Democratic candidacy campaign, largely due to online donors.
Several industries have heavily invested in and benefited from internet marketing and online
advertising. Some of them were originally brick and mortar businesses such as publishing, music,
automotive or gambling, while others have sprung up as purely online businesses, such as digital
design and media, blogging, and internet service hosting.
Online marketing or internet marketing is a relatively new, but rapidly expanding and fundamentally
important aspect of strategic implementation. Indeed in many organizations, it may be regarded as a
functional aspect of marketing strategy and certainly of the business model. Final Touch Inc
considers online marketing very different from ordinary business marketing and brings six categories
of organic benefit: costs are reduced, capability is increased, communications are refined, control is
enhanced, customer service is improved and competitive advantage may be achieved depending on
the competitors reaction.
Analysis
Online marketing processes include not only e-marketing and sales, but supply chain and channel
management, manufacturing and inventory control, financial operations and employees workflow
procedures across an entire organization. Essentially e-business technologies empower customers,
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employees, suppliers, distributors, vendors, and partners by giving them powerful tools for
information management and communications. Online marketing or e-marketing is always confused
with e-commerce. Any business marketing using online media is known as e-marketing, while on the
other spectrum, if there is financial transaction involved with the electronic process using internet
technologies, it is e-commerce.
Since a web presence is essential for a business to grow in all dimensions, a dynamic website, blog
and social media activity, is the best way to develop sell your products and services to prospective
local and international clients.
Customer satisfaction is the most important aspect of business development through e-marketing.
There are certain online marketing tips that can truly enhance the worth of your business. The
website needs to show complete contact information, this will help customers to rely on the company
that if something goes wrong, someone will be there to listen to them. Impressive profile of products
or services search engines is great idea of marketing business through online sources. Data
warehousing to map customer needs that is FAQ`s, auto replies, built in call back facility and queries
recording is also essential in this regard. Customer relationship management CRM needs to be
focused separately. E-branding, that is, to make your site attractive through animations and slide
shows inclusion.
Conclusion
Driven by competitive pressures, companies are employing online marketing for a variety of
purposes. Its main advantage is the increase in revenues through optimal customer and partner
management. Online marketing strengthens the operational core of a business by reducing the
amount of loss and instability. In addition to this, it fortifies interactivity that is pull mechanism and
push model. Industry structure enhances customer relations and removal of intermediations, agents
and distributors. Hence e-marketing has been playing a role of bridge between businesses and end
customers in a most effective manner.
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Shopping/Buying Pattern
Indians are shopping online and as per eBay Indias latest numbers eBay India is selling one
product every minute.Hot selling products are not the most obvious ones i.e. software/computer
related etc, but its jewelry!
It is jewelry that is the most sought and a piece of it is sold every 7 minutes on eBay India (other
popular categories are Coins or currency notes, mobile handsets, stamps, books, music players and
watches).
On an average day, a piece of jewellery is sold every 7 minutes, a coin or note sells every 16
minutes, a stamp sells every 19 minutes, an apparel sells every 22 minutes and a book is sold every
27 minutes.
ecommerce in India : India had over 2,471 eCommerce Hubs in eBay Census 2009. With
Lakshadweep making its debut in eBay Census 2009, all 28 States and 7 Union Territories witnessed
eCommerce Transactions. The IT Hubs of Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Maharashtra and
Gujarat were the most wired states in India with the most cities where ecommerce originates.
Rural Indians are active online shoppers: Online shopping is active in 747 rural towns in India.
Rural India featured in eBay Census for the first time with towns like Bundi (Rajasthan), Thevaram
(Tamil Nadu) and Tezpur (Assam) witnessing active buying and selling trends. In fact, 181 rural
towns are active entrepreneurship hubs selling to buyers in India & worldwide.
Global Trade is well established: India has 226 Export Hubs where Indian entrepreneurs sell a
variety of products to millions of eBayers in 172 countries around the globe. Indian exports include
horse saddles, Freemason collectibles, Bollywood memorabilia, Steel Dabbas and cricket bats.
The first live Internet link into low earth orbit was established on January 22, 2010 when astronaut T.
J. Creamer posted the first unassisted update to his Twitter account from the International Space
Station, marking the extension of the Internet into space. (Astronauts at the ISS had used email and
Twitter before, but these messages had been relayed to the ground through a NASA data link before
being posted by a human proxy.) This personal Web access, which NASA calls the Crew Support
LAN, uses the space station's high-speed Ku band microwave link. To surf the Web, astronauts can
use a station laptop computer to control a desktop computer on Earth, and they can talk to their
families and friends on Earth using Voice over IP equipment.
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Communication with spacecraft beyond earth orbit has traditionally been over point-to-point links
through the Deep Space Network. Each such data link must be manually scheduled and configured.
In the late 1990s NASA and Google began working on a new network protocol, Delay-tolerant
networking (DTN) which automates this process, allows networking of spaceborn transmission
nodes, and takes the fact into account that spacecraft can temporarily lose contact because they move
behind the Moon or planets, or because space "weather" disrupts the connection. Under such
conditions, DTN retransmits data packages instead of dropping them, as the standard TCP/IP internet
protocol does. NASA conducted the first field test of what it calls the "deep space internet" in
November 2008. This network technology is supposed to enable missins that involve multiple
spacecraft where reliable inter-vessel communication might take precedence over vessel-to-earth
downlinks. According to a February 2011 statement by Google's Vint Cerf, the so-called "Bundle
protocols" have been uploaded to NASA's EPOXI mission spacecraft (which is in orbit around the
sun) and communication with Earth has been tested at a distance of approximately 80 light seconds.
Internet governance
As a globally distributed network of voluntarily interconnected autonomous networks, the Internet
operates without a central governing body. It has no centralized governance for either technology or
policies, and each constituent network chooses what technologies and protocols it will deploy from
the voluntary technical standards that are developed by the Internet Engineering Task
Force(IETF).However, throughout its entire history, the Internet system has had an "Internet
Assigned Numbers Authority" (IANA) for the allocation and assignment of various technical
identifiers needed for the operation of the Internet. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names
and Numbers (ICANN) provides oversight and coordination for two principal name spaces in the
Internet, the Internet Protocol address space and the Domain Name System.
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current decision-makers in the day-to-day technical aspects of the network. While recognized as the
administrators of certain aspects of the Internet, their roles and their decision making authority are
limited and subject to increasing international scrutiny and increasingly objections. These objections
have led to the ICANN removing themselves from relationships with first the University of Southern
California in 2000, and finally in September 2009, gaining autonomy from the US government by
the ending of its longstanding agreements, although some contractual obligations with the U.S.
Department of Commerce continued.
The IETF, with financial and organizational support from the Internet Society, continues to serve as
the Internet's ad-hoc standards body and issues Request for Comments.
In November 2005, the World Summit on the Information Society, held in Tunis, called for
an Internet Governance Forum (IGF) to be convened by United Nations Secretary General. The IGF
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short in being able to accommodate all the existing data types and in being able to grow without
bottlenecks.
One of the most promising user interface paradigms during this period was hypertext. The
technology had been inspired by Vannevar Bush's "Memex" and developed through Ted Nelson's
research on Project Xanadu and Douglas Engelbart's research on NLS. Many small self-contained
hypertext systems had been created before, such as Apple Computer's HyperCard (1987). Gopher
became the first commonly-used hypertext interface to the Internet. While Gopher menu items were
examples of hypertext, they were not commonly perceived in that way.
In 1989, while working at CERN, Tim Berners-Lee invented a network-based implementation of the
hypertext concept. By releasing his invention to public use, he ensured the technology would
become widespread.[84] For his work in developing the World Wide Web, Berners-Lee received
the Millennium technology prize in 2004. One early popular web browser, modeled after HyperCard,
was ViolaWWW.
A potential turning point for the World Wide Web began with the introductio of the Mosaic web
browser[87] in 1993, a graphical browser developed by a team at the National Center for
Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (NCSA-UIUC), led
by Marc Andreessen. Funding for Mosaic came from the High-Performance Computing and
Communications Initiative, a funding program initiated by the High Performance Computing and
Communication Act of 1991 also known as the Gore Bill. Indeed, Mosaic's graphical interface soon
became more popular than Gopher, which at the time was primarily text-based, and the WWW
became the preferred interface for accessing the Internet. (Gore's reference to his role in "creating
the Internet", however, was ridiculed in his presidential election campaign. See the full article Al
Gore and information technology).
Mosaic was eventually superseded in 1994 by Andreessen's Netscape Navigator, which replaced
Mosaic as the world's most popular browser. While it held this title for some time, eventually
competition from Internet Explorer and a variety of other browsers almost completely displaced it.
Another important event held on January 11, 1994, was The Superhighway Summit at UCLA's Royce
Hall. This was the "first public conference bringing together all of the major industry, government
and academic leaders in the field [and] also began the national dialogue about the Information
Superhighway and its implications."
24 Hours in Cyberspace, "the largest one-day online event" (February 8, 1996) up to that date, took
place on the then-active website, cyber24.com.It was headed by photographer Rick Smolan.[92] A
photographic exhibition was unveiled at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American
History on January 23, 1997, featuring 70 photos from the project.
Search engines
Even before the World Wide Web, there were search engines that attempted to organize the Internet.
The first of these was the Archie search engine from McGill University in 1990, followed in 1991
by WAIS and Gopher. All three of those systems predated the invention of the World Wide Web but
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all continued to index the Web and the rest of the Internet for several years after the Web appeared.
There are still Gopher servers as of 2006, although there are a great many more web servers.
As the Web grew, search engines and Web directories were created to track pages on the Web and
allow people to find things. The first full-text Web search engine was WebCrawler in 1994. Before
WebCrawler, only Web page titles were searched. Another early search engine, Lycos, was created in
1993 as a university project, and was the first to achieve commercial success. During the late 1990s,
both Web directories and Web search engines were popularYahoo! (founded 1994)
and Altavista (founded 1995) were the respective industry leaders. By August 2001, the directory
model had begun to give way to search engines, tracking the rise of Google (founded 1998), which
had developed new approaches to relevancy ranking. Directory features, while still commonly
available, became after-thoughts to search engines.
Database size, which had been a significant marketing feature through the early 2000s, was similarly
displaced by emphasis on relevancy ranking, the methods by which search engines attempt to sort
the best results first. Relevancy ranking first became a major issue circa 1996, when it became
apparent that it was impractical to review full lists of results. Consequently, algorithms for relevancy
ranking have continuously improved. Google's PageRank method for ordering the results has
received the most press, but all major search engines continually refine their ranking methodologies
with a view toward improving the ordering of results. As of 2006, search engine rankings are more
important than ever, so much so that an industry has developed ("search engine optimizers", or
"SEO") to help web-developers improve their search ranking, and an entire body of case law has
developed around matters that affect search engine rankings, such as use oftrademarks in metatags.
The sale of search rankings by some search engines has also created controversy among librarians
and consumer advocates.
On June 3, 2009, Microsoft launched its new search engine, Bing. The following month Microsoft
and Yahoo! announced a deal in which Bing would power Yahoo! Search.
File sharing
Resource or file sharing has been an important activity on computer networks from well before the
Internet was established and was supported in a variety of ways including bulletin board
systems(1978), Usenet (1980), Kermit (1981), and many others. The File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
for use on the Internet was standardized in 1985 and is still in use today. A variety of tools were
developed to aid the use of FTP by helping users discover files they might want to transfer, including
the Wide Area Information Server (WAIS) in 1991, Gopher in 1991, Archie in 1991, Veronica in
1992, Jughead in 1993, Internet Relay Chat (IRC) in 1988, and eventually the World Wide
Web (WWW) in 1991 with Web directories and Web search engines.
In 1999 Napster became the first peer-to-peer file sharing system. Napster used a central server for
indexing and peer discovery, but the storage and transfer of files was decentralized. A variety of
peer-to-peer file sharing programs and services with different levels of decentralization
and anonymity followed,
including: Gnutella, eDonkey2000,
and Freenet in
2000, FastTrack, Kazaa,Limewire, and BitTorrent in 2001, and Poisoned in 2003
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All of these tools are general purpose and can be used to share a wide variety of content, but sharing
of music files, software, and later movies and videos are major uses. And while some of this sharing
is legal, large portions are not. Lawsuits and other legal actions caused Napster in 2001,
eDonkey2000 in 2005, Kazza in 2006, and Limewire in 2010 to shutdown or refocus their
efforts. The Pirate Bay, founded in Sweden in 2003, continues despite a trial and appeal in 2009 and
2010 that resulted in jail terms and large fines for several of its founders. File sharing remains
contentious and controversial with charges of theft of intellectual property on the one hand and
charges of censorship on the other.
Dot-com bubble
Main article: Dot-com bubble
Suddenly the low price of reaching millions worldwide, and the possibility of selling to or hearing
from those people at the same moment when they were reached, promised to overturn established
business dogma in advertising, mail-order sales, customer relationship management, and many more
areas. The web was a new killer appit could bring together unrelated buyers and sellers in
seamless and low-cost ways. Entrepreneurs around the world developed new business models, and
ran to their nearest venture capitalist. While some of the new entrepreneurs had experience in
business and economics, the majority were simply people with ideas, and did not manage the capital
influx prudently. Additionally, many dot-com business plans were predicated on the assumption that
by using the Internet, they would bypass the distribution channels of existing businesses and
therefore not have to compete with them; when the established businesses with strong existing
brands developed their own Internet presence, these hopes were shattered, and the newcomers were
left attempting to break into markets dominated by larger, more established businesses. Many did not
have the ability to do so.
The dot-com bubble burst in March 2000, with the technology heavy NASDAQ Composite index
peaking at 5,048.62 on March 10[106] (5,132.52 intraday), more than double its value just a year
before. By 2001, the bubble's deflation was running full speed. A majority of the dot-coms had
ceased trading, after having burnt through their venture capital and IPO capital, often without ever
making a profit. But despite this, the Internet continues to grow, driven by commerce, ever greater
amounts of online information and knowledge and social networking.
phenomenon with Japan, South Korea and Taiwan all soon finding the majority of their Internet
users accessing resources by phone rather than by PC. Developing countries followed, with India,
South Africa, Kenya, Philippines, and Pakistan all reporting that the majority of their domestic users
accessed the Internet from a mobile phone rather than a PC. The European and North American use
of the Internet was influenced by a large installed base of personal computers, and the growth of
mobile phone Internet access was more gradual, but had reached national penetration levels of 20
30% in most Western countries. The cross-over occurred in 2008, when more Internet access devices
were mobile phones than personal computers. In many parts of the developing world, the ratio is as
much as 10 mobile phone users to one PC user.
Online population forecast
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including a lack of centralized documentation for much of the early developments that led to the
Internet.
"The Arpanet period is somewhat well documented because the corporation in charge BBN left a
physical record. Moving into the NSFNET era, it became an extraordinarily decentralized process.
The record exists in people's basements, in closets. [...] So much of what happened was done
verbally and on the basis of individual trust."
Doug Gale (2007),
Gerard Goggin is currently researching internet histories in Australia and the Asia-Pacific and the
implications of audio-visual media for government policy .
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E-business encompasses all activities that a firm performs for selling and buying products and services using
computers and communications technologies. In broad terms, e-business includes a host of related activities, such
as online shopping, sales force automation, and supply-chain management, electronic payment systems, Web
advertising, and order management.
E-commerce is buying and selling goods and services over the Internet. Based on this definition, e-commerce is
part of e-business. However, in many cases the two are used interchangeably.
E-business, a major contributor to the popularity of global information systems, is a system that includes not only
those transactions that center on buying and selling goods and services to generate revenue, but also those
transactions that support revenue generation. These activities include generating demand for goods and services,
offering sales support and customer service, or facilitating communications between business partners.
E-commerce builds on traditional commerce by adding the flexibility offered by computer networks and the
availability of the Internet. By generating and delivering timely and relevant information through computer
networks, e-commerce creates new opportunities for conducting commercial activities online, and thus it fosters
easier cooperation between different groups: branches of a multinational company sharing information for a major
marketing campaign; companies working together to design and build new products or offer new services; or
businesses sharing information to improve customer relations.
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Global reach
Higher profile
24 7 availability
Targeted focus
Cost savings
Global Reach
A small organization no longer has to be a local organization. Anyone with Web access (in a living room in
Chicago, in a log cabin in Alaska, or in a caf in Bordeaux) can spend their time, and their money, at any online
business.
Higher Profile
A company can have a significant Web presence and profile, even with relatively modest depth and breadth to its
inventory. On the Internet, a small but very efficient company can have the profile of a much larger, deeppocketed competitor.
24 7 Availability
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E-businesses do not have to close at the end of the day. Information and services can be available any time, any
day, allowing revenue to be earned without interruption.
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E-business websites are private property. They may be thought of as a piece of virtual real estate in cyberspace.
Because they are positioned in cyberspace there is an implied invitation to visit them. They are intended to be
visited. Visitation is encouraged further by advertising. This is one reason why websites need to implement
applicable Terms of Use so that customers and visitors are on notice as to the house rules applicable to the
websites, their content, services and use. Website Terms of Use have become the principal legal strategy for
managing the legal risks associated with e-business or virtual business websites.
Another major characteristic of e-commerce business applications is to recognize their dependence on information
technology. The risks of computer errors, hackers, computer viruses, denial of service attacks, power outages,
computer malfunctions and unplanned downtime need to be appreciated. Security, reliability and scalability are
thus very important to e-commerce businesses and promise to become increasingly more important in the years
ahead. Cyber security has become increasingly more important as the risks become increasingly more threatening.
Another factor is the anonymous nature of the relationship between e-buyers and e-sellers. Fraud is much more of
a risk in e-business transactions because of the anonymous character of the relationship. There are concerns over
possible export control violations, customers being children or other persons who are not competent to enter into a
contract with the seller, or being someone using another partys identity or account number. Identity theft has
become a major concern. These concerns are more problematic because of the anonymous, virtual relationship
that exists in e-business transactions. It is also important to recognize that brand names and branding strategies are
much more important in e-business. E-business companies need to recognize the importance of a trust relationship
with their customers. Trust has emerged as a critical success factor.
It is important to recognize that most e-business applications involve intellectual property considerations. Linking,
framing, caching and downloading, for example, all implicate the copyright laws. Access to and use of most of
website content also may require copyright analysis. Patent, trademark, domain name and trade secret issues may
also need to be considered. The intellectual property analysis should be an integral part of the early planning and
design for new e-business applications.
E-commerce business models are usually based on the network effect. Network effects arise when the value of the
e-business application increases with the addition of each participant.
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Supply and demand do not have the traditional economic relationship. E-business agreements tend to be short in
duration with due regard to rapidly changing market conditions and advances in technology. Exponential
improvements in technology keep occurring year after year. These differences need to be appreciated.
E-business transaction data and site usage data are becoming increasingly more valuable. Click-histories and
customer data are considered to be very valuable commercially. Likewise, privacy policies and procedures are
given more heightened concern in e-business transactions compared to other brick and mortar transactions.
The internet is a communications medium. First Amendment issues may arise. Much of e-business is carried out
through electronic agreements and electronic communications which implicate some specific legal issues and
requirements. Electronic communication and transactions are being carried out at internet speed. The speed of
these communications and transactions also needs to be appreciated. There is less time for reflection and more
potential or mistakes. Computer software errors and data input errors, for example, may cause serious problems.
Finally, the internet affords dramatic possibilities for opening up societies that are relatively insular and closed to
the outside world, although that promise remains unfulfilled particularly in countries that block unfettered access
to the internet or that control ISPs.32 However, there are many countries that block access to the internet, or
regulate the content that may be seen by citizens in their country.33 Efforts to obstruct content stand starkly in the
way of the free flow of information and technology that has led new markets to emerge, in part, as new
technologies have matured.
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Typically in the B2B environment, E-Business can be used in the following processes:
Procurement;
Order fulfillment;
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For many Welsh SME s B2B E-Business is synonymous with the vision of integrated supply chains. This might
be the ultimate objective, but, in the short term, B2B E-Business could be used as a significant enabler in their
move towards greater trading partner collaboration. E-Business technologies have allowed even the smallest
businesses to improve the processes for interfacing with customers. They are now able to develop services for
individual clients rather than provide a standard service. Pentwyn Splicers based in Pontypool manufacture
pneumatic splicers for the UK and world textile market. They evaluated all aspects of their business process to
determine where the greatest return could be obtained. Using the Web to sell more products was an initial
consideration, but it was in the provision of customer service and support to their overseas distributors that the
greatest benefits have been achieved.
Streamline the supply chain, manufacturing, and procurement processes, and automate corporate processes to
deliver the right products and services to customers quickly and cost-effectively;
Capture, analyze, and share, information about customers and company operations, in order to make better
decisions.
Example: A home user wishes to purchase some good quality wine. The user accesses the Internet site
http://wwww.craigs.com.au and follows the links to read a report on the recommended wines. After reading the
tasting notes the user follows the links to place an order along with delivery and payment details directly into the
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merchants inventory system. The wine is then dispatched from the suppliers warehouse and in theory is
delivered to the consumer without delay.
Example: Harry is planning a holiday in Darwin. He requires a flight in the first week of December and is only
willing to pay $250. Harry places a submission with in a web based C2B facility. Dodgy Brothers Airways
accesses the facility and sees Harrys submission. Due to it being a slow period, the airline offers Harry a return
fare for $250.
B2A is the least developed area of e-Business and it relates to the way that public sector organizations, at both a
central and local level, are providing their services on-line. Also known as e-Government, it has the potential to
increase the domestic and business use of e-Business as traditional services are increasingly being delivered over
the Internet.
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The UK government is committed to ensuring this country is at the forefront of e-Business and it is essential
that e-Government plays a significant part in achieving this objective
among corporations until recently, especially web-based auctioning platforms, and were used for
sourcing.
There are benefits to both buying and selling online, and it is becoming an industry on its own. If
retailers can succeed in making their stores accessible and enjoyable to use, consumers will keep
coming back, and keep up the growth of online stores.
Online retail industry has learned the importance of customer its satisfaction and services required.
Retailers can present themselves online and retail sales for the consumers will be easier to get
information with a single click.
A portal provides easier, quicker, convenient and more understandable information and shopping
experience for consumers. Consumers can make product feature comparisons among a selection of
items all at once and quickly, Product research to finding the best. Buyers guides can help you much
in this regard. You can also get secure transactions privacy on online shopping.
Online shopping is now the main tool for the retailers that are providing good customer base and the
conversion of online shopping had increased tremendously in past few years.
Online shopping is a fastest growing culture in India and it becomes very popular dut to the rapid
internet penetration. Online shopping has shown a consistent rise due to the great response from
people. In future, the numbers suggesting the development of the online shopping is expected to rise
continuously. Consumers buy a variety of products and services from online stores. There are just
hundreds of products like Books, clothing, household appliances, toys, hardware, software, and
health insurance which consumers can buy from an online store. Many people prefer to conduct
shopping online because of the convenience.
Online shops provide almost every product that you might need in your day to day life. Several
Online Shops offer the rarest range of products that you generally not even find on the physical
stores.
Online shopping provides numerous advantages like 24 hours shopping, which requires less travel,
rich product availability and specifications etc. Unlike conventional shopping the consumer can get a
detailed account of the variety of the products through the website. By Online Shopping You save a
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lot of time which you normally need to go to the physical store and buy the products which you
want.
Bestbuy.ind.in is India's fastest growing online shopping portal which provides low price deals,
coupons, discounts and promotions from popular Indian stores. Bestbuy offers an exclusive onestop-shop online hub for net-savvy Indian online shoppers. It offers best low price daily deals on
various brands and products from popular Indian
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There are many more sites for shopping online, people feel easy to buy stuff online with their debit
and credit cards. One can sit anywhere such as at home, cybercafs etc and buy what ever they want.
With the growth of supporting network technology and popularity of social media, it is said that
internet usage in India will continue to grow.
The current online shoppers base in India is 34.5 million, a good 6.5 million bigger than last years
figure of 28 million. The balance 78% online shoppers only search for products online and then
probably buy them offline. Google is the most used website in India, almost 35% of all online
Indians use this website. Yahoo the second most used website, then Gmail, Rediff etc
Its hard to believe that India only had 25,000 internet users backin1988. Comparing to the current
internet users, the result is simply notable. India has now become a need for all the Indians.
Indias National Per Capita income is US$ 2,880 (Using PPP method), so for a population of 7.72
million work out to be US$22 Billion. So if, only 10% is being spent on the online spend, it still
works out to be US$2 Billion.
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CHAPTER:-02
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Since about 1990, online shopping has emerged into every corner of life, linking people to the
culture of capitalism in frequent and daily ways. It lets us buy what we want, when we want at our
convenience, and helps us to imagine ourselves buying, owning, and having positive outcomes by
the goods available out there on the web. Shopping has been a way of identifying oneself in today's
culture by what we purchase and how we use our purchases. Online shopping has always been a
middle to high class commodity since its first arrival on the internet in society
History of Online Shopping starts not so long ago. Tim Berners-Lee created "The World Wide Web
Browser" in 1990. In1994 few other developments took place. Online bank , the first of its kind
opened in year 2005-2006. Another development was opening of online pizza shop by pizza hut.
In the same year Netscape introduced SSL encryption to enable encryption over the data transferred
online. This later became the necessity of online shopping. In 1995, Amazon started operation, one
of the largest online shopping mall now. Then in 1996 eBay started its online shopping portal.
1998 witnessed use of electronic postage stamps, where people can download and print postal
stamps after paying nominal fee. In 1999 the first online shop in UK launched.
Years later, people started reviewing products and then it became obvious that web can also be used
for selling goods. Instead of writing reviews, marketers started writing with sales pitch
(copywriting), which is still one of the important aspects of e commerce.
The important years in e-commerce history.
1994 : Pizza Hut opened its Online Shop.
1994 :
Netscape introduced the SSL system, which became the necessity for every online
transaction.
1995
1996
Amazon.com
:
eBay
launched
its
operations.
started
its
services.
2003 : Amazon.coms first year of profit.2005 : Google became the dominant search engine to find
and buy goods and service.
Online shopping, internet shopping or web shopping is the process of buying and selling done
over the web. With the help of Internet, now you can buy things online from the comfort of your
home. You can compare products, check prices, read reviews and make decision in fraction of time
than that you normally need when you do the real world shopping.
Just like in real-world shopping, you need to have a shop or mall for people to come and buy things.
In online world, the shop is a website called online shopping site or simply online shopping mall.
Online mall in reality is a catalog of products available for shopping. These catalog contains
products arranged to categories, prices and brands. You can select the products of your interest and
add to the Virtual Basket called online shopping cart. When you finish shopping, you can
checkout and pay for the products using your credit card or bank account.
Online shopping does not necessarily be concentrated on products, in fact online shopping can also
be done for services. For example, insurance services can be bought online. Online shopping is the
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one part of e commerce revolution, where every business is finding its online presence more
profitable and easily manageable.
Features:
1. Digital convergence: The digital revolution has made it possible for digital devises to
communicate with each other there is a massive growth of networking which has made it
possible to navigate on internet. As today we can see many transactions takes place through
network connected globally. Smooth and efficient transactions take place because of digital
availability.
3. Increasing pressure on operating costs and profit margins: Global competition and the
proliferation of products and services worldwide have added unusual pressure on operating
costs and profit margins. E-commerce addresses these concerns quickly and efficiently at
lower costs.
4. Changes in organization: Today, the trend is toward parterning owners and managers across
department to develop chain of relationships that adds value to the enterprise by maintaining
relationship with the customers.
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5. Demand for customized products and services: Today, the customer have become more
choosy and demand higher quality and better performance, includinga customized way of
producing, delivery and paying for goods and services.
7. .Collaborative Working: Ecommerce facilitate the various business partners, customers from
different geographical locations and suppliers to work in a collaborative manner in order to
manage, allocate and improve project work without any geographical location barriers.
Advantages
1. Convience: The major advantage of online shopping is the convenience it offers. By sitting
back at home you can now shop anything from candles to vehicles by several clicks of mouse
buttons. The worry you may have on traveling, traffic blocks and parking constraints in real
world shopping can be avoided while shopping online. With online shopping, you need not
have to worry about weather conditions as well.
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2. Time Flexibility: Another big advantage of online shopping is the flexibility of shopping.
Unlike offline shops, online shops have no holidays, closing times or any other problems.
You can shop 24hrs a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year. Is n't that amazing to have a
shop open always ?
3. Price and quality comparison: One of the advantage of online shopping is the facilities
available for product, price comparisons. Since so many companies have come up with the
facilities of online shopping, the price comparison and quality comparison of the products
and services are possible. Some online malls also provide customer reviews about each
product, thus you can easily find out what other customers think about the product or services
before buying it.
4. Amazing Offers: You can efficiently use these facilities to decide whether a product or
service is worth the price quoted. If you are lucky you will be also getting amazing offers
from different online stores that will effectively reduce the price than buying offline.
5. Information provided: online shopping provides ample information regarding the product
which the consumer expect about the product such as for car it covers the company name,
mileage, manufacturing date, etc.
6. Payment Credit Period: In E-shopping consumer do not need to make tangible payment of
their goods as the consumer need to pay it after some period which gives consumer a better
time period to make arrangement for the payment.
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7. No Geographical Barrier: Ecommerce facilitate people to carry out their business without any
geographical barrier because all the business transaction of buying and selling has to be done
over the internet which implies no geographical barrier.
Disadvantages to consumers:
1. Lack of personal interaction: In online shopping consumer is supposed to buy the goods
with the help of information provided by the website about the respective product, here it is
assumed that with these information the is convinced to buy the product. there is no salesman
to provide information about the product.
2. Tangibility factor: in online shopping there is absence of tangibility factor. . Seeing the
picture of a product is far inferior to that of seeing it in real world. When you go for real
world shopping, you can actually touch, feel or sense it with different means, but for online
shopping you can only view the electronic catalogues. Eventhough this problems has been
rectified to certain extent by use of 3D product catalogues, some online malls still uses the
old fashioned images in product catalogues.
3. Shipping cost: If the shipping cost is more than the actual product cost, then in such situation
it becomes senseless and meaningful to make purchase through online shopping.
4. No scope for bargaining: In online shopping the consumer do not have any scope for
bargaining he has to get convinced with what the displaying price of the product. Except for
online auction.
5. Time factor: Once the customer places an order then he has to wait long, in order to get
delivery of his product, since it is a long procedure it normally takes 10-15 days to actually
reach the product to the consumer.
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6. Security factor: While making online shopping the consumer should have to be conscious
about the usage of his credit cards, so that it gets prevented from any unauthorized users such
as hackers, so security concern becomes another deterring factor for the consumer while
going for online shopping.
7. Not suitable for all categories of products: The consumer become more physical oriented for
some goods such as perfumes, clothes etc because they can be purchased by the customer
only having a good fragrance, good quality etc.
The Internet is the lowest cost system ever developed to communicate with a potential audience of
hundreds of millions of people all over the world. Evenlocally, the cost of a simple Web site is
usually less than the cost of a modest ad in a business telephone directory. A Web site can also give
more information than atelephone directory ad, including color photos, detailed descriptions of
products andservices, and price information that can be changed at any moment, for any
reason,instead of waiting for a printed directory's next publication cycle.
As a news medium, the Internet is faster and more flexible than a newspaper or magazine. A story
can be added to a Web site instantly at any time of the day or night. There are no deadlines (except
self-imposed ones) for Internet news. The"printing press" is always on, you might say. Even
television news, aside from afew 24-hour news channels, must usually wait for scheduled news
broadcast timesinstead of breaking into entertainment programming whenever a new story
comesalong. Television is also constrained by its necessarily linear information deliveryformat. It
must tell a story, then another story, then take a break for advertising, thentell another story, and so
on, in sequence. A viewer cannot choose to view only afew stories that he or she finds interesting,
which may occupy only five minutes outof a 30-minute newscast. On the Internet, a reader is free
not only to choose to view just those stories in which he or she is most interested, but also gets to
choose theorder in which he or she sees them. If sports scores are the highest item on today'sagenda,
click and there's the sports section, as easy as turning a newspaper page.Another click and there's the
score from the game that just ended, possibly withvideo highlights only one more click away.
Corrections, changes, and updates to a story published on the Internet can be madeas fast as they
come in without waiting for a printing press to roll. Breaking news
alerts can be sent instantly by email to subscribers who request this service, and areader can instantly
communicate with an online publication's editors via email or,if the publication has this facility, post
his or her comments on a "message board"for other readers to see right away, without waiting for a
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fax or mail to get throughand an editor to look the message over and perhaps include it in the "letters
to theeditor" section several days after the original story ran.
An online publication can also offer an advertiser something that is not available inany other
medium: ads that link directly, with one click, to a Web page full of compelling reasons to buy the
advertised product or service. Even if only a fractionof one percent of all people who see a Web ad
click on it, that is still an infinitelyhigher percentage than can click on a magazine ad or TV spot for
additionalinformationor even to buy a product directly from the advertiser right now. Evenif few
readers click on an individual online ad and buy right now, a Web ad still hasthe same branding and
general "get the name out" effect as advertising in other media. If the cost of an online ad is similar
to the cost of one in another medium, itrepresents a better value because of the ability it gives an
advertiser to give aninterested person an entire Web site full of information right away, only one
click removed from the online publication in which that ad is running.
But the most direct way to make money online, no matter how a merchant getstraffic to his or her
Web site, is to sell over the Internet. E-commerce has had itsups and downs, but the overall trend is
upward, and it is likely to stay that wayfor many years to come. Putting up a "catalog" Web site is far
less expensivethan printing and mailing paper catalogs, and the Web site can have "instant"ordering
and credit card acceptance built right into it, whereas a paper catalogcan generate only phone orders
that require a horde of (expensive) liveoperators to process or mail-in order forms that a customer
must fill outAn6
These are some companies which are working online:Ebay.in: No wonder that worldwide leader in retail Ebay is doing great in India too. Backed by a
powerful brand, loyal customers, and experience in online retail it has generated good traction in
India. It came to the Indian scene with a bang by acquiring Baazee.com in june 2004 for Rs 230 cr.
Their graph in compete or alexa shows that though they have a large loyal customer base , they are
not attracting new visitors. Maybe its time to revamp their strategy a little
Flipkart.com: I call it the Indian amazon.com; and what do you know according to their linkedin
page it was launched in sept 2007 by employees of Amazon.com . With traffic comparable to that
of ebay.in I dont think they should call themselves a startup. I also came across some good revies
about the site in mouthshut.com. The success story of flipkart would require a separate post.
Infibeam.com: I will give a 9/10 to this website on site content and design. They were in news
recently when they acquired picsquare. Infybeams Car retail section is also a unique in this space
which is helping them to gain a lot of eyeballs.
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Shopping.rediff.com: Rediff never fails to impress me. Full with Simple and elegant web 2.0
features and the website is seamless. I did actually buy a gift from rediff and the experience was
quite satisfying. What they could probably do is to increase their inventory. I think they can do better
given that alexa shows only 1.7% of the customers visiting rediff.com visit shopping.rediff.com
Naaptol.com: Positioned as a comparison website, they actually do sell online too. They have
multiple revenue sources like advertising, selling online and passing on leads for local stores. The
site is very rich on content and the design seems to be flawless. Refined web 2.0 features are also
present in the website.
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Shopping.indiatimes.com: Give the Times brand and the popularity of the Indiatimes website I
personally feel that they can do better. Their homepage is cluttered with a lot of links. They are
trying to sell too many things but unfortunately they only have a single homepage. A redesign in the
lines of shopping.rediff.com can do wonders to their traffic and profitability.
Indiaplaza.in: Amazingly Indiaplaza which looks so Indian is a company based in US. They were
acquired by Fabmall.com and retained the name Indiaplaza. Given their traction and visits I think
they can afford a redesign of the website. I find the websites design and features very basic.
Homeshop18.com: Like all other network 18 websites, it has also taken India by storm. Very
professionally designed and promoted the website is gaining traction fast. Running on Network 18s
Information network they are a possible player to be watched out in the future.
India getting comfortable with online shopping now
Is the average middle class Indian getting more tech-friendly in terms of consumer electronics,
changing the way India shops? This is the question Experian Hitwise asked in its research. Its
findings show that shopping is the 10th most popular online activity in India, ranking below social
networking, news and travel, but picking up more visits than government, music or sports websites.
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By international standards, Indian e-commerce is immature - shopping ranks fifth in online activities
in the US and fourth in the UK, Experian's research reveals - but it is developing rapidly. Indians are
increasingly seen using the internet to get more information and to shortlist preferences.
A typical online retailer in India receives half of its traffic from search engines. Topping the list of
most searched-for products are cellphones at 3.5 per cent of all product-related search terms sending
traffic to retailers. Nokia rules, picking up two in every five searches.
Searches for "wireless internet" have more than doubled over the last three months, while 'mobile
movies' is the eighth most popular mobile phone-related search term. Software downloads are also in
demand, while laptops, TVs and cameras are respectively the third, fourth and fifth most searched
for products online.
"The only non-gadget to make it into the top five list of most searched-for products is cars - one in
every 25 searches is for cars. A third of these searches are for 'used' or 'second hand' cars; many
specify a location. Bangalore is the most popular location for car searches, followed by Mumbai and
Chennai," said Navin Chandani, MD, Experian Marketing Services, India.
Cars are not the only the products searched for by location. Three of the 10 most visited retail sites
fall into this category, with Quikr and ClickIndia taking the two top spots and carwale.com in eighth
position. "The popularity of local classifieds sites pushes eBay India into seventh place. At number
four, Amazon, another global e-commerce superpower, is one of only two other non-India sites in the
top 10," Chandani said. At number three is Softronic, which specialises in software downloads. The
fifth spot is taken by B2B trading platform Alibaba, while entertainment and ticketing site Book-myshows.com is in ninth place.
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Process of e-shopping
At first the consumer need to decide that whether he would like to go for online shopping or not then he may
proceed.
In todays world there are many web sites available for the customers for people such as ebay.com,
rediff.com, ezee.com etc. so they can get access to any one of these and they may decide what product
whether they would like to purchase these websites provides consumers with number of products from
which a buyer can have his choice for purchasing products or services.
At first the consumer need to visit online malls.i.e. website in internet language these online malls are nothing
but the the website, from where you will be making online buying of goods and services.
The consumer must select a proper and good website for purchasing product such as eay.com., baazi.com etc.
after accessing and getting connected to a respective website, a consumer need to go for selection of particular
category of products. There are huge number of categories available right from antiques products, maps of the
country to internet games, fine jewellery etc.. if we go for each category then it will take entire day to look for
all the products available for buying.
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Now take one example, if any customer selects motor category where in automobiles are there for selling.
then the consumer shall required to click on motor category, then he will see many sub-categories such as
cars and trucks, powersports,motorcycles(two-wheeler), boats, other vehicles which includes uses, military
vehicles, race cars etc. now among each of these sub-categories the consumer will have various products
available for them such as in cars and trucks category the consumer will have different models of cars along
with their entire details including price image of the model etc.then from these the consumer can make
decision regarding buying or not.
After looking at the product then consumer will take the decision that whether he will buy the product or not.
If consumer decides to buy the product then consumer shall place the product in virtual shopping cart i.e.
consumer will just add the product on the shopping cart .in other words shopping cart is just like basket in
physical shopping terms. Where you will take or keep all those products which you decided to buy.
The next step is to login using a username and password. Many online malls first require you to register with
them before allowing you to pay for the bought items. Enter the address to which you want the product to be
delivered. You might also want to select the payment modes for payment here. After choosing the mode of
payment there will other boxes to fill your billing address or the payment details. Some online malls even
asks for your email, phone numbers etc.
Then wait for the confirmation of your order, you can also modify the order by adding or removing
items. You can also cancel order if needed.
Keep the printed copy of the purchased order and confirmations for records. In the event of any
disputes, you will need to show these documents for verification.
After some days the order will be placed at your door step and you can have the actual product or
service that you have ordered and just need to check that whether the product purchased is as per
your wish.
Now well if any consumer want to buy tickets online then
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At first the consumer need to select the category or event of which he intended to buy then he may proceed
further. Consumer can also type a particular search for his ticket.
Your search will show all the relevant info needed to enter a bid or Buy-it-Now, including section and row
information. Utilize the venue maps within the listings which show you exact venue seating layout. Also,
check out our team and concert tour schedule pages which allow you to easily manage ticket search results by
team or artist, event date and location. These schedules are available for popular teams such as the Yankees,
Red Sox, Cubs, Heat and Lakers, artists like the Rolling Stones and Coldplay, and leagues such as the NFL
and NCAA Football.
You can book your ticket and then you can have it at your by making payment to the online seller through
credit cards. If incase the event cancels due to any reason or it never takes place then in such a situation it is
not refunded. But if the event does not take place then in such a situation it depends upon the policy of the
seller whether to refund it or not.
There are many websites which provides for the guidance of newcomer as to how he should buy the
ticket and about all related stuff. The sellers online ticket places their advertisement well before an
month advance. The sellers in order to attract the buyer gives various preferences or information
related to the subject. For E.g. The site which sells tennis tickets it also gives information about top
ten men, women, doubles, mix etc.
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Payment by credit card is the widely accepted method of payment for online shopping. However
the other methods, like using e checks, paypal & bank transfer are also common. The method of
payment is decided upon the mutual trust and familiarity between online merchant and the customer.
Various methods of payment are described below.
Credit Cards:- A consumer can make payment by using credit cards, buyer is supposed to give his
Credit card number then seller will check whether it si valid or not and accordingly debit his account.
Credit card also has its limit only till that amount a credit can be taken.
Debit Cards:- A similar transactions as like Credit Card but only the difference is here already the
amount will be there in buyers account and he can make a purchase only up to the available balance
amount.
Cheque Payment:- Just mail or courier the cheque to the sellers place with the relevant or invoice
amount.
Money Order :- The consumer actually physically make the payment of goods. He send it through
post and then cash is received by the seller. Consumer gets a acknowledgement of his payment which
assures him that his payment has reached to the seller.
Electronic money:- In electronic cash consumer is supposed to pay via internet. Consumer must pay
to his bank then the bank gives certain numerals for payment which the consumer gives through
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internet to seller and then the buyer bank will send supply the he money is withdrawn from a
consumer's account in the form of a certificate and transferred into the vendor's account for
purchases. Like paper money, it can be reused as long as there's money in the bank to back it up
Cash on delivery (C.O.D., offered by very few online stores):- These is offered by few sellers only as
there is always a risk(In case if consumer refuses to pay the entire amount and get involves in
unnecessary bargains) involved in these where is consumer is supposed to pay his money at the
delivery of his product to the company official.
online
payment using credit cars, debit cards,. Here for more protection Paypal gives a security
code, PayPal introduced an optional security key as an additional precaution against fraud. A
user account tied to a security key has a modified login process: he enters his login ID and
password, as he normally would, but then he is prompted to press the button on the security
key and enter the six-digit number generated by it. This two-factor authentication is intended
to prevent an account from being compromised by a malicious third party without access to
the physical security key. However, if a user loses his key, he can alternatively authenticate
by providing the credit card or bank account number listed on his account.
Google Checkout:- Google Checkout is an online payment processing service provided by Google
aimed at simplifying the process of paying for online purchases. Users store their credit or debit card
and shipping information in their Google Account, so that they can purchase at participating stores at
the click of a button. Google Checkout also offers fraud protection, as well a unified page for tracking
purchases and their status. Making transactions using Google Checkouts is banned in ebay , ebay
insist its buyer to go for paypal.
Some sites will not allow international credit cards and billing address and shipping
address have to be in the same country in which site does its business. Other sites allow
customers from anywhere to send gifts anywhere. The financial part of a transaction might
be processed in real time (for example, letting the consumer know their credit card was
declined before they log off), or might be done later as part of the fulfillment process.
While credit cards are currently the most popular means of paying for online goods and services, alternative
online payments will account for 26% of e-commerce volume by 2009 according to Celent.
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Now once we make payment then, the seller should accept it.
Once a payment has been accepted the goods or services can be delivered in the following ways.
Download: This is the method often used for digital media products such as software, music, movies,
or images.
Shipping: The product is shipped to the customer's address.
Drop shipping: The order is passed to the manufacturer or third-party distributor, who ships the item
directly to the consumer, bypassing the retailer's physical location to save time, money, and space.
In-store pickup: The customer orders online, finds a local store using locator software business
model
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In the case of buying an admission ticket one may get a code, or a ticket that can be printed out. At
the premises it is made sure that the same right of admission is not used twice.
In the event of a problem with the item - it is not what the consumer ordered, or it is not what they
expected - consumers are concerned with the ease with which they can return an item for the correct
one or for a refund. Consumers may need to contact the retailer, visit the post office and pay return
shipping, and then wait for a replacement or refund. Some online companies have more generous
return policies to compensate for the traditional advantage of physical stores. For example, the
online shoe retailer Zappos.com includes labels for free return shipping, and does not charge a
restocking fee, even for returns which are not the result of merchant error. (Note: In the United
Kingdom, Online shops are prohibited from charging a restocking fee if the consumer cancels their
order in accordance with the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Act 2000.
One of the hardest areas to deal with in online shopping is the delivery of the products. Most companies offer
shipping insurance in case the product is lost or damaged; however, if the buyer opts not to purchase
insurance on their products, they are generally out of luck. Some shipping companies will offer refunds or
compensation for the damage, but it is up to their discretion if this will happen. It is important to realize that
once the product leaves the hands of the seller, they have no responsibility (provided the product is what the
buyer ordered and is in the specified condition).
Travel and tourism: In India, IRCTC is the most successful eCommerce initiative. It has
contributed Rs 340 Million to the total eCommerce business of Rs 900 Million.
Online Shopping: In metro cities, particularly Delhi and Mumbai, online shopping is becoming
popular. Some of the stores providing online shopping facilities include: The Bombay Store, Big
Bazaar, Pantaloons, and shopping portals on websites such as www.rediff.com.
Locations of widespread eCommerce activity: Mumbai is Indias leading eCommerce
marketplace. Delhi ranks second in online shopping activity. Indias top 5 eCommerce hubs are:
Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Jaipur and Bengaluru.
According to a survey conducted by eBay, India had about 2,471 eCommerce hubs in 2009. In this
year, all 28 states and 7 Union Territories of India witnessed eCommerce transactions. Additionally,
the survey reveals that most of the eCommerce transactions originate from Andhra Pradesh, Tamil
Nadu, Kerala, Maharashtra, and Gujarat. These are the cities where most of the IT hubs are located.
Products
Kindle Store
Manage Your Kindle
Appstore for Android
Applications
Games
Free Amazon Applications
Digital Games & Software
Game Downloads
Software Downloads
Your Games & Software Library
Audible Audiobooks
Audible Membership
Audible Audiobooks & More
New & Notable
Listener Favorites
Books
Books
Kindle eBooks
Textbooks
Audiobooks
Magazines
Movies
Music & Games
Movies & TVBlu-ray
Amazon Instant Video
MusicMP3 Downloads
Musical Instruments
Video Games
Game Downloads
Electronics & Computers
TV & Video
Home Audio & Theater
Camera, Photo & Video
Cell Phones & Accessories
Video Games
MP3 Players & Accessories
Car Electronics & GPS
Appliances
Musical Instruments
Laptops, Tablets & Netbooks
Desktops & Servers
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Computer Accessories
Computer Parts & Components
Software
PC Games
Printers & Ink
Office & School Supplies
Home, Garden & Tools
Kitchen & Dining
Furniture & Dcor
Bedding & Bath
Patio, Lawn & Garden
Home Improvement
Power & Hand Tool
Lamps & Light Fixtures
Kitchen & Bath Fixtures
Hardware
Building Supplies
Arts, Crafts & Sewing
Pet Supplies
Grocery, Health & Beauty
Grocery & Gourmet Food
Natural & Organic
Health & Personal Care
Beauty
Toys, Kids & Baby
Clothing (Kids & Baby)
Video Games for Kids
Clothing, Shoes & Jewelry
Handbags & Accessories
Luggage
Watches
Sports & Outdoors
Exercise & Fitness
Outdoor Recreation
Athletic & Outdoor Clothing
Team Sports
Bikes & Scooters
Golf
Boating & Water Sports
Fan Shop
Automotive & Industrial
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CHAPTER:-03
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If even those are taken, you can register your name in one of the more than 100 non-U.S. top-level
domains (TLDs) like .cc and .nu. The drawback is that these don't have the recognition of. Com-and
your
prospects will automatically slap on a .com if your domain name hasn't imprinted itself on their
noggins.
B) Choosing a Web Host:With your Web site authored, you need a place to stow it so visitors can access itand you have
hundreds of choices. Many of these hosts are free, and few cost more than $20 per month. Truth is,
setting
up your own host--a dedicated computer that's permanently wired into the Net--is time-consuming
and
expensive and, for most small businesses, a bad idea. Better to outsource hosting to folks who
specialize
in it.
While choosing the web host for our E-Business we should adopt the following parameters
How
will it cost?
How
C) A to Z of Legal Issues
Copyright :- The footer of When building our Web site, domain names are an important part. Often
they
are directly tied to our our site should display a copyright notice for the content of the site. The
notice should read " [date] [copyright owner name] All rights reserved." We should also deposit a
copy of
the site with the Copyright Office to record ownership of the site's content, look and feel.
Domain Name:business name, our logos and our brand. Businesses often fail to give proper
thought to which domain name to choose. Picking a domain name should have the same careful
thought
as naming other products or services. Choosing a domain name should include analysis of trademark
law
in relationship to the name.
Export:- If persons from other countries use our site, then We are exporting. Depending on the
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information on your site, what kind of business We do, the technology and information involved, our
site
may be subject to regulations formulated by both exporting and importing countries, and We should
consult with our legal adviser about these business decisions.
Framing:- It is important to be careful how our Web site frames to other sites. There have been
trademark cases regarding consumer confusion over which site is which, and which site is the source
of
the content and data.
Giveaways:- Sweepstakes, contests, lotteries and giveaways are governed by state and national
laws as to how they must be conducted.
Home Page:- On the footer of the home page of the site, We should have a link to our privacy
policy, our user agreement or terms and conditions, and our copyright notice.
Insurance:- Be sure that our business insurance covers Web site activities. Often Web site
activities are excluded from errors and omissions and other business insurance.
Jurisdiction:- One of the primary reasons for having a user agreement is to better address the
issues of jurisdiction. Under current law, Web site owners may be subject to jurisdiction and law in
any
state or country where its users are located.
Linking:- When linking to other sites, we should consider two factors. One is what word or image
you are using for the link and whether it is a trademark of another site or company. If so, you need
the
trademark owner's permission to post the company's trademark on your site. Second, you should
always
link to the home page of a Web site since there have been "deep linking" cases claiming loss of
advertising
revenue, which would have been gained if the users had been directed through the home page.
Obscenity:- Materials that are considered obscene by state or federal law are not permitted on
the Internet and, especially, may not be viewed by children. What is obscene is based on the local
standards of the viewing community.
Trademark:-Trade marking the name of our company, logo, mottos and domain name is an
important part of our business development and should be reflected on our Web site. our nationally
registered marks should display an and unregistered marks should display a or SM.
User Agreement:-Having a user agreement or "terms and conditions" may be the most important
part of a Web site. A user agreement requires each user to agree to be bound by a contract governing
his
or her use of the site by clicking "I agree" before being permitted to use the site.
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Warranties:- Statements on our Web site about our products and services are express warranties
to customers. It is important to carefully review all Web site text to be sure that what our company
promises is true and corresponds with its other policies and advertising.
Your Risk:- The law is all about risk. The more time and money We spend following laws and
regulations governing our business, the lower our risks of fines or successful claims by government
or third
parties
D) Accepting Payments
The number-one question on the minds of new Web site builders is, how do I arrange to accept
credit cards for payments? A good first place to start your search for merchant status is your own
bank.
Most issue credit cards, and if you have a long-term relationship, that's a big plus. Your bank says
no? Try
a few other local banks--offering to move all your accounts--and you just may be rewarded with
merchant
status. You may also try other companies that specialize in issuing accounts to online merchants,
including:
Card service International
VeriSign
Credit Card Processing Services
The Processing Network
21st Century Resources
Or log onto Google and search for credit card processing. You'll find many dozens of outfits, large
and small, that are on the prowl for start-ups seeking merchant accounts.
While choosing the medium or accepting the payment we should consider the following points
1) Making Customers Feel Secure
2) Fraud Prevention Tools
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Site
eCommerce Companies
Marketing Your Site 21 Ways to Promote Site Online and Off
Offline Promotions
1. Always put our URL on letterhead, business cards and in e-mail signatureswherever potential
visitors are likely to see it.
2. If our employees wear uniforms, put our URL on them so every one of our customers sees a
walking
advertisement of our Web site.
3. Include our URL on all promotional items we give awaycoffee mugs, T-shirts, key chains and
so on.
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16. Get active in online discussion groups and chats and always include our URL in our signature.
(Don't do any hard selling, though. Most groups frown on such behavior and will think you're
spamming the
group.)
17. Any time someone orders a product from our site, include a catalog with their order to get them
coming back for more.
18. Inspire our visitors to spread the word for you with viral marketing techniques, from the
aforementioned newsgroup participation to including an "e-mail this link" on every page of our site.
19. Not sure what our customers want? Try creating an online survey to get their crucial opinions on
how
well our site is selling to them.
20. When creating our own ads, make sure we understand who we are targeting, the goal of our
campaign, and how to creatively use the ad confines to get viewers to click on our ad, not away from
it.
21. Use other selling venues like online classified advertising or online auction sites to increase
exposure
to your site and products.
overlooked. A lot of people don't even realize that things like their navigation menus, links or even
their
newsletter subscription offers are copy and require careful consideration.
Marketing
Creating, Managing and Increasing Opt-In List
Here's the simple truth: If our site isn't collecting opt-in e-mail addresses from our visitors, we're
losing money. I'm always blown away by the number of sites I visit that don't have a place for
visitors to
leave their e-mail addresses, but I think I've finally discovered the reason why every site doesn't take
advantage of this essential marketing strategy: People are convinced that the process of adding this
function to their site is complicated. It's not! Getting set up is quick and easy: we don't have to be a
programmer to do it--and our opt-in list will quickly become our most valuable sales vehicle.
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Transaction Processing
Supply Chain Planning & Collaboration
Order Tracking & Delivery Coordination
Transaction Processing
Most of the case companies, 10 out of 18 (A, C, D, G, H, I, J, K, L, N), used IT to process
transactions with their suppliers. Eight of the case companies (B, C, E, F, I, K, M, P), in turn, used IT
to transaction processing with their customers. Consequently, only three of the companies (C, I, K)
used IT for transaction processing towards both up- and downstream of the supply chain. EDI, XML,
or Extranet solutions were typically used for the processing of orders and invoices in the companies.
In some cases, IT was also used to process delivery verifications and dispatch advices.
As expected, reduction of manual work and costs, improvement of information quality, speeding up
of information transfer, and volume of transactions were found to drive the use of IT for transaction
processing. Furthermore, the reasons for using IT for transaction processing were rather homogenous
between the companies. The companies aimed to reduce manual work associated with sales
transactions to reduce the related costs, and to increase the reliability and speed of information
transfer between companies. In most cases, the partners for the IT applications were selected based
on the volume of transactions. However, several of the companies stressed that especially with lean
IT solutions, such as Extranets, a high volume of transactions is not needed for receiving a positive
payback of the integration effort.
Instead, the continuous nature of the business relationship was considered important in these cases.
Interestingly, when comparing the drivers for transaction processing towards customers to those
towards suppliers, no significant differences were found.
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Some conclusions can be made regarding the business environment of the companies that utilize IT
for transaction processing with their customers. Based on our sample, these companies are located in
the upstream part of the supply chain (i.e. they are either equipment or component manufacturers).
Further, compared to the non-users, these companies have fewer customers and more concentrated
customer base, which is well in line with the identified drivers of transaction volume and business
continuity.
The only notable difference between the companies using IT for transaction processing with the
suppliers and the non-user companies is that all companies in the latter category have a high or at
least moderate number of suppliers. This relationship between the number of suppliers and the use of
IT for transaction processing is in line with the identified drivers.
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Actually the only instances where information is shared without a strong link to a specific crossorganisational process are the following: Case company I receives demand forecasts, Case company
A distributes demand forecasts also to the suppliers not involved in the VMI replenishment scheme,
and Case company J shares information on capacity utilisation to the suppliers. This apparent
reluctance in information sharing via IT simply for the purpose of improving the planning processes
of supply chain partners is rather surprising.
As for the characteristics of business environments, all the companies using IT for planning and
collaboration with their customers have concentrated or highly concentrated customer base, which is
well in line with the nature of IT use building customer-specific processes with the aid of IT
solutions and supply chain visibility. Other clear correlations between the use of IT in supply chain
planning and collaboration and the characteristics of business environment of the companies were
not identified.
Order Tracking & Delivery Coordination
Five companies (H, I, K, M, P) in our sample utilize IT systems in order tracking andcoordinating
the progress of orders or deliveries or in providing this information. Of these, in Case I orderspecific status reports were updated manually into an Extranet page if customers specifically
requested it. In Case M, the company provided delivery status information to its customers as a high
end logistics service provider.
In Cases H, K, and P, delivery status information is actively collected, disseminated and utilized. In
Case K, the company offers delivery status information to its customers on project orders, enabling
the customers to synchronize the project activities with the availability of the material. The Case
company P, in turn utilizes the delivery status information of the main telecom components to ensure
material availability before scheduling installation tasks. The tracking information is most
comprehensively utilized in Case H, where the company uses delivery status information to control
in-transit consolidation of the components of the end product. The delivery status information is also
used to ensure that the final customer shipment includes all the necessary sub-deliveries.
As to business environment characteristics, the use of IT for order tracking and delivery coordination
seemed to be associated with a customized nature of the offered products. Aside this, no further
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commonalities between the companies were found regarding the characteristics of their business
environments.
To summarize, based on our sample of companies, project-orientation of business and in transit
consolidation seem to drive the use of IT for order tracking and delivery coordination.
Furthermore, this role of IT is especially emphasized when other deliveries or human activities (such
as installation tasks) are controlled based on the progress of specific tracked deliveries.
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CHAPTER:-04
MARKETING
STRATEGIES
BY
ONLINE
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Online Marketing Strategies As we discovered in my white papers, SEO SEM in a Nutshell and How
to Create a Search Engine Friendly Site, search engines exist to help manage and organize massive
amounts of information accessible over the Internet.
If I had to come up with a successful formula to launch an online marketing campaign and ignite my
website performance, it would look something like this . .
1. On-page optimization
2. Site submission
3. Pay-per-click campaign
4. Social networking initiative
5. Third party content management
6. Social bookmarking
7. Web analytics
(1.) On-page Optimization
1. Ensure that your pages are index able
2. Ensure that Google knows about your site
3. Ensure that crawlers can crawl your site and robots and index the site
4. Brainstorm the keywords that your clients would most likely Google
5. Develop a one-line mantra and short 30 second elevator pitch
6. Ensure the meta tags on site reflect the keywords, mantra and pitch
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(2.) Site Submission Submit site to the following directories and websites:
1. www.Business.com
2. www.BOTW.org
3. www.DMOZ.org
4. www.Google.com
5. www.Yahoo.com
6. www.Ask.com
7. www.MSN.com
8. www.Netscape.com
9. www.Live.com
(3.) Pay-Per-Click Campaign
1. Establish https://adwords.google.com account
2. Define monthly budget
3. Define keywords & target locations
4. Define marketing copy and call to action
5. Test various marketing copy alternatives
6. Optimize campaign for efficiency, performance, ranking
7. Integrate AdWords account with Analytics account for traceability
8. Monitor and adjust campaign based on performance expectations
(4.) Social Networking Initiatives
1. Establish accounts on the following social networking sites:
a. www.LinkedIn.com
b. www.FaceBook.com
c. www.YouTube.com
d. www.MySpace.com
e. www.Flickart.com
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Link accounts back to primary site to build inbound links (5.) 3rd Party CMS 1. Establish accounts
on the following blog sites: a. www.Wordpress.com b. www.Blogger.com 2. Create about page based
on mantra, elevator pitch, product/service offerings and descriptions. 3. Provide regular (minimum
of one article per week per blog), unique, relevant content, tagged and optimized for lead generation
and conversion. 4. Include social book marking tiles, links to professional social networking profiles,
and references to network of resources, friends and primary web site. (6.) Social Bookmarking 1.
Establish accounts on the following blog sites: a. www.Technorati.com b. www.Del.icio.us c.
www.Digg.com 2. Drop social bookmarking tiles on all sites within the network 3. Actively visit
each page of each website in the network and bookmark (7.) Web Analytics 1. Ensure that
http://www.google.com/analytics/ is effective on site 2. Determine website visitors call to action 3.
Set up conversion goals to track web site visitor calls to action 4. Ensure connectivity between
Google Ad words and Google Analytics 5. Produce, monitor, and disseminate analytics
weekly/monthly reports 24 25
Marketing Your Site
K) 21 Ways to Promote Site Online and Off
Offline Promotions1.
Always put our URL on letterhead, business cards and in e-mail signatures
coffee mugs, T-shirts, key chains and so on.A daily reminder is a good way to get people to visit our site.
4.
Be sure to include our Web address in all press releases we send out to members of the media.
Byhaving it at their fingertips, they may be more likely to include it in articles they write about our company.
5.
Don't forget to put our Web address in our Yellow Pages ad. That people see every day.
6.
Do we own any company vehicles? Be sure to put your URL on the side of any car or truck that's outthere
delivering your products.
7.
In addition to listing your toll-free number, put our Web address on the bottom of every page of ourcatalog so
customers have easy access to our online store.
Online Promotions
8.
Hone our search engine submission process so we can get the best exposure possible.
9.
If we are still itching for more exposure, we can explore search engine marketing, wherein we pay
tohave a text ad appear when visitors search for certain keywords.
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10.
Launch a sweepstakes that offers anyone who registers on our site or subscribes to enewsletterswithin a certain time
frame the chance to win a free gift.
11.
Send out a weekly e-mail newsletter to registered site members that offers tips and news related toour company or
industry with links back to your site.
12.
Offer free content to other sites. It's a win-win situation: The other site gets free articles to beef
uptheir offerings and we get a link back to our site and the cachet of being an expert.
13.
Send a well-planned, customer-focused e-mail promotion to a targeted list of potential visitors
andoffer a credit toward the purchase of anything from our site. Spend time on our e-mail's look and content:We
want to offer value to customers and not have it appear to be spam.
14.
Create our own link exchange by asking sites complementary to ours (but that don't compete) to
putour link on their pages and we'll do likewise.
15.
Hook up with Web affiliates
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As the number of shoppers on the Internet has grown, so too has the number of Web sites and landbased businesses clamouring for a piece of the multi-trillion-dollar e-commerce pie. As many
Internet companies have discovered, even with a multi-million dollar marketing campaign, its
difficult to get the attention of Internet users even for just a split second. After all, Internet users
are bombarded with so many advertisements every day and see so many Web sites, its hard for any
one firm to stand out. One of the most difficult jobs youll have as an e-commerce merchant is
figuring out what blend of offline and online marketing techniques to use to promote your Web site.
If youre a small business, that challenge is even greater on a tight budget. The right marketing mix
depends on many factors, including the types of products you are selling, the types of people you are
trying to target, and, of course, your marketing budget. In this guide, well review a variety of
different techniques for raising the profile of your online store and attracting shoppers to your Web
site. Marketing your Web site is not an easy task, nor is it a short one youll need to work hard and
work continuously to make sure that your online store doesnt get lost among the billions of pages of
information on the Web.1) Know Your Audience! The key to successful marketing is very simple:
know your audience. Before you spend any time or money on marketing, you need to know who
your target market is. What types of customers are most likely to buy the types of products you are
selling? For example, males or females? What age bracket? What income bracket? Are you trying to
reach people with certain interests or skills? Once you know the profile of your typical customer,
you need to find ways of reaching customers with that demographic profile. This may involve online
advertising, offline advertising, or a combination of the two. But dont even begin to think about
spending money on marketing until youve spent time thinking about who you are trying to reach.
You may even need to do some market research to uncover this information. We cant emphasize this
step enough. Your marketing efforts wont be successful unless you are spending your marketing
dollars in the right places(2) Your Brand Name One of the most important marketing assets that you
have is the name of your online store. Give it careful consideration. You should pick a name thats
easy to remember yet distinct from other similar names on the Internet. Closely related to the issue
of picking a name is choosing a suitable domain name. The domain name is the part of your Web site
address that appears after www. For example, the domain name for the Office Depot is
officedepot.com and the domain name for Eddie Bauer is eddiebauer.com. Office Depots Web site is
at www.officedepot.com and Eddie Bauers Web site can be found at www.eddiebauer.com. To avoid
confusing your customers, you will want to have a domain name that is as close as possible to your
organizations name. This will also make it easier for customers to find your Web site. For example,
customers looking for Eddie Bauers Web site would probably start by typing www.eddiebauer.com
into their Web browsers. In addition to being close to your business name, your chosen domain name
should be short, easy for your customers to remember, and intuitive. Finally, keep in mind that you
dont have to have www in your Web address. Some organizations have chosen to drop it
entirely, e.g. CBS promotes itself simply as CBS.com.
In addition, you can, with the help of the technical folks who support your site, sometimes use words
or characters in front of your actual domain name, and get an extra identity hook that might be
unique enough to draw attention to your site. One such example of this is the Web site Beer.com,
which gained some attention during the 2000 Olympics. It ran an ad that used the address
mmm.beer.com indeed, during the commercial, the graphic showed the www flipping over to
become mmm, as the announcer mimicked the mmmm or tastes good sound. There was
a huge increase in traffic to the site. Its important that both your brand name and your Web 27
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site address be as distinctive as possible to avoid confusion with other similar companies selling on
the Internet. There are tens of thousands of merchants on the Internet all vying for attention, making
it difficult for online merchants with similar names to get noticed. Even if the domain name you
want is available, you should find out if similar names currently used by online stores might compete
with yours. Many online merchants have found it necessary to change their names because their
names were being confused with other similar names on the Internet. When trying to come up with a
name for your online store, consider getting a group of friends or colleagues together to brainstorm
with you. Alternatively, you could hire a market research firm to hold focus groups with consumers.
Issues to Consider When Choosing a Name for Your Online Store
Can you get a Web site address (i.e., domain name) for that name?
Is the name too long?
Is the name easy to pronounce?
Are there other Web sites or online stores with similar-sounding or similar-looking brand names
or domain names?
Is your name unique or distinctive enough?
Is your name memorable and does it make an impression?
Is the name consistent with the image you want to project?
If you really want to have a domain name that someone else has already registered, you could
approach the owner and see if he/she is interested in selling the domain name to you. Many
companies register domain names but never activate them. Even a company that is using a domain
name may consider selling it to you for the right price. Finally, if you believe that someone else has
registered a domain name that infringes on a trademark that you own, you can pursue legal action
against the owner of the domain name in question. Alternatively, an appeals process exists for
domain names, and it might be possible for you to launch an appeal to see if the other party can be
forced to give up the name. To learn about this option, visit a domain name registrar, and read about
the international domain name appeals process. You can also visit the ICANN Uniform Domain
Name Dispute Resolution Policy site at www.icann.org/udrp/udrp.htm for more information. Which
raises an important point it might be a good defensive manoeuvre for you to register as many
domain names as possible early on, related to your store name, your product names, or other words
and phrases that, when used as a domain name, might help drive traffic to your store. How to Get a
Domain Name To get a domain name, you can go to any one of the accredited domain name registers
on the Internet, including Register.com (www.register.com). You can get a complete list of
accredited domain name registrars on the Inter NIC Web site at www.internic.com. The list can be
viewed alphabetically or by geographical location. You dont need to have a Web site in order to
register a domain name and most registrars will hold your domain name for you until you are ready
to activate it on your online store. Many browser based storefront solutions allow you to set up a
domain name for your online store when you are setting up your account. This removes the need for
you to go directly to a domain name registrar. Once you have registered a domain name, you want to
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make sure that no one is registering similar names, or taking out a trademark similar to your name.
To automatically track your name, consider using a service like Name Protect
(www.nameprotect.com). One of Name Protests services will constantly monitor new US trademark
applications and domain name registrations for you and flag any applications/registrations that are
identical or very similar to your domain name. Its a great way to keep informed of any potential
threats to your brand name. This service will also help you identify companies that may be trying to
register your domain name as a trademark. This is a potentially serious situation as you could lose
your domain name if a trademark similar to your brand name is granted to someone else. 28
(3) Offline Marketing Perhaps the most important piece of advice we can give you in this guide
is this: Dont restrict your advertising and promotional efforts to the Web. Online stores often rely
too heavily on online advertising at the expense of more traditional advertising vehicles that may
actually produce better results. Throughout this guide, well review a number of different ways for
you to promote your online store on the Web. But its important not to get too dependent on online
marketing for your success. Think about the types of customers you are trying to attract and what the
best methods would be to reach those customers. Rather than spending your money advertising on
the Web, you may find that a more effective strategy would be to place advertisements in a couple of
well-targeted magazines. For example, Noggintops (www.noggintops.com), an online hat retailer,
has spent very little on Internet advertising. Instead, the company did some marketing research and
identified a number of magazines that appealed to the companys target market: outdoorsmen. Ads
featuring the companys Web site address were then placed in those magazines. In fact, the bulk of
Noggintops marketing budget has been spent on offline ads. Our point is that you shouldnt ignore
traditional advertising vehicles. Think about how you can use both print (e.g. newspapers,
magazines, journals) and broadcast media (radio and television stations) to reach your target
audience. Be realistic with your expectations. In years past, many Internet companies invested
millions in television ads with often disappointing results. Many companies quickly learned that
brands cant be built overnight. It can take years to build a successful and recognized brand name.
That being said, if you develop any print or broadcast advertising, make sure that your Web address
is featured prominently in your ads. You may want to even consider purchasing advertising for the
sole purpose of promoting your Web site It is important to use your imagination when looking for
ways to raise awareness of your Web site. Dont limit yourself to radio, television, and print media.
Why not advertise your Web address in buses or subways, or on the transfers handed out by your
local transit authority? How about on newspaper polybags (the plastic bags that newspapers are
wrapped in when they are delivered to your front door)? Or in movie theatres? Some organizations
have even gone so far as to include their Internet addresses on bananas! The possibilities are endless.
In many respects, marketing a Web site is no different than marketing any product or service. The
challenge is to find innovative ways to get the word out.
(4) Your Retail Store
If your business has a brick-and-mortar retail presence, use it to promote your online store
aggressively. Include your Web site on your receipts, invoices, and shopping bags, and print it on
your catalogs and sales literature. Make sure that your Web address is advertised prominently both
within your store and outside if you can. Many retailers, unfortunately, dont leverage their retail
presence in this way.
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(5) Gift Certificates Brick-and-mortar stores give out gift certificates, so why not online stores
too? Consider offering an online gift certificate that your customers can give to a family member or a
friend. Gift certificates purchased online make great last-minute gifts because they can be sent by email to arrive almost instantly. The recipient can then visit the stores Web site and apply the gift
certificate toward the purchase of any products offered by the store. How does it work? Online stores
that offer this service let you pay with your credit card and the gift certificate is delivered to the
recipient by e-mail as soon as the payment is authorized. The gift certificate is essentially an e-mail
message with a number attached to it. The recipient can redeem the certificate on their next purchase
at that online store. When the recipient proceeds to check out of the store, they will be asked to
provide their certificate number. The value of the gift certificate will then be deducted from the total
amount of the purchase. Electronic gift certificates not only make great gifts theyre a great way to
drive new customers into your online store! 29
(6) Cross-Selling You should get in the habit of cross-selling products in your online store to
increase sales. This means that where possible, product pages on your online store should feature
accessories or complementary products that your customers may be interested in. For example,
consider what Smith & Hawken has done in their online store (www.smithandhawken.com).
Whenever a customer views a product, complementary products are displayed on the right-hand side
of the page. For example, a customer may select a bench. Smith & Hawken realizes that customers
who are interested in purchasing a bench may also be interested in purchasing a matching chair or
table. Thats why there is a section called Also Look At: where complementary products are
displayed, including an armchair and table. As you might expect, if you look at the Web page
advertising for the armchair, the bench is recommended as a complementary product. The idea here
is to try and upsell customers. Eddie Bauer employs a similar strategy on its Web site
(www.eddiebauer.com). Customers looking at a specific piece of clothing can ask to see coordinating
products by clicking on a link. As you can see, cross-selling is an excellent strategy to increase
overall sales in your online store.
site owners usually try to find merchants who sell products or services related to their own Web sites.
A Web site with movie reviews may try to affiliate with a merchant who sells movies, and a Web site
devoted to golf may align itself with a Web site that sells sporting goods or athletic apparel. Its in a
Web site owners best interests to identify merchants with compatible products because it will
increase the likelihood of making lots of sales. For example, suppose you sell travel guidebooks. You
could sign up travel agencies to your affiliate program and invite them to create links from their Web
sites to yours. You would then pay the travel agencies a commission on any book sales and/or leads
you get from their customers. Online retailers with affiliate programs compensate customers in
different ways. Some merchants pay affiliates strictly for sales (pay-for-sale), while other merchants
compensate affiliates simply for sending a potential customer their way (pay-per-lead). Other
programs may compensate affiliates if a person clicks on an advertisement, regardless of whether
that person turns into a lead or ends up purchasing a product. This is called a pay-per-click program.
Affiliate programs can be extremely powerful because they allow you to increase your revenues by
having your brand name displayed on dozens if not hundreds of complementary Web sites. There are
literally thousands of affiliate programs on the Web. For an example, visit the online store for Staples
(www.staples.com) and read about their affiliate program. Web sites that sign up can earn a
percentage of every sale for referring customers to Staples.com. There is no cost for affiliates of
Staples to sign up, but they must first agree to the 30 programs terms and conditions and then
complete an online application form that requests information about their Web site. If a Web site is
approved into the program, Staples will provide the owner with a selection of Staples.com graphics
that can be placed on the Web site and linked to Staples.com. Every time someone clicks on the link
and proceeds to buy something from Staples.com, the Web site owner will be paid a commission.
Staples.com says its affiliate program has been a success, with over thirty thousand Web sites
signing up since the program was first created. The commission that you offer your affiliates is up to
you. Some firms, like Staples, offer a percentage of sales; other firms offer flat fees. Commission
structures can range from less than 1 percent to as high as 50 percent. Flat-fee commissions, on the
other hand, can range anywhere from $0.05 to $50.00, or more. Affiliate programs are popular
because theyre an inexpensive way of attracting customers to your Web site. In essence, you are
getting other Web sites to market your online store for you. Moreover, it doesnt cost a lot to get such
a program underway. Best of all, you may only have to pay affiliates if they generate sales or leads
for you. Affiliate programs do have a number of drawbacks, however. It can be a burden to keep
track of all of your affiliates and process all of the commission checks. Keep in mind that the number
of affiliates you have really has no direct bearing on how successful your program will be. For
example, even though Staples.com has over thirty thousand affiliates, what really counts is the
number of affiliates that are sending significant amounts of business to Staples.com. A lot of online
stores have found that many of the Web sites that sign up for their affiliate programs bring in very
little business. That is why when you are setting up an affiliate program, your focus should not be on
signing up as many Web sites as possible, but finding those Web sites that can generate the most
sales for you. Obviously, its hard to screen Web sites in advance but eventually you will discover
which affiliates are valuable and which are immaterial to your business. As you might imagine,
setting up an affiliate program can take a lot of time and effort, especially once you begin to sign up
hundreds of affiliates. You need to screen applicants, track sales from each affiliate, prepare
commission checks, and spend time on other administrative functions that take you away from
running your online store. For this reason, many online retailers hire organizations called affiliate
program providers that specialize in running affiliate programs on behalf of online stores. Weve
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listed some of the more popular affiliate program providers in the table below. Affiliate Program
Providers My Affiliate Program www.myaffiliateprogram.com Commission Junction www.cj.com
LinkShare www.linkshare.com The cost of using an affiliate program provider varies depending on
the affiliate provider. For example, some companies charge a one-time fee plus they receive a
monthly commission based on a percentage of affiliate sales. Others may charge a one-time setup
fee, an annual renewal fee, plus a percentage of your payout the amount of money you pay your
affiliates. Still others have no set up fee, or commission charge but have a flat monthly fee. Which
affiliate program provider is best? It all depends on what you are looking for. Services and program
features vary from one affiliate program provider to the next, so make sure you carefully consider all
your options before making a final decision. One of the major benefits of using an affiliate program
provider is that these organizations will help you find Web sites that can begin linking to your online
store immediately. If youre a small business with very little brand name recognition, how is
anybody going to find your Web site to learn about your affiliate program? Affiliate program
providers maintain a directory of participating online stores so that interested Web sites can quickly
find merchants they want to work with. If youre interested in setting up an affiliate program for
your online store, start by getting in contact with the various affiliate program providers we listed
earlier in the guide. When comparing affiliate program providers, think about the following
questions:
How much does the affiliate program provider charge you to set up an affiliate program?
31
What information do the performance reports contain? How frequently are the reports updated? Are
the reports delivered by e-mail in addition to being available on the Web?
How user-friendly is their affiliate management software? What account management features
does their software offer? How easy is it for you to update or replace the ads being served by your
affiliates?
What tools exist for communicating with your affiliates, both through the affiliate program
providers Web site and by e-mail? Can you target certain affiliates with special offers?
Who issues the commission payments to your affiliates? Do you have to, or will the affiliate
program provider do that for you?
How does the affiliate program provider guard against fraud? For example, what happens if the
same person clicks on a link to your Web site 50 times do you have to pay for that?
Is there any flexibility with regard to payout rates? Can you customize payout rates for different
affiliates or do you have to give the same commission structure to everyone?
Does the affiliate program provider offer any client services to assist you with the implementation
of your affiliate program, or are you expected to do it on your own? What technical support is
available for both affiliates and merchants? Are any consulting services offered?
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How easy is it for Web site owners to join an affiliate program and create links from their Web
sites to yours? To get the answer to this question, we recommend you visit some of the leading
affiliate program providers sites and try signing up with some of their merchants. By doing this,
youll get a first-hand look at how the process works from an affiliates point of view.
What types of link options are available for your affiliates?
Does the affiliate program provide support for e-mail-based affiliate programs? For example, how
easy is it for an affiliate to include links to your Web site in their e-mail messages to customers?
How many affiliates are part of the companys network? What is the company doing to recruit
new affiliates into their network?
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discount on a future purchase, entry in a sweepstakes or contest, or just the promise of relevant
advice by e-mail. The easiest way to undertake permission marketing is by establishing a mailing list
that customers can join. You can then use the mailing list to send out promotional messages to your
customers. The trick is to give your customers an incentive to join your mailing list. For an example
of how a permission-based e-mail marketing program can be implemented, consider what Payless
ShoeSource (www.payless.com) did on their online store. They ran a contest on their home page for
a dream trip to Tahiti. Customers were invited to enter their e-mail address into a box on the
screen. Once a customer entered his/her e-mail address, a new page appeared inviting the customer
to join Payless ShoeSource's mailing list. The contest was the hook to get customers to spend a
few minutes filling out the form that is required to join the mailing list. Once customers joined the
Payless mailing list, they were automatically entered into the vacation contest. Keep in mind that if
you are going to set up a mailing list for your customers, you should clearly tell your potential
customers how they can leave the list, and about any other conditions that might apply to the list.
Dont restrict yourself to your Web site when collecting e-mail addresses from customers. If you
have a retail store, have your salespeople at the checkout counter ask customers for their e-mail
addresses. Similarly, if you have a call center, collect e-mail addresses from customers when they
call in. But regardless of how you collect the information, make sure you let customers know how
you intend to use it. For example, if you have a retail store, have your salespeople say something like
this to your customers: We frequently send out notices of sales and other promotions by e-mail. If
you have an e-mail address, Mr. Smith, Id be happy to add it to our database so that youll receive
advance notice of our special events. By asking customers for their e-mail addresses in this
fashion, youre clearly stating why youre asking for the information and giving the customer an
incentive to provide his or her e-mail address to you.
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(10) Search Engines and Web Directories Many online shoppers use a search engine or a Web
directory when they are trying to find something on the Internet. A search engine is a Web site that
indexes the contents of millions of Web pages. A Web directory, on the other hand, organizes Web
sites by category so that they can be easily browsed by Internet users. Unlike search engines,
directories are usually compiled by human beings. In the following table, weve listed the names and
addresses of the most popular search engines and Web directories. Making sure that your Web site is
registered with all of these sites is one of the most important things you can do to draw traffic to
your store. Why all of them? Your customers (and potential customers) wont all be using the same
search engine or Web directory. Some people use Excite, some use AltaVista, some use Lycos, etc.
By registering with all the major search engines and Web directories, you have the best chance of
being found by online shoppers regardless of what search engine or Web directory they are using.
Popular Search Engines
AltaVista www.altavista.com AOL.COM Search search.aol.com Ask Jeeves www.askjeeves.com
Google www.google.com Overture www.overture.com Excite www.excite.com FAST
www.alltheweb.com HotBot www.hotbot.com Lycos www.lycos.com MSN Search search.msn.com
Popular Web Directories Look Smart www.looksmart.com 33 Open Directory Project
www.dmoz.org
Yahoo! www.yahoo.com
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search engines, allows you to create text ads for your company that will be displayed whenever an
Internet user searches for a keyword that youve selected. Googles program, called AdWords
(adwords.google.com), is affordable for small businesses because there is no monthly minimum
spending limit and it costs just $5 to set up your account.
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part of an online advertisement. As online creative becomes more animated, logos are often shown
less frequently. To test how omnipresent logos (campaigns where the creative 37 contains the
brand or logo 100% of the time) compared to sporadic logos (campaigns where logos are NOT
present all of the time), Dynamic Logic evaluated its AdIndex database. Campaigns with
omnipresent logos had a 7% lift in brand awareness, while sporadic logos saw only a 3% lift. The
message association metric had similar results, with omnipresent logos seeing a 33% lift compared
to a 17% lift for ads with logos that were sporadic (Carlon & Hislop, 2001.) ACNielsen recently
conducted research todetermine how creative elements affect ad recall, or the ability of a consumer
to remember an ad. When branding was used consistently in each frame of an ad, ad recall and other
brand metrics improved for almost all ads that were tested. Ad exposure. How many times does a
person see your ad before the message association begins to level off? Research by Dynamic Logic
has indicated that 1 exposure leads to a 5.6% liftin brand awareness, 2-3 exposures add a 64% lift in
brand awareness, while 4 or more exposures add an approximate 10.4% lift in brand awareness.
After five exposures, however, returns were found to have diminishing returns (Carlon & Hislop,
2001; Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, 2001). Are click through the best way to measure whether an ad
is effective? Click through do not necessarily lead to more conversions. The Summer 2001 Online
Advertising Report found that people who viewed an online ad and went to the site at alter time by
typing in the URL, were 60% more likely to repeat their conversions than people who clicked
through the ad initially. Only a quarter of the conversions attributed to ads are from direct click
through. The rest of the conversions occur after the ad is viewed, but are most likely to occur within
24 hours of the first ad impression (Engage Study, 2001). How can a company get the most for its
money? The standard payment for banner ads has often been based on CPM rates (Liz Claiborne,
2001). But many companies would like a selection of ways to pay for online ads. Some companies
are now paying for their advertising by performance. One company that offers this type of payment
system is Commission Junction that is currently working with Liz Claiborne. Using Commission
Junction, Liz Claiborne only pays for ads when a sale is made (Liz Claiborne, 2001). Another
company, Global Network Inc., has also introduced a new pricing model for advertisers. CAPP
(Client Alternative Pricing Plan) allows companies to choose how they would like to pay for
advertising from CPM, click through rates, lead generation rates, or actual sales conversion. This
helps companies to choose from a model that will help to best meet their objective. For example, a
company that wants to increase conversion may pay a premium, while a company just interested in
branding may pay a flat rate (Global Network, 2001) How did it all begin?
Internet advertising began in 1994, when the first commercially available Web browser, Netscape
Navigator 1.0, was released. As Web browsers became more enhanced over time, advertising has
changed to better utilize these enhancements. Online advertising began as simple banner ads, while
companies can now use banner ads as well as destination sites, micro-sites, pop-ups, and even
advertisements that affix themselves over a competitors ads. The Internet has essentially become the
only medium where users can view ads, request and receive information, make an instant purchase,
and save time and money. Advertising banners account for 54% of total online advertising revenues
and are the predominant advertising vehicle on the Web, with full-size banners still receiving the
most advertising impressions (Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, 2001). Banners let viewers request free
samples, register to win contests, and order products. They are able to build brand awareness and are
now better at generating awareness than television or print advertising. 75% of respondents to a
survey by Forrester reported that Internet users sacrificed TV viewing to use the Internet. As Web
browsers were enhanced and became able to support better graphics and more Web sites, micro-sites
and destination sites began to explode. Micro-sites contain small clusters of brand pages, which are
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hosted by content sites or networks. They enable advertisers to communicate deeper product benefits
and collect customer information without 38 incurring the cost of a full-blown Web site, which can
cost millions to create and maintain. Web sites or destination sites use information, entertainment,
and high-product values to pull users in and keep them coming back. Basically, companies use the
Internet as a full channel for exchanging information with customers. Pop-ups have become another
tool that works in conjunction with banner ads. When a person another browser on top of the site the
user is viewing. It has the same benefits as a banner visits a Web page, an advertisement opens in ad
but brings more attention directly to the advertisement. A recent technology that was introduced is
called Gator. It has allowed companies to advertise on rival companies sites by selling ads that are
designed to block banners on sites such as Yahoo with pop-ups of the exact same dimensions,
completely obscuring the original ad. As the customer scrolls down their screen, the new
advertisement stays affixed so the viewer cannot tell that it is not the ad originally placed on the site.
This technology, however, has been seen as unfair competition.
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As explained earlier in the guide, affiliate program providers have different pricing schemes, so
make sure you understand how you will be charged. Also find out if there is a minimum escrow
amount that you must give the affiliate program provider (this money is used to pay commissions to
your affiliates).
What types of affiliate programs are offered? As noted earlier, there are three basic types of
affiliate programs that you should be familiar with:
1) pay-per-click programsyou pay a Web site for referring a visitor to your online store regardless
of whether a sale results or not 2) pay-per-lead programs you pay a Web site for referring a visitor
to your Web site to fill out a form or perform another action that may lead to an online or offline sale
3) pay-per-sale you pay a Web site for referring a visitor to your Web site who immediately buys
a product or service
What type of performance tracking is provided? How sophisticated is the performance tracking?
What information do the performance reports contain? How frequently are the reports updated? Are
the reports delivered by e-mail in addition to being available on the Web?
How user-friendly is their affiliate management software? What account management features
does their software offer? How easy is it for you to update or replace the ads being served by your
affiliates?
What tools exist for communicating
Equally, in the old days (and remember, many organisations are still in these old
days) we believed that an Englishmans home (business) is his castle. So we guarded our
perimeter like mad we had locks, bolts, fences, guards, alarm systems, etc and as long as
the perimeter was not breached we felt safe.
Okay, there was always the challenge of the odd rogue member of staff, and the temp
(or the cleaner, or whoever) who was not exactly what they were supposed to be, but, by and
large, we felt secure from external attack, and an insider still had to take the information out
of the premises physically, and was thus vulnerable.
And if by chance we did find someone up to something, it was nice and clear and they
could be sacked, whether or not we pressed charges. Of course security was important, but
it was physical security that worried us and the police were always there to back us up if
our physical perimeter was breached.
So what had this to do with marketing? In those days, almost nothing security was
seldom used as a differentiator. If you were handling cash, or high-value items, or drugs or
anything with a high street value, then it was presumed that you had put in the necessary
security.
Safe as the Bank of England was a saying from the past and more recently there
have been advertising campaigns that talk about getting the security of certain groups of
companies around you. Physical security plus financial security something you could
kick and feel and see providing a nice warm feeling.
You were pretty clear about whether or not your organisation was a target. You could
identify your physical defences and contrast them with the value that an attacker might steal
(such as cash, valuables and easily disposable items), or you could decide you were just not
worth attacking! In retrospect, a nice, simple life.
So marketing in general took security for granted, and certainly did not get directly
involved. And please note that security meant one thing only: protection from actual
physical loss. Therefore, the items were being protected from being stolen, copied or
destroyed. But who thought of protecting things from being altered? Or from being kept out
of your own reach for a crucial period of time?
Also, most items were physical. Yes of course documents were often involved, especially
if they had intrinsic value, but the protection of information was rarely discussed
because information was not such a readily available commodity. Today, the e-revolution
has broken through our parameters. A modern organisation that communicates by email
and via the Internet has inserted the equivalent of the M25 straight into itself and anything
can drive along it, unless you have taken the necessary management decisions followed by
the necessary technical responses.
It is never the other way round: you have to take the information risk management decisions
at board level, and then inform the IT department of the criteria against which to work. It
is madness to expect the IT people to understand the relative value of each type of information
_ 42 THE SECURE ONLINE BUSINESS_____________________________________
_______________________________________ THE MARKETING DIMENSION 43 _
within your organisation and its relative importance in terms of confidentiality, integrity
and availability. So what does all this mean for todays marketing management?
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for all internal and external communications on this issue, otherwise they will occur
in a piecemeal fashion, undertaken by people who are not trained in communications skills.
The expectation: experience equation
Whatever we do, we cannot claim to have e-trust and e-confidence unless we have
genuinely got it. Remember that many so-called hackers carry out attacks just to be able to
say that they have got through a specific organisations defences. You may claim to be
secure they may well try you out!
To have an Information Security (Assurance) Management System (ISMS or IAMS) in
place and working properly will provide you with the assurance that you require to make
such a claim in the first place. But that is not the reason to have such a system you need it
in order to conduct business electronically, whether you go public about having it or not.
So the answer to the question do we publicise our security, or do we keep quiet about
it matters not; you need it to carry out business, even if you only intend to tell your stakeholders
(clients, suppliers and staff included).
But what can happen?
Viruses, worms, trojans, deliberate attacks (external hackers, internal hackers, recent
leaver-hackers, hactivists), random attacks from the same communities and errors (as all the
above can be let in by mistake) and, in addition, simple human error can, in a poorly
protected system, wreak havoc.
The cost in terms of economic damage from the above sources for just the first 9
months of 2002 is estimated to be between US$32 39 billion for overt digital attacks only
not including the errors.
And just in case you are saying to yourself, Okay, but I am/we are not likely to be
targets (which totally ignores the random nature of viruses etc and the potential for internal
attacks), let us look at some actual examples.
1. The mistake (or I didnt mean to destroy your
livelihood)
Recently a hactivist (someone who believes that their hacking is ethical because they
only break into sites and systems that are owned or run by organisations that they dont
agree with) destroyed a company that was totally innocent, even of the so-called crime
that the hactivist was so worked-up about.
Unfortunately for the company its original founder had chosen a name that was similar
to the name of a business that was connected with the use of animals for their fur not the
same name; not the target name; and the business certainly had nothing to do with the
practice so hated by the hactivist. The company was totally innocent and is now totally out
of business.
_ 44 THE SECURE ONLINE BUSINESS_____________________________________
A simple case of mistaken identity was how it was portrayed, but the end result was
catastrophic for the owners and all of the workers, simply because someone who was so full
of their own rights made an electronic search for any company that had a similar name and
attacked them without any further check.
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Product
PayPal is an online transaction business allowing payments and financial transfers to be made
through the internet. PayPal is an alternative to offline tranaction methods such as checks and money
orders.
eBay offers a marketplaces for the sale of goods and services. It also provides online payment and
communication services to individuals and businesses.
Products on sale at Ebay include millions of collectibles, dcor, appliances, computers, furnishings,
equipment vehicles and other miscellaneous items are listed, bought, or sold, daily.
Bill Me Later is an Ebay service that provides convenient and secure payment method designed for
purchasing on the web or over the phone.
Rent.com is an Ebay subsidiary which is a first pay-for-performance online rental site, a business
model that outperformed competitors who went with subscriptions, listing fees, or costs-per-lead
revenue models The company charges the property manager when a verified lease is produced
through the site.
Shopping.com is an online community Owned by Ebay it provides a price comparison service and
operates webpages in the USA, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia.
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StubHub is a subsiiary of Ebay which acts as an online marketplace for buyers and sellers of tickets
to sporting, concert and theater events.
Skype is an economical communication tool owned by Ebay. The company provides free video
calling , free chat with other Skype members, free instant messaging and call to landlines at low
rates.
Half.com is a subsidiary of Ebay, Inc in which sellers offer items at fixed prices, usually items that
have a ISBN, UPC or database file indicators as opposed to rare, old or collectible items. The items
available on half.com are limited to textbooks, music, movies, video games, and video game
consoles.
Price
Ebay, Inc. recently changed some of its pricing policies, dictating different listing fees from frequent
and occasional sellers.
EBay, Inc. Every Day eliminated upfront listing fees (for auctions only, not Buy It Now), and instead
charges 9-percent of the final sale price, up to $50.
Ebay, Inc. employs a quality click pricing model which pays affiliates "by the click", just like
AdSense.
Sellers are charged when an item is listed on eBay a nonrefundable Insertion Fee is charged, which
ranges between 30 cents and $3.30, depending on the seller's opening bid on the item.
Sellers pay a fee for additional listing options to promote the item, such as highlighted or bold
listing.
A final sale price fee is charged to a seller at the end of an auction. This fee generally ranges from
1.25% to 5% of the final sale price.
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Promotions
According to afaqs eBay will use outdoor extensively in cities such as Lucknow, Coimbatore, Pune,
Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai while Radio advertising will be used in Delhi, Mumbai,
Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad. While it will also use display advertising across major portals
such as Yahoo.co.in and Rediff.com. Search marketing will also be used.
Very recently Subhiksha used a TV campaign to highlight lowest prices for mobiles and they pulled
it off quite well and that might have been motivation for EBay to launch this campaign. Indians
being so price conscious I am sure this one month long campaign is definitely going to give eBay a
good boost. If you are going to go for this campaign do keep a look out for Terms and Conditions
wherein lies the catch.
Place
Ebay have already a vast online space & still moving forward to capture more space.
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Groups - There are groups for EVERYTHING on Ebay! You can join groups for hobbies, selling,
or local interests. In these groups you can find invaluable information, great friends, and threads
where you can showcase your items.
Discussion Boards - Again, there is a discussion board for everything Ebay related. Have a
question? Someone there can answer. They share tips for marketing as well. Not only that, but your
ID gets known! Perhaps a few sales will ensue.
Utilize Your E-Mail- Add a signature line to your outgoing e-mail. All you need to include is a
hyper link to your Ebay listings with a line such as "Check Out My Ebay Listings!"
Utilize a Business Card- There are sites where you can order these for next to nothing. Google
search a company called Vista Print.
- Put one in every package you ship out
- Post them at area businesses. The Laundry Mat, Library, etc.
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business owners on MySpace for the sole purpose of marketting their industry. Get on board! A few
clicks in your profile set up can protect your account, so all friends must be approved by you. Try it
out. I have found that MySpace has risen to the 4th ranking site directing traffic to my store.
Include the unexpected - When packaging your items, include a little something extra. This could
be something as simple as a craft project printed out for a craft seller to care instructions for jewelry
if you sell jewelry. Customers love the extra touch!
Ebay India Marketing Campaign: Lowest Price Challenge
EBay India one of the largest e commerce stores in India has launched a price challenge an age old
marketing trick wherein they are challenging people to find prices lower than those advertised by
eBay India. The challenge is focused on a select range of gadgets, including mobile handsets, MP3
players and digital cameras.
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Target Segment
Most young Indian men are passionate about three things women, cars/bikes and gadgets. This
campaign is targeted at tech savvy young men who take an interest in gadgets and reside in the top
10 metros of the country. Men in the age group of 18-35 years account for 70-75 per cent of the
traffic on eBay. The site claims that men prefer buying gadgets, while women prefer buying jewelry
from the site.
Promotions
According to a faqs eBay will use outdoor extensively in cities such as Lucknow, Coimbatore, Pune,
Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai while Radio advertising will be used in Delhi, Mumbai,
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Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad. While it will also use display advertising across major portals
such as Yahoo.co.in and Rediff.com. Search marketing will also be used.
Very recently Subhiksha used a TV campaign to highlight lowest prices for mobiles and they pulled
it off quite well and that might have been motivation for EBay to launch this campaign. Indians
being so price conscious I am sure this one month long campaign is definitely going to give eBay a
good boost. If you are going to go for this campaign do keep a look out for Terms and Conditions
wherein lies the catch.
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Ebay Offers
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Indias leading online marketplace, announced a month long promotional offer for movie buffs, in
conjunction with Shemaroo Videos. Its a Buy 1, Get 1 free promotion with over 200 popular movie
titles on offer at Rs. 149, right through till December 5, 2005.
As part of the special movie promotions on eBay India, all movie buyers who buy a movie VCD at
Rs. 149, will also get a 3 in 1 hit song VCD absolutely free worth Rs. 66/-. Buyers can choose from
over 200 titles which include golden classics like Bobby, Chupke Chupke, Deewar, Mr. India,
Rangeela to the more recent hits like DUS, Masti, Herra Pheri and dozens more.
All eBay users can avail this attractive offer and create a collection of VCD from the wide range of
titles that Shemaroo has to offer. The offer begins from November 5, 2005 and will last until
December 5, 2005.
eBay India has the largest online movie library of VCDs and DVDs online where buyers can
choose from over 9000 titles, from the Hollywood, Bollywood, Tamil & Bengali film hits. Log onto
http://movies.ebay.in/ to create or add to your own personal movie collection from the comfort of
your home.
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example where buyers and sellers leave feedback for each other, and whereby awards are given to
the most genuine of eBayers.
The term 'eBay' has become a generic term for online auctions. Other companies with such a strong
position include Hoover for vacuum cleaners, and Google for search engines. Today it is common to
hear that someone is 'ebaying' or is an 'eBayer,' or that someone is going 'to eBay.'
Weaknesses
The organizations works tremendously hard to overcome fraud. However, the eBay model does
leave itself open to a number of fraudulent activities. Often the company deals with such activities
very quickly. Fraud includes counterfeit goods being marketed to unsuspecting (and suspecting!)
eBayers. Other forms of theft could include the redistribution of stolen goods. It should be pointed
out that fraud and theft are problems with individuals, not eBay. The weakness is that unscrupulous
individuals can exploit the C2C business model.
As with many technology companies, systems breakdowns could disturb the trading activities of
eBay. In the past both eBay and its payment brand Paypal have encountered shutdowns and outages.
As technology improves such a weakness is less and less of an issue.
Opportunities
Acquisitions provide new business strategy opportunities. eBay has agreed to buy online telephone
company Skype Technologies in a deal reported to be worth $2.6 billion. Skype's software lets PC
users talk to each other for free and make cut-price calls to mobiles and landlines. eBay has been
buying up firms - including payment system PayPal - in an effort to increase the number of services
it offers to consumers and keep its profits growing.
New and emerging markets provide opportunities (Market Development). Countries include China
and India. There, consumers are becoming richer and have more leisure time than previous
generations. Aspirating consumers are a growing segment in many developing nations.
There are also still opportunities in current markets (Market Penetration). Western Europe and the
USA still have many potential consumers that have yet to discover the benefits of online auctions.
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Remember products have life cycles that eventually come to an end, and such products are ideal for
selling and buying on eBay.
Threats
As with many of the global Internet brands, success attracts competition. International competitors
competing in their domestic markets may have the cultural experience that could give them a
competitive advantage over eBay. In fact eBay has found that it has met with other USA-based
Internet companies when trading overseas. For example, Yahoo! dominates the Japanese market.
Attack by illegal practices is a threat. As with weaknesses above, the brand is attacked by
unscrupulous individuals. For example e-mails are sent to unsuspecting eBayers pretending to come
from eBay. Logos and the design of the pages look authentic. However they are designed so that you
input private information that the thieves can use to take passwords and identifications. -so beware!
Some costs cannot be controlled by eBay. For example delivery charges and credit card charges. If
fuel prices were to rise, the cost is passed on to the consumer in terms of delivery and postal fees.
This could make the overall cost of an auctioned item too expensive. Similarly, if a credit card
company such as Visa or Mastercard imposed a charge for online transaction, the total cost of the
same items would increase with similar consequences.
Amazon.com is obsessed with a fervor to serve consumer and shareholder alike. Since its inception
over fifteen years ago, Amazon.com has steadily grown from a burgeoning dot-com corporation
into a multinational monster, a king in the domain of internet retail. It targets two goals: the
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satisfaction of a customer and efficient corporate growth. Its marketing strategies are near-legendary,
and budding business should take a page or several chapters from Amazon.coms proven
marketing manual.
Amazon.com History
Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com founder and CEO, dreamed about books. In 1994, he created Amazon.com,
Inc., which he labeled as Earths Biggest Bookstore. The ecommerce company went online in
1995 and soon expanded into other media, including DVDs, VHS, CDs, MP3s, and eventually a
wide range of other products, including toys, electronics, furniture and apparel. As such, the tagline
soon changed to Earths Largest Selection. But books were only the beginning of Bezos up-andcoming enterprise.
Amazon.com went public in 1997. In the first shareholder letter, Bezos penned the fundamental
foundation for Amazon.coms success: Start with customers, and work backwards Listen to
customers, but dont just listen to customers also invent on their behalf Obsess over customers.
This policy was backed by a startling business philosophy Bezos planned on operating at a loss for
4-5 years. It was not until 2001 that Amazon.com posted a net profit at a minuscule one-cent per
share. Yet, despite its bizarre business strategy, Amazon.com claimed over 1.4 million customers
after only two years of being online.
Now, 45 million satisfied customers shop at Amazon.com for everything from books (most popular)
to fashion apparel to fine jewelry to Christmas toys. It has one of the most recognized brand names
in the world and garners an estimated 50% of its sales from overseas consumers. Surviving the dotcom bust of the late 1990s and early 2000s, Amazon weathered the e-storms and now thrives in the
retail marketplace, challenging vending giants like Wal-Mart and Target. Focused on technological
innovation and centered on customer fulfillment, Amazon.com proceeds into the next decade with a
profit firmly in one hand, and the capacity to blow it out of the water in the other hand.
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Much of its marketing is subliminal or indirect it does not run $1 million dollar ads during Super
Bowls nor post flyers in mall marketplaces. Amazon.com relies on wily online ploys, strong partner
relations and a constant declaration of quality to market itself to the masses.
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holidays, especially during Black Friday. Amazon.coms strategy is simple: since customers shop
online, online is where they will be found.
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packing and shipping the merchants product. This frees the merchant from a complex ordering
process while allowing them control over their inventory.
Affiliate Marketing
Keeping in line with their fourth marketing pillar, Amazon.com sponsors a wildly successful
program called Affiliate Marketing. Using Amazon Web Services (AWS) XML service, Associates
(independent retailers) and third-party sellers agree to place links on their websites to Amazon.com
or to specific Amazon.com products. If the third-party Associates list their own products on
Amazon.com, they may create links to those products as well. Associates receive a fee for each
visitor to Amazon.com that is directed through their links, and receive extra commissions if the
visitor buys a product. However, at the beginning of 2009, Amazon.com decided to terminate PPC
referral commissions to its North American Associates for paid search traffic. In an email sent to all
Associates, Amazon.com said, After careful review of how we are investing our advertising
resources, we have made the decision to no longer pay referral fees [that] send users . through
keyword bidding and paid search. Time will tell how the North America Associates program reacts
to this change, but with AWS, it is unlikely that Amazon.com will lose many of its Associates. To
offset this change, ion August 19, 2006, Amazon.com released aStore, which enables Associates to
embed a subset of Amazon products within, or linked from, another site.
How successful is this program? Nearly one million Associates have joined with Amazon.com, and
approximately 40% of its sales result from its Affiliate Marketing program. At the conclusion of
2007, Amazon.com reported over 1.3 million sellers through Amazon.coms World Wide Web sites.
It continues to expand its Affiliate program.
video) into a single product available for commentary. However, this simplifies commentary and use
accessibility, a preeminent concern for Amazon.com.
Email Marketing
For such a money-conscious company as Amazon.com, the lure of free and accessible e-mail is one
delectable temptation that is too potent to resist. Amazon.com engages in permission marketing,
where customers give the company permission to send them e-mails detailing product promotions.
Seth Godin, Online Marketers, writes that By talking to only volunteers, Permission Marketing
guarantees that consumers pay more attention to the marketing message. This strategy has acquired
Amazon.com an obsequious following. Melvin Ram, a satisfied Amazon.com customer, writes on
webdesigncompany.net that Looking at the e-mails Ive received from Amazon over the last two
years, I did not find a single e-mail that was irrelevant to me. Every single one seemed like it was
hand-picked for me based on my previous purchases.
Customer Service
Jeff Bezos would argue that customer service is not an addition to a corporate goal it is the
corporate goal. He calls Amazon.com, The most consumer-centric company. In a lecture to
Massachusetts Institute of Technology students, Bezos Tells of technological advances that have not
only enabled customers to find products, (and now at 28 million items), enabled products to find
customers [italics original]. Amazon.com focuses on the customer experience. It wants customers to
quickly access their hearts desire and obtain it without hassle. It has spent billions enhancing and
developing its website interface and customer relations.
There are numerous methods that Amazon.com uses to assist the customer. All customers may send
e-mails to Amazon.com requesting clarification about purchasing or other information. Nor are all
responses automated. Amazon.com engages many employees simply to respond to customer issues
by phone and e-mail.
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These are but the first few pages of Amazon.coms extensive marketing manual. By refusing to
compromise with mediocrity, Amazon.com has revolutionized ecommerce. Millions of customers,
who are reading their books, donning their jewelry, or vacuuming their floor, are a living testament
to Amazon.coms success. Are you one of them?
experience, which drives word-of-mouth promotion and repeat customer visits. Amazon delivers
personalized Web pages and services and employ a variety of media, business development
activities, and promotional methods. We employ various means of advertising, which consist
primarily of online advertising, including through our Associates program, sponsored search, portal
advertising, e-mail campaigns, and other initiatives. Associates program directs customers to our
websites by enabling independent websites to make millions of products available to their audiences
with fulfillment performed by us or third parties. It pays commissions to participants in Associates
program for click-through customer referrals and customer referrals resulting in product sales,
subject to the terms of the specific commission agreement.
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CHAPTER:-05
LEGAL ASPECT
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FIREWALL
The term "fire wall" originally meant, and still means, a fireproof wall intended to prevent the spread
of fire from one room or area of a building to another. The Internet is a volatile and unsafe
environment when viewed from a computer-security perspective, therefore "firewall" is an excellent
metaphor for network security.
The most important aspect of a firewall is that it is at the entry point of the networked system it
protects
Def: A firewall is hardware, software, or a combination of both that is used to prevent unauthorized
programs or Internet users from accessing a private network and/or a single computer.
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A firewall is a set of related programs, located at a network gateway server, that protects the
resources of a private network from users from other networks. (The term also implies the security
policy that is used with the programs.) An enterprise with an intranet that allows its workers access
to the wider Internet installs a firewall to prevent outsiders from accessing its own private data
resources and for controlling what outside resources its own users have access to.
Basically, a firewall, working closely with a router program, examines each network packet to
determine whether to forward it toward its destination. A firewall also includes or works with a
proxy server that makes network requests on behalf of workstation users. A firewall is often installed
in a specially designated computer separate from the rest of the network so that no incoming request
can get directly at private network resources.
There are a number of firewall screening methods. A simple one is to screen requests to make sure
they come from acceptable (previously identified) domain name and Internet Protocol addresses. For
mobile users, firewalls allow remote access in to the private network by the use of secure logon
procedures and authentication certificates.
A number of companies make firewall products. Features include logging and reporting, automatic
alarms at given thresholds of attack, and a graphical user interface for controlling the firewall.
Computer security borrows this term from firefighting, where it originated. In firefighting, a firewall
is a barrier established to prevent the spread of fire.
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II)
validates connections before allowing data to be exchanged, the firewall doesn't simply allow
or disallow packets but also determines whether the connection between both ends is valid
according to configurable rules, then opens a session and permits traffic only from the
allowed source and possibly only for a limited period of time. Whether a connection is valid
may for examples be based upon:
time of day
protocol
user
password
III)
The Application Level Gateway acts as a proxy for applications, performing all data exchanges with
the remote system in their behalf. This can render a computer behind the firewall all but invisible to
the remote system.
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It can allow or disallow traffic according to very specific rules, for instance permitting some
commands to a server but not others, limiting file access to certain types, varying rules according to
authenticated users and so forth.
Encrypted Authentication
Allows users on the external network to authenticate to the Firewall to gain access to
the private network
Virtual Private Networking
Establishes a secure connection between two private networks over a public network
This allows the use of the Internet as a connection medium rather than the use
of an expensive leased line
Virus
A computer virus is a term that has struck fear into the hearts of people since the first virus attacks
decades ago. This form of malware infects files on your computer; when these files are run, the virus
is given the chance to infect other files and relentlessly invade the computer. Viruses are
programmed to do a variety of things, ranging from utter file destruction to simple "electronic
graffiti".
Worm
Worms are similar to viruses, but they have two traits that differentiate them from their cousins.
First, they install their own files rather than infecting others. Second, they spread like a disease over
a computer network rather than within a single computer. Worms can be used to install other
dastardly forms of malware, such as Trojans, adware, and spyware.
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Adware
Adware seems relatively harmless at first sight - it's a program that displays advertisements while
you're using it. After all, most adware are freeware, and the ads are just a way with which the
freeware's publishers can recoup their development expenditures, right? Wrong. Adware is infamous
because it sneaks spyware with it, and spyware is always bad!
Spyware
Speaking of spyware, these programs spy on you (hence the name) while you're using your
computer. This form of malware is the most common one after viruses, and they do their damage just
by invading your privacy - they collect information from your files and record your online activities
and send them to a third party.
Trojan horse
Trojan horses, like spyware, spy on or otherwise steal information from you. Trojan horses are used
by their creators to control your computer from their location. One of the webmasters of this site has
experienced the fury of Trojans - back in his high school days (when he was new to the Internet and
quite nave), his dial-up Internet connection password got pilfered by a Trojan horse and sent to an
online message board. End result: a titanic bill from the ISP a few days later. Fortunately, he didnt
have to pay for it!
Other threats
There are security threats that can't be dealt with by firewalls. One example is a denial of service
attack, wherein an intruder sends hundreds to thousands of connection requests that overwhelm a
network or a website. Here, the goal is to shut down the target rather than sneak into the system to do
damage or steal information.
A variant of the denial of service attack is the distributed denial of service attack, which is even
worse as it launches a lot, lot more connection requests to swamp the target.
TRANSACTION SECURITY
One of the main worries - and rightly so - of any shopper using an online shop is: "Is it safe to send
my card details across the internet?". We use SecureTrading (ST), a payment service provider
who process payments by credit card and debit card in real time across the internet. Their e-payment
network uses digital signatures and strong encryption to ensure that all sensitive information is
protected
throughout
the
payment
process.
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Information is communicated using an extremely high level of security: namely, 2048-bit RSA
encryption with variable 168-bit session keys. This is many billions of times more secure than
standard web browser security, and is also much higher than all currently proposed new standards for
encryption
in
e-commerce.
The information you are viewing at present, along with the other pages in the Times Historic
Newspapers shop, is being served from a normal web server. When you click on Order Now, your
basket will appear which is not secure since it contains no sensitive information. Only after you have
confirmed your agreement to the Conditions of Sale, will secure pages be in
You will be taken to the SecureTrading (ST) secure server and asked to fill in your name, address
and credit card details. After confirming the order your transaction is carried out and authorised
through the banking network. In reality, payment through a secure payment service provider like
SecureTrading (ST) is probably more secure than a card transaction in a shop or conducted over the
telephone or fax. Information transmitted is encrypted using complicated logarithm combinations,
unlike these other methods that use standard medium coding.
Further protection is provided because card issuers protect cardholders from fraudulent use of their
card in a card not present environment, such as over the Internet. As the shopper did not sign for
the goods, they have the absolute right to demand a charge-back if those goods did not arrive or the
card was used fraudulently.
Chapter:4
Traffic of consumer
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Overall, the Shopping & Classifieds category received 25% of traffic referred from search. While the
number may seem low, keep in mind that many of the product categories received a higher share of
traffic from search while the Auctions & Classifieds are less reliant upon search (15% and 14%) but
represent nearly 35% of the visits within the Shopping & Classifieds category.
It is interesting to know that many consumers are going for online shopping to purchase the GROSSERY
items. Because of the convenience the consumer get of sitting home and shopping. People of India generally
metropolitan cities residing consumers go for online grocery shopping.
Groceries are different from many other products, such as music and books, that are commonly
purchased online. Many grocery products are perishable and therefore time-sensitive in terms of
their delivery needs. In addition, groceries are a replacement product, i.e., the same basket of
products is more-or-less purchased on a regular basis. Finally, groceries are high-touch items,
meaning that consumers like to inspect the quality of items they are purchasing. Nearly five years
ago the business of online shopping was not that much accelerated as it is now as it was just the
initial stage of grocery purchasing online. Apart from these even people were not aware about
purchasing online.
Slowly, Slowly internet shopping started penetrating in the minds of consumers and so purchasing of
online grocery also. ). This growing market had attracted an number of "pure-plays" - companies that
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focused exclusively on selling through the Internet, and attempted to replace traditional bricksand-mortar supermarkets. Most of these pure-plays failed spectacularly. Today, traditional bricksand-mortars stores are increasingly entering the online market in an attempt to leverage both brand
awareness and create distribution efficiencies. Many seller i.e. online sellers started going foe Bricks
And Clicks selling where the consumer can get the delivery of his product at the nearby store by
placing online order.
One of the Most popular website for purchasing grocery online is indiaplaza.com Which provides
over 1500 products that you can purchase online where almost all the drands all available such as
BRU, Amul ,MDH, Horlicks ,Bournvita etc.
The Food Marketing Institute (or FMI) is an organization that conducts research, education and
public affairs programs for food retailers and wholesalers. FMI's membership consists of
approximately 1,500 companies in 50 countries, ranging from large chain stores to independent
supermarkets. The Food Marketing Institute (FMI) has identified reasons that people, generally
speaking, choose to shop online (FMI, 2000). FMI research revealed that 86 percent of consumers go
online or access their computer on a daily basis. Of these individuals, 70 percent use the Internet
frequently for shopping. Those consumers between the ages of 25 to 34 are most likely to use the
Internet for shopping. FMI also identified how respondents locate online shopping sites. The two
main methods are looking in the Web site of a familiar store and doing a keyword search on a
browser; Table 1. as we saw in table 1. which clearly indicates that consumer while going for
grocery shopping will go for those website where they are experienced with or very well aware
about the website. By accessing or going through it clearly indicate that stores with a bricks-andmortar presence have an advantage in attracting new users to their sites. as majority will access to
the website of familiar store.
Consumers Decision for Going Online
At first the consumer decides on certain aspects, and then it influences him/her whether to go for online
grocery shopping or not. There are many traditional Retail shops, supermarkets from where the consumer can
easily buy the grocery products. It is but obvious that consumer will compare between various factor and then
arrive ultimately at the final decision of buying.
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The decision to purchase groceries online occurs after consumers evaluate the benefits and costs of
this decision versus using a traditional brick-and-mortar versus a straight online store. There are five
critical elements that determine whether a consumer shops online or in a traditional grocery store .
1. Price;
2. Ambiance;
3. Convenience;
4. Service;
5. Product variety
Many of the bricks-and-mortar formats vying for consumers' attention are focused primarily on two of these
elements, namely price and variety. However, owing to service fees incurred when shopping online,
traditional grocery stores typically experienced a comparative price advantage over e-grocers. Online grocery
shopping involves certain service charges which get skipped in traditional purchase of online shopping.
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Well on grocery shopping there are also certain other factors which deters the consumer for going
grocery shopping and make favorable them online grocery shopping. The factors such as:
Time Constraints: In many house there is dual-income family structure. A study reveals out
that 50% of e-grocery consumers earn more than US$50,000 per year .Mainer times the lady
of the house dont get enough time to go physically and purchased the Grocery which is a
keen essential commodity. Now here their preference towards online grocery shopping make
it easy for them as they can just access the internet and get the grocery of their choice just
sitting at their home or office or even in car.
Disabilities related to age: In a study conducted by Finland, Heikkila on these topic
discovered that the elder persons and disabled persons are second most consumer who go for
shopping of grocery online. It is basically because of their age it is not possible for them to
physically go and buy grocery. Majority of them live alone so buying online is the best
preferred choice by the elder citizens. even if they order on telephone they are not able to get
the price of each and every product other than these
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Price comparison and variety.: Well another of consumer is the one who just sit at home and
with the help of E-Shopping they are able to see the varieties of product can compare
between the prices of two products. Due to ample of varieties availability these make a
preference for them to go for online shopping.
Purchasing of grocery
Sr.n
Malls, supermarkets
o
1
Here
even
internet
though
are
arranged
and
some activity.
Always carrying
while
shopping
At the same time their has also been increase in the alcohol sector, consumer mainly prefers to buy online
alcohol because they are able to see different varieties available and accordingly go for their purchase of
online shopping of alcohol. A consumer can find ample alcohol such as Echinacea Extract Alcohol Free 4 Oz
Immune System,etc.
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House and garden is third most products which has been sold out in the year 2008, nearly the sales
in these sector has been increased by almost 30%. The consumer prefers these products because
these are the daily user products of the consumers. The products which are available under these
sector are
1. Inside the Home:- These Sub-category of House and Garden involves all those products which are
required at home and almost which are essential to put into the basket. The products such as
Bath,Bedding,Food & Wine, Furniture, Home Dcor & Accents, Housekeeping & Organization
Kitchen Dining & Bar Lamps, Lighting & Ceiling Fans, Major Appliances, Rugs & Carpets. It
includes smallest of the smallest product of our home under window treatment which includes curtain
rods and hardware, curtain drapes, shutters, so with these products available online consumer prefers
to go online.
2. Pet supplies:- It is surprising to know that even pets are sold online, the pets such as parrot fish, dogs,
cats etc, with a number of varieties available. There are more than 1000 to 2000 varieties available for
online shopping. The products under Pet categories involves Aquarium and fish, Cat, Dog, Bird,
Reptile, Horse etc.Also even smallest of the smallest product required for these products is available
such as cage for birds, belts for dogs, even pedigree. Thermometer and Heaters for animals and birds
etc.
3. Tools and Home improvement:- These category includes the products which keeps our home up to the
mark and which arte essential in our home such as hardware, air cooling and Heating Equipment,
Home security E.g. Camera outside the door, Plumbing and Fixtures E.G. bath Tub, Hand Shower,
Taps etc. Tools i.e. the devices which are usually required by the carpenters, plumbers.ets E.g. Drill
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machine, Air compressor, power generator etc. other than these it also involves magnifying glass,
safety products for carpenter, welders etc.
4. Weeding and Party supplies:- Under these we can the products such as Flowers and bouquets, where
you a beautiful artificial flowers catching your eyes. Apart from these it also involves Greeting cards
for various occasion. In these category the Seller usually puts ample number of products say he can
put more than 20000 products. Generally every other web host try to put innovative products under
because consumer like innovative kind of products for weeding moments and so they access internet
in search of some unique and innovative kind of products.
5. Yard, Outdoor living and garden:- The products which requires for your garden are available in these
category, Artificial products to keep your garden decorated for e.g. papyrus plants etc. Here the consumer
will get everything right from, Bird & Wildlife Accessories, Garden Dcor , Garden Structures &
Fencing, Gardening & Plants, Lawnmowers, Outdoor Cooking & Eating , Outdoor Lighting, Outdoor
Power Equipment, Patio & Garden Furniture,.
With these Various number of products available right from kitchen, plumbing equipments to pets, even
smallest and cheapest curtain drapes etc. the category House And Garden remains at 3rd position with
regards to number of sales.
There are various categories we can see over here. Hair Care, Hair Oil. Hair and shaving removal etc
will be made available over here. Apart From these there are the products such as spa, Diet pills
which helps in reducing the weight, Gum mint etc is available online. So consumer can take
advantage of these. There are also the products which take care of your vision so a person having a
low sight can take a good care of his vision. lenses ,good quality of spectacles are there which a use
it.
The products such as Facial steamer , Spa herbal etc these are the products which takes care of your
skin. Many online consumers browse these sub-category of Health and Beauty. as here ayurvedic
skin care products are also available.
There are ample number if products available online in these category, Lets take for E.g. If consumer
browses to ebay.com and look out for these category. Then the products available are as follows,
Next to the sub-category there is a numerical which indicates the total umber available items in that
respective category. For E.g. In Bath and body there are 23604 products available of different brands
and different varieties such as Bath oils, Bath lotions, Prostrate massager. Etc
Bath & Body(23604)
Coupons(2389)
Dietary Supplements, Nutrition(16284)
Fragrances(62197)
Hair Care(28334)
Health Care(13956)
Makeup(78754)
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Massage(5115)
Oral Care(4576)
Over-the-Counter Medicine(2180)
Skin Care(57222)
Vision Care(11608)
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Weight Management(10186)
Wholesale Lots(2126)
Owing to the increasing conscious of people towards themselves and availability of such huge stocks
it makes more and more consumer to go for this kind of product to physically use such innovative
and different brands product conveniently. And so basically the reason for increment of consumer by
almost 29% as compare to last year (2007)
5.3 Appliances and CE:
In these category a consumer can buy Appliances that are required at home the Appliances such as
Stoves knobs, Stylishness. knobs for ovens,. The traffic of online appliances shopping is more in
Australia. The products are appliances such as Refrigerators with a varieties available in that viz
Consumer has a option to go for the product ,the variety, model of their choices, since having these
much types of refrigerator available online gives the consumer a satisfaction by looking at these
much varieties of the appliances. Also the features of every appliances is displayed in a proper
manner which is easily accessible for the consumers.
Apart from refrigerator the other product which are sold under these category are as follows Laundry
products, ovens, vacuum cleaners, Dishwashers etc. With
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Due to these all factors and consumer changing behavior towards purchase of the goods is the reason
for good increment of these category by almost 20%.
5.4 Rewards and Directories
In these category there are just rewards which are given to consumers such as say20% cash back on
purchase on certain category. Now consumer could be seen purchasing more and more under these
category mainly because they get a good rewards on purchase of something and it is but obvious that
the consumer will like to shop more and more under these to save their money and grab the best
opportunity out of that.
There is an increment of about 15% in these sector which reveals that many consumers like to go for
online shopping which gives them certain aspects or benefits of purchasing.
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Secure transactions
Technology to carry out secure transactions is here and has been for some time. This centers mainly
on:
Security in E-shopping
Privacy Online
Many online malls use cookies to track the user activity for showing relevant results to maximize the
shopping experience. It can also be used to track your personal details. Thus before you pass your
personal information, ensure the credibility of the online merchant. Good companies post their
privacy policy ( that is how they are going to use the personal information about you ) on the
website. Read carefully!
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2. Keep a separate low limit credit card for internet transactions : A client in the credit card industry
shared this tip with me. You may feel safer if you dedicate a low-limit credit card for your online
purchases. Use as low a limit as you are comfortable with, and which will cover your monthly purchases.
That way, you will know that even in case of misuse, your losses are cut.
3. Look for the security indicators : These are - a yellow/ green bar in Mozilla/ IE in the URL window and
a
A
lock
URL
beginning
signA
with
Verisign
https://
when
authentication
you
are
taken
on
to
the
the
site
payment
gateway
Verified by Visa/ Master Card Secure Code - these are the latest protocols developed to protect users from
fraudulent transactions.
4. NEVER make an offline deal with an individual you find online: E-Bay says this and It is a good
general rule to apply - Always transact only through a site, which will then be accountable/ responsible if
you are de-frauded.
5. There are no irresistible deals: I am happy to get a 10-15% saving in most
suspicious of anyone offering something 50% cheaper online than it actually costs. When you find such
deals, be aware that they are risky and take cautions accordingly (call up the site, get hold of a person, a
phone number, an e-mail ID of someone you can catch later if things go wrong).
Dont mistrust small/ less known sites on principle: Some of the best and most professional dealings that
have had have been with smaller/non-advertised sites. use a standard procedure to check on a new site that
you are transacting with.
a) Check user feedback on the site by googling blogs and forums.
b) Send an email query and use the speed/ quality of response to form
judgement
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c)
Restrict
the
first
purchase
to
Rs.1000
or
below.
Identification
We've talked about the first problem -- secure transmission of sensitive data using encryption. The
second problem is to make sure you know who you're dealing with.
The latest trend is that customers will be issued a Digital ID of their own.
The SET (Secure Electronic Transaction) standards which have been developed by Visa,
MasterCard, Netscape, Microsoft, and others, carry this a step further. When these are implemented,
a Web browser will be able to transmit an encrypted digital ID which contains the customer's credit
card number. This number couldn't be decrypted or even seen by the merchant, but would only
decrypted when it reaches the merchant's credit card clearinghouse.
Business models
Internet marketing is associated with several business models:
e-commerce this is where goods are sold directly to consumers (B2C) or businesses (B2B) or
consumer to consumer(c2c).
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lead-based websites an organization that generates value by acquiring sales leads from its
website
affiliate marketing the process in which a product or service developed by one entity (ecommerce business, single person, or a combination) is sold by other active sellers for a share of
profits. The entity of the product may provide some marketing material (sales letter, affiliate link,
tracking facility) However, the vast majority of affiliate marketing relationships come from ecommerce businesses that offer affiliate programs.
local internet marketing through which a small company utilizes the Internet to find and nurture
relationships, which are to be used for real-world advantage. Local internet marketing uses tools
such as social media marketing, local directory listing and targeted online sales promotions.
blackhat marketing this is a form of internet marketing which employs deceptive, abusive, or
less than truthful methods to drive web traffic to a website or affiliate marketing offer. This method
sometimes includes spam, cloaking within search engine result pages, or routing users to pages they
didn't initially request.
One-to-one approach
The targeted user is typically browsing the Internet alone therefore the marketing messages can
reach them personally. This approach is used in search marketing, where the advertisements are
based on search engine keywords entered by the users.And now with the advent of Web 2.0 tools,
many users can interconnect as "peers."
Appeal to specific interests
Internet marketing and geo marketing places an emphasis on marketing that appeals to a specific
behaviour or interest, rather than reaching out to a broadly defined demographic "On- and Off-line"
marketers typically segment their markets according to age group, gender, geography, and other
general factors. Marketers have the luxury of targeting by activity and geo location. For example, a
kayak company can post advertisements on kayaking and canoeing websites with the full knowledge
that the audience has a related interest.
Internet marketing differs from magazine advertisements, where the goal is to appeal to the projected
demographic of the periodical, but rather the advertiser has knowledge of the target audience
people who engage in certain activities (e.g., uploading pictures, contributing to blogs) so the
company does not rely on the expectation that a certain group of people will be interested in its new
product or service.
Geo-targeting
Geo targeting (in internet marketing) and geo marketing are the methods of determining the geo
location (the physical location) of a website visitor with geo location software, and delivering
different content to that visitor based on his or her location, such as country, region/state, city, metro
code/zip code, organization, Internet Protocol (IP) address, ISP or other criteria.
Advantages
Internet marketing is relatively inexpensive when compared to the ratio of cost against the reach of
the target audience. Companies can reach a wide audience for a small fraction of traditional
advertising budgets. The nature of the medium allows consumers to research and purchase products
and services at their own convenience. Therefore, businesses have the advantage of appealing to
consumers in a medium that can bring results quickly. The strategy and overall 10
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creatives to rich multimedia experiences such as those containing more updated technology like
HTML, JavaScript, and Adobe Flash. As a result, advertisers can more effectively engage and
connect their audience with their campaigns which seek to shape consumer attitudes and feelings
towards specific products and services. The paradigm shift from dialup to high speed internet has
fuelled these changes.
In a national survey between November 30, 2009 and December 27, 2009, the Pew Research Centre
found that 74% of American adults (ages 18 and older) use the Internet. The same study found that
60% of American adults use broadband connections at home. 55% of American adults connect to the
Internet through a wireless network like a public/private access point, a Wi-Max network, or a
cellular 3G/4G network through a mobile cellular device.
Effects on industries
The number of banks offering the ability to perform banking tasks over the internet has also
increased. Online banking appeals to customers because it is often faster and considered more
convenient than visiting bank branches. Currently over 150 million U.S. adults now bank online,
with increasing Internet connection speed being the primary reason for fast growth in the online
banking industry. Of those individuals who use the Internet, 44 percent now perform banking
activities over the Internet.
Internet auctions have become a multi-billion dollar business. Unique items that could only
previously be found at flea markets are now being sold on Internet auction websites such as eBay.
Specialized e-stores sell an almost endless amount of items ranging from antiques, movie props,
clothing, gadgets and much more. As the premier online reselling platform, eBay is often used as a
price-basis for specialized items. Buyers and sellers often look at prices on the website before going
to flea markets; the price shown on eBay often becomes the item's selling price. It is increasingly
common for flea market vendors to place a targeted advertisement on the Internet for each item they
are selling online, all while running their business out of their homes.
In addition to the major effect internet marketing has had on the technology industry, the effect on
the advertising industry itself has been profound. In just a few years, online advertising has grown to
be worth tens of billions of dollars annually. PricewaterhouseCoopers reported that US$16.9 billion
was spent on Online marketing in the U.S. in 2006.
This has had a growing impact on the electoral process. In 2008 candidates for President heavily
utilized Internet marketing strategies to reach constituents. During the 2007 primaries candidates
added, on average, over 500 social network supporters per day to help spread their message.
President Barack Obama raised over US$1 million in a single day during his extensive Democratic
candidacy campaign, largely due to online donors.
There are several industries that have heavily invested in and benefited from internet marketing and
online advertising. While some of these were originally brick and mortar businesses such a
publishing, music, automotive or gambling, others have srung, up as purely online businesses, such
as digital design and media, blogging or internet service hosting.
Business or consumer model It is now commonplace to describe Internet marketing opportunities in
terms of whether an organization is transacting with consumers (business-to-consumer (B2C) or
other businesses (business-to-business (B2B)). those where consumers transact directly with other
consumers (C2C) and where initiate trading with companies (C2B). Note that the C2C and C2B
monikers are less widely used (e.g. The Economist, 2000), but they do highlight significant
differences between Internet-based commerce and earlier forms of commerce. Consumer-to152 | P a g e
consumer interactions were relatively rare, but are now very common in the form of customer
support and feedback the community components of sites and online auctions. Indeed, Hoffman
and Novak (1996) suggest that C2C interactions are a key characteristic of the Internet that is
important for companies to take into account C2C interactions as is shown by activity 1.2. It should
be noted before we leave C2C and C2B interactions that although it is useful to identify these
separately, both types of site are set up by intermediaries businesses, so they can be considered to be
part of B2C. 14
Business-to-consumer (B2C) Commercial transactions are between an organisation and consumers.
Business-to-business (B2B) Commercial transactions are between an organisation and other
organisations (Inter-organisational marketing) Consumer-to-consumer (C2C) Informational or
financial transactions are between consumers, but usually mediated through a business site.
Consumer-to-business (C2B) Consumers approach the business with an offer.
Risks and Benefits of Pure Online Commerce
Especially_as_compared_with_other_ channels,_ the_ Internet_as_ a_method_ for_ retail_ sales_
has_ specific_ advantages_ and_disadvantages_as_ well_ as_ opportunities_ and_risks._When_
observing_ the_ characteristics_ of_ Internet_ commerce,_ we_ recommend_ taking_ a_ two_
pronged_view__one_from_the_business_side_and_the_other_from_the_customer_s_perspec_
tive._ Business_owners_ thereby_ avoid_ leaving_ the_ impression_ of_ a_ truncated_company_
value_chain_in_which,_correspondingly,_only_one_partner_profits_from_the_transaction_
(Passenheim_2003,_p._99)._In_Figure_5_1,_the_advantages_and_disadvantages_of_the_Inter_
net_distribution_channel_are_illustrated_from_the_perspective_of_the_company._
Figure_5_1:_
_Risk_benefit_analysis_of_online_distribution_channels_from_a_company_s_perspective_
Source: Based on Passenheim 2003, p. 99
Global presence
Direct ordering
Acquisition of customer data
One-to-one marketing
Cross/up-selling
Long tail marketing
High technical complexity
Slow ROI
Competition with vendors from
other sectors
"Freeloader" mentality
Dependence on Google
Advantages and opportunities Disadvantages and risks
Business
perspective
G. Heinemann, C. Schwarzl, New Online Retailing, DOI 10.1007/978-3-8349-6378-9_5,
Gabler | GWV Fachverlage GmbH, Wiesbaden 2010
Risks and Benefits of Pure Online Commerce 5.1
211
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ment._ Building_ a_ customer_ base_ also_ requires_ considerable_ effort,_ meaning_ that_
turnover_is_generated_in_a_very_time_delayed_manner._On_the_other_hand,_online_re_
tailers_ can_ attain_ sustainable_ economies_ of_ scale_ after_ slowly_ building_ up_ their_
businesses._
_ Competition_with_vendors_in_other_sectors_occurs_due_to_the_spatial_and_temporal_
infinity_of_the_online_channel;_it_allows_other_merchants_to_sell_products_they_might_
not_have_sold_before_with_little_effort._The_Internet_also_induces_former_deliverers_
to_sell_directly_to_customers,_thereby_disintermediating_the_business._
_ __Freeloader__problems_occur_when_customers_who_use_the_brick_and_mortar_store_
to_ gain_ information_ about_ a_ product_ then_ shop_ around_ for_ a_ less_ expensive_ offer_
online._ Through_ intelligent_ customer_ relations_ management,_ customers_ can_ be_
bound_to_the_store._Channel_hopping_speaks_to_the_advantage_of_multi_channel_so_
lutions.__
_ Google_ dependency_ is_ something_ Internet_ retailers_ cannot_ avoid._ There_ are_ no_
longer_any_online_retailers_who_can_get_by_without_the_traffic_generated_by_Google._
Companies_whose_ Internet_business_models_ were_ built_on_ Google_s_ visitor_ traffic_
have_become_dependent_on_it_(Schmidt_2008,_p._14).__
5.1.2 Risks and Benefits from an Online Customer Perspective
The_Internet,_as_a_virtual_meeting_room_for_vendors_and_consumers,_features_character_
istics_ of_place_and_time_independence_(ubiquity)._ All_participants_can_enter,_ stay_and_
leave_this_virtual_space_as_they_wish,_depending_on_their_technical_infrastructure_and_
preferences._ This_ fundamentally_ differentiates_ the_ Internet_ from_ other_ markets,_ in_
which_global_reach_and_time_independence_are_impossible.__
_
These_ and_ other_ advantages_ have_ certainly_ caused_ the_ diffusion_ of_ the_ Internet._ In_
Figure_5_2,_the_advantages_and_disadvantages_of_the_Internet_as_a_distribution_channel_
are_displayed_from_the_customer_s_perspective._
_
The_fundamental_advantages_and_benefits_from_the_customer_s_perspective_turn_out_
to_ be_ ubiquity,_ independence_ from_ store_opening_ times/locations,_ the_ large_ selection_
Risks and Benefits of Pure Online Commerce 5.1
213
and_ comparability_ of_ products_ and_ offers,_ market_ transparency,_ individual_ offers,_
openness_and_better_information:__
_
Figure_5_2:_ _Risk_benefit_ analysis_ of_ online_ distribution_ channels_ from_ a_ customer_s_
_perspective_
Source: Based on Passenheim 2003, p. 99
_ Anywhere/anytime_availability_results_from_access_to_the_Web._Due_to_the_interna_
tionality_ of_ the_ Web,_ the_ customer_ has_ access_ to_ all_ merchants_ worldwide_ and_
therefore_ has_ considerably_ more_ alternative_ merchants_ than_ would_ be_ possible_
with_brick_and_mortar_retail._
_ Independence_from_opening_times_ is_ possible_through_24_hour_ordering_ options_
and_ shipping_ to_ any_ desired_ address._ Experience_ in_ online_ retail_ has_ shown_ that_
evenings_and_nights_are_the_preferred_times_for_making_purchases.__
_ Larger_selection_is_possible_through_access_to_the_Web,_but_also_through_the_lack_of_
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spatial_and_temporal_boundaries_on_the_supply_side,_which_leads_to_long_tail_mar_
keting._
_ Market_ transparency_ becomes_ full_scale_ through_ the_ possibility_ of_ comparing_
goods_in_real_time,_price_comparisons_in_electronic_channels_and_search_engine_or_
software_ agents_ that_ seek_ out_ the_ best_ offer_ according_ to_ customers__ preferences,_
without_charging_additional_costs_for_the_service.__
_ Individual_offers_are_a_direct_result_of_one_to_one_marketing._Product_individuali_
sation_goes_hand_in_hand_with_the_trend_toward_interactive_value_creation,_or_mass_
customisation_ and_ open_ innovation._ The_ technology_ further_ allows_ for_ personal_
ised_customer_contact._
Anywhere/anytime availability
Independence from opening times
Larger selection of offers
Market transparency and comparability
of products and offers
Individual offers
Openess
Better information
Advantages and opportunities Disadvantages and risks
Customer
perspective
Lacks physical contacts with products
Lacks social aspect of purchase
Possibile difficulty with complaints
Safety risk in payment processing
Minimum order value and additional
costs
5
Risks and Benefits of New Online Retailing
214
_ Openness_and_transparency_mark_the_Internet_age._Companies_as_well_as_custom_
ers_are_affected_by_it,_as_they_are_no_longer_able_to_hide_things_from_their_customers._
_ Consumers_benefit_from_better_information_through_both_transparency_and_docu_
mentation._The_Internet_allows_us_to_connect_to_products_better_via_its_transmission_
of_emotional_pictures_and_sounds._Products_are_displayed_in_a_more_graphic_way_
than_in_mail_order_retail._The_same_is_true_of_3_D_animations,_which_are_being_used_
more_and_more_frequently._
Despite_ its_ varied_ technical_possibilities,_ the_ online_ channel_ still_ possesses_ disadvan_
tages_ and_ risks_ from_ the_ customer_s_ perspective_ and_ these_ should_ not_ be_ underesti_
mated._They_result_from_a_lack_of_possibilities_to_contact_a_merchant_(both_physical_and_
social),_difficulties_and_risks_regarding_returns_and_payment,_as_well_as_possible_finan_
cial_risks_through_minimum_order_requirements_or_criminal_activities:_
__
_ The_ lack_ of_physical_ contact_ has_ proven_ to_ be_ a_ decisive_ disadvantage_ from_ the_
customer_s_point_of_view._This_is_connected_with_the_risk_of_not_being_able_to_verify_
the_quality_and_functionality_of_a_product._
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_ A_ lack_ of_ social_ contact,_which_ is_ implicit_ in_ brick_ and_ mortar_ trade,_ raises_ the_
customer_s_ perceived_ risk_ in_ distance_ retail_ because_ of_ the_ anonymity_ that_ comes_
with_it._Technical_innovations_such_as_communication_platforms_cannot_alter_this._
This_speaks_for_the_existence_a_brick_and_mortar_supplementary_channel_or_at_least_
a_call_centre_option.__
_ Possible_ difficulties_ with_ returns_ result_ from_ the_ relative_ anonymity_ associated_
with_the_process._Sending_back_the_goods_and_the_inherent_trip_to_the_next_post_of_
fice_present_a_temporal_and_financial_risk_for_customers._
_ Safety_ risks_ during_ payment_ processing_ give_ rise_ to_ latent_ fears_ in_ customers._
These_fears_have_been_nurtured_by_news_of_an_increasing_number_of_cases_of_fraud_
in_connection_with_online_payments._These_concerns_should_by_all_means_be_taken_
seriously_by_online_retailers._
_ Minimum_order_requirements_and_additional_costs_accrued_through_complaints,_
returns_and_repairs_are_an_equally_never_ending_discussion_for_customers._This_of_
ten_results_from_a_lack_of_transparency_or_non_Internet_specific_GTCs._This_shows_
that_quite_a_number_of_online_retailers_have_neglected_to_take_this_topic_into_consid_
eration._
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CHAPTER:-06
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The Indian private sector recognizes economies of e-business. Clearly, the opportunity (and the
need) for Indian businesses to get onto the e-business power curve is really quite high. Needless to
add, that the potential exists. The size of the transactions over the net piddling size when compared
to world.
Unlike in the past, Where existing attitudes have posed major challenges to adopting a new way of
life, with the internet it has been rather a smooth sailing, thanks to the extraordinary levels of
internet awareness in the country. As a result of this, companies have been more open to taking
studied chances. As a result of this, companies have been more open to taking studied chances, as is
evident. Here, we are not just talking of companies that have static web sites but those which
conduct commerce on the net like color Plus, India Bookshop, bababazzar, Rediff-on-the\net and
shoppers stop, Bazee.com, Auctionindia.com, India plaza.com, selling from books and shirts to
vegetables and soaps, from electronic goods to the old second hand non performing assets of
companies to other companies.
The lack of infrastructure was a serious impediment, but bottlenecks are soon being removed. With
several private value-added networks(VANs) coming up and with the reach of internet expanding,
this is becoming less of a problem. In fact, collective experience indicates that firms can deploy ecommerce solutions over the current infrastructure and realize significant benefits from them. To be
fair, this is one area that has received focus from the highest levels and there is feverish activity to
build bigger bandwidth and crucial payment gateways, which will enable online care authorization.
The needs to get its legal, legislative, regulatory, infrastructure and manpower ready for e-business.
Already some of this readiness can be seen, and hence, India is ready to boom in e-business While
the air of optimism persists, the fact remains that in India Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) has not
really taken off. Therefore, doubts persists whether corporate and government in specific will adopt
this as quickly as is made out. One of the main reasons is high entry cost of EDI because of which
companies fight shy of trying out.
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online auction
In the Busy and crowded world, today one can even buy the products of his preferences online
through auction. Generally auction is carried on for all those goods which have a high demand but
are scarce, so a consumer who do online shopping can also get entered into online auction which is
normally termed as E-Auction.
1. .Brochures containing information and photos of the equipment for sale are available via mail
and viewable online so that it becomes convenient for the buyer or intended buyer to go
through the terms and conditions and also details regarding product.
2. Lots became available for preview online two weeks before the e-Auction. Buyers can get a
list of equipment by finding the e-auction they are interested in on website, or by doing a
keyword search.
3. lots are open for bidding several days before the specified closing time.
4. Buyers can submit bids and/or proxy bids. The e-Auction lot goes into overtime bidding if a
buyer bids within the last 2 minutes of the closing time. The time remaining is reset at 2
minutes.
5. The lot closes at a specific date and time. An invoice with payment instruction is faxed to the
winning buyer. buyer pays via wire transfer with in 24 hours.
6. Buyer receives an authorization to pick up for all lots and arranges for load out with each
yard.
E-Auctions: When to play, how to play, how to win
Like it or not, electronic auctions are here to stay. Management loves them and large numbers of
corporations are quietly putting big chunks of their annual spend on the electronic block. Do eAuctions threaten supplier relationship? Absolutely! But there are plenty of big spend categories
where relationship matters very little. And even where it makes sense to partner with suppliers for
long haul, the astonishing price reductions achieved in some electronic auctions are causing many
purchasing execs to wonder if the love they feel for their supplier partners might really be
unrequited.
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Contributors to the first E-Auction playbook represents both purchasing professionals and suppliers Who have
participated in reverse auctions, technology developers, marker makers, management consultants and other eAuction facilitators.
Why wait till Diwali? You can probably do better than that.; Try putting the goods up for sale on an auction
site and you might be surprised at the number of bleary-eyed people out there mouse in hand who will stay
up till midnight for a chance to add it to their personal collection. It sure makes makes you wonder if auction
sites are actually going to be the shopping malls of the future. Thousands of people around the world have
started to shop for everything from objects and arts to ordinary travel packages at these sites. And there are
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businessman out there who are not only too willing to bet their venture capital on the fact that their will soon
be a huge community of Indians wanting to do their buying and selling via auctions.
There is little evidence of Indians paying a visit to international auction sites. Yet the number of Indians
websites that are in the auction space is slowly and steadily going up. Bazee.com already has around 15,000
registered users and the site has over 25,000 bids every month. If his claim is correct then it appears that it
takes only a gentle push-high-decibel advertising actually- for Indians sellers to take a shoe at putting their
personal belongings and whatever else they want to get rid of under the virtue gavel.
The Indian sites are also not charging anybody anything yet though sometime they will slap a small fee for the
seller. For many people who bid on the internet it is more fun than bargaining in a shop as they tend to feel on
top of the world when they outbid others from particular item.
Indian sites have taken a page out of ebay- the online answer to Sothebys- when it comes to content. These
sites offers the range available on any international auction site.:: art & antiques, automobiles, mobile phones,
books, collectibles, apparel, computers, electronics, jewellery, movies, collectibles are sold at the same place
that the domain name Hrithiksucks.com is on sale. Neat ploy. Wonder who bids fair for it: Hrithik roshans
fan club or his detractors? Perhaps the star himself? Whoever it is, the bidders should find out which type of
auction is he participating in. most sites offer two kinds of auctions at the moment. There is normal auction
where bids are ranked in order of price, quantity and time. The auction starts at the starting price that the
seller selects..
Low prices attract more bidders and more activity tends to result in higher closing prices. The second type is
like the former except the seller selects a reserve price in addition to a starting price. Buyers can bid below the
reserve price to the seller is under no obligation to sell unless a bib matches, or is more than, the reserve price.
If the reserve price is not met when the auction closes, it closes without a winner.
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The more complicated dutch auction is not available on Indian sites. In a dutch auctipon, the winner has to
pay only as much as the lowest bid amount. However, the chances of getting the limited items on offer are
more if you bid higher a nearly foolproof way of making sure there is no collusion between buyers.
The upside
This is a busy site and it can e quite difficult to find ones way around it if youre a first time theres
a good choice, but its a bit like spaghetti junction its hard to know where to and to join in.
QXL
Another excellent site its clearly laid out and the security is very good QXLs safe pay service. As a
buyer, you pay to a central service; no money exchanges hands until QXL arranges for the item to be
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safely delivered to you. The editors auction choice is handy and highlights some interesting
bargains its quick way to find out whats up for grabs.
Yahoo!
Yahoo started life as a simple web-based directory and now boastsa an impressive range of auction
categories. Theres an excellent search engine facility to help find bargains.
How to bid online auctions?
Its easy to buy items online .The process is Straight forward and the sites usually give newcomers
plenty of help. Lets take ebay an example even other auction site has the same procedure.
1. To start bidding youll need to register as an ebay member. Once youve done this you can
start looking for things that are available for bidding. And that you are looking to bid for.
2. You can find some amazing details about the seller including how many things theyve sold
the bidding that took place and comments from the buyers. You can even ask the seller
questions by email if you want more detail about the item.
3. You bid by scrolling down the page of the itemyoure interested uin and submitting your user
ID. Password and the amount you want to bid. Click on place bid and youll see whether or
not you are the highest bidder.
4. While you waait for the auction to close (usually several days latter) you will receive a daily
email telling you whether you are the high bidder or if you have been outbid by another eBay
member. Remember that some bidders wait until, the last minute to place the bids.
5. If you are the highest bidder at the end of an auction you must contact the seller within three
working days. You are under the contract to pay your last bid plus shipping cost it this was
specified in the item listing. The sellers are under contract to send the products/ items to the
customer.
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68%
2. General Merchandise
17.7%
3. Computer hardware/software
03.4%
03.3%
5. Work-at-home schemes
01.6%
6. Business opportunity
01.1%
7. Pyramid schemes
0.6%
0.5%
0.5%
0.4%
It could be seen that many frauds and complaints emerges from Auction is basically the seller fails to
deliver the product or buyer does not make the payment of the goods. So overcome with these
complaints and frauds many online auction sites have come up either a solution that the seller must
be displayable to all the buyers along with the entire details of the sellers such as Name, contact no,
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address.ets. The condition remains the same for the buyer, while he log in, in a particular website
along with his name address even he is displayable to the seller.
Two good Website where one can arm oneself against online auction fraud is the FTCs Internet
Auction: A guide
for
buyers
and
Sellers,
available
with
other
useful
tips,
at
TYPES OF E-BUSINESS
where as today the most popular connection is the internet. The two businesses pass information
electronically to each other. B2B e-business currently makes up about 94% of all e-business
transactions.
Typically in the B2B environment, E-Business can be used in the following processes:
Procurement;
Order fulfillment;
Managing trading-partner relationships.
For many Welsh SME s B2B E-Business is synonymous with the vision of integrated supply chains.
This might be the ultimate objective, but, in the short term, B2B E-Business could be used as a
significant enabler in their move towards greater trading partner collaboration. E-Business technologies
have allowed even the smallest businesses to improve the processes for interfacing with customers. They
are now able to develop services for individual clients rather than provide a standard service. Pentwyn
Splicers based in Pontypool manufacture pneumatic splicers for the UK and world textile market. They
evaluated all aspects of their business process to determine where the greatest return could be obtained.
Using the Web to sell more products was an initial consideration, but it was in the provision of customer
service and support to their overseas distributors that the greatest benefits have been achieved.
this type of business that has been successful in using e Business to deliver services to customers. These
businesses may have been slow in gearing-up for e Business compared to the innovative dot.com start
ups, but they usually have a sound commercial structure as well as in-depth experience of running a
business - something which many dot coms lacked, causing many to fail
Example: A home user wishes to purchase some good quality wine. The user accesses the Internet site
and follows the links to read a report on the recommended wines. After reading the tasting notes the user
follows the links to place an order along with delivery and payment details directly into the merchants
inventory system. The wine is then dispatched from the suppliers warehouse and in theory is delivered
to the consumer without delay.
Example: Harry is planning a holiday in Darwin. He requires a flight in the first week of December and
is only willing to pay $250. Harry places a submission with in a web based C2B facility. Dodgy Brothers
Airways accesses the facility and sees Harrys submission. Due to it being a slow period, the airline
offers Harry a return fare for $250.
B2A is the least developed area of e-Business and it relates to the way that public sector organizations, at
both a central and local level, are providing their services on-line. Also known as e-Government, it has
the potential to increase the domestic and business use of e-Business as traditional services are
increasingly being delivered over the Internet.
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The UK government is committed to ensuring this country is at the forefront of e-Business and it is
essential that e-Government plays a significant part in achieving this objective.
.B2B (Business-to-Business)
Companies doing business with each other such as manufacturers selling to distributors and
wholesalers selling to retailers. Pricing is based on quantity of order and is often negotiable.
Eg:-Cisco company, logistics - transportation, warehousing and distribution (e.g., Procter
and Gamble);
application service providers - deployment, hosting and management of packaged
software from a central facility (e.g., Oracle and Linkshare);
B2C (Business-to-Consumer)
Businesses selling to the general public typically through catalogs utilizing shopping cart
software. By dollar volume, B2B takes the prize, however B2C is really what the average Joe
has
in
mind
with
regards
to
ecommerce
as
a
whole.
Having a hard time finding a book? Need to purchase a custom, high-end computer system?
How about a first class, all-inclusive trip to a tropical island? With the advent ecommerce, all
three things can be purchased literally in minutes without human interaction. Oh how far
we've come!
Eg:- Dell laptop to consumers like student
C2B (Consumer-to-Business)
A consumer posts his project with a set budget online and within hours companies review the
consumer's requirements and bid on the project. The consumer reviews the bids and selects
the company that will complete the project. Elance empowers consumers around the world
by providing the meeting ground and platform for such transactions.
C2C (Consumer-to-Consumer)
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There are many sites offering free classifieds, auctions, and forums where individuals can
buy and sell thanks to online payment systems like PayPal where people can send and
receive money online with ease. eBay's auction service is a great example of where personto-person transactions take place everyday since 1995.
Self-Discipline
Are you the sort of person who tends to raise your voice when something doesn't go your way?Or do
you even have A tendency to shout at your spouse, children or colleagues when you areunder
pressure? Whenever you start shouting, swearing or using negative language you arewasting your
energy energy better put to use on your business venture. Swearing and grumblingkills your
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creativity and blocks your mind. You must be strong enough to withstand any tendencyto get angry
or upset or else you will never succeed in your business.
Courage
It takes great courage to make decisions and set goals because this means you have to prove
toyourself that you can follow your own words through to a conclusion. Look at your friends,family
and colleagues. How often do you hear somebody make a promise like I'll call you nextweek. or
I'll look this information up for you. or Sure I'll help you when you move house, just let me know
when you need me. Those are statements, offers, promises all based on words.Yet, how often are
they followed by deeds? Do you make New Year's Resolutions such as Nextyear I'll quit smoking,
Next year I'll start this business course at night school, and Next year I'll go on a trip to Paris or
Egypt with you? How many of those resolutions and promises haveyou kept? How many of
them did you simply forget two weeks into the New Year? It takescourage to make a real decision, as
you will have to make a sacrifice to follow it through. Also,when you start up a business you will be
alone, at least to begin with. There will be no-one to tellyou what to do, nobody at first to motivate
and support you. You will have to take responsibilityfor yourself and to a certain degree, for any
possible partners and you can only lead others if youhave your own fears under control and are
willing to take risks. Many people do not setthemselves goals because they are afraid of failing
of admitting defeat and they think the bestway to avoid defeat is to simply not set goals.
Creativity
Establishing a business means creating a product, service or system that solves a specific problem or
enhances a person's life in one way or another. You can achieve this purpose whenyou create
something new This doesn't mean that you have to re-invent the wheel though.Examine any new
product development that enters the market and you will see that this newcreation is not entirely
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new but has been made up by combining existing elements in a novelway. This action of rethinking
existing elements is the formula of creativity. So, in order to createsomething new you have first to
analyze an existing product to find out how it can be improved,developed or enhanced in any way so
it will do a better job. Take Google its foundersexamined and analyzed existing search portals, in
particular Yahoo and MSN. Based on their exhaustive studies they came up with an indexing and
searching system that provides a higher search term relevancy. Study people's behaviour identify
their latent needs and desires andyou will tap into a never-ending supply of product ideas.
Vision
Vision is the ability to see things not as they are right now, but what they will be like in thefuture.
Most people are so stuck in the moment, so preoccupied with their personal daily problems that they
don't have the time or energy to think about how a particular market candevelop in the future.
Look at any successful business venture and you will find that its founder was able to project into the
future, to estimate how people's behaviour will change. Your successin business is directly related to
your vision capacity and your vision capacity is determined bytwo factors: How far ahead are
you able to see into the future and how precise are your predictions? When Larry Page and Sergey
Brin founded Google in 1998, they could see well beyond the year 2003, in which they yielded A
revenue of almost $ 1 billion. By 1998 Yahoo andMSN were operating worldwide known search
services and no one would have thought that twostudents could take the lead in the industry within 5
years. Yet, Brin and Page had becomeexcellent analysts of the web search market and they collected
and recorded the necessary data torecognize a pattern in human behaviour. Based on their
observations they then drew conclusionsand made a prognosis. If you want to build your own
business, you must be able to see into thefuture. You can develop vision capability just like you
can develop any other skill. Your firststep is to study and analyze human behaviour. Ask yourself
this question: What are peoplelooking for when they use the Internet?
ESSENTIALS OF E-BUSINESS
You cant just open an online store and expect customers to flock to it. Find out if your nichemarket
is one that you can reach through a website. How? Does your niche market have anidentifiable need
for your web offering? Do they have the wherewithal to pay for it? Is the nichegroup sizeable, i.e.,
will it provide enough business to produce the income you need? If theanswers are yes, you have
found a good niche. Now dig deep within that niche to understand theconsumer behaviors that drive
it. Every e-commerce operator should assume that his or her customers are sophisticated shoppers
who demand prompt delivery of a product that is exactly as portrayed on their website. The most
common mistake made by inexperienced web operators i
to fail to be responsive to their customers order processing and fulfillment needs. But thoseservices
are the very underpinnings of all successful e-commerce ventures neglect those areasand you
have a business catastrophe.To help in the follow-through, you and your customers must be able to
track the status of each purchase. Most new e-commerce businesses, however, fail to integrate this
necessary backendsupport. Another must is to make certain that your customers know that your
web-based business
will not only deliver
a value online that cannot be found offline,
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but
that it is just asresponsive with customer service issues as the most well-regarded offline business.By
keeping customer service and product fulfillment as an immediate priority you can build avaluable
relationship with your customer. In doing so, you earn that customers loyalty. Thathelps to stem the
natural flow of attrition as customers who pursue the lowest price find that thetrade-off is a void
in the cut-rate businesss customer service department.Another common problem for new ecommerce businesses is misinterpreting the power of theWeb. Yes, a website with the right
infrastructure can economically automate transactions.However, the real power of the Web is its
role as a relationship-building magnet through itsability to provide numerous opportunities for
interactivity. If you are careless with automated processes this very real advantage will
vanish.Use your website to provide not only useful and interesting information about
your products/services, but also about your entire niche market. The group that makes up a
nichemarket always yearns for more information. They will return time and again to your website
if they are appealed to on the basis of their special interests detailed articles and contentrichadvertising specifically targeted to them.The dot-com bust of 2000 was a failure of business
plans; the concept itself has not failed. Andwhile numerous news articles over the last few years
detail how various websites lost sales andcustomer confidence due to inadequate prelaunch planning,
there have also been many successes,especially in the small business arena.
product and create your sitearound it. As in the advertising world headings for your pages should be
catchy. Internetvisitors scan web pages for information instead of reading through them, so all the
rulesof advertising world which helps in writing the content for the advertisement apply here.Do it
yourself, get to know what the inverted pyramid style of writing is or hire a web
With pay per click, the internet advertising world has revolutionized. It offers
youadvertising opportunities on the net for a few shillings. Check out Google Adsense or Overture
PPC campaigns. These are offered by mostly the leading search engines andyour advertisements are
displayed on the search result pages of these sites for keywordsyou choose. If controlled optimally
you can benefit from these. Use PPC to get visitors toyour site during the launching period. Dual
benefits. One you get visitors though your siteis too new and second due to advertising, your site
gets noticed. If you are not aware of this, use the services of a PPC management company to do this
for you.4.So what else to look out for? Interaction. Give reasons to your visitors to come
back toyour site. Start a newsletter campaign. Offer your visitors something free. Give them
tips.Start a blog. Make your visitors come back to your site.5.Give them options to sign up for
your newsletter free. You get their emails and use a mailer program to send out regular mails
to them.
What benefits does the Internet provide for the marketer? Case study 1.1 highlights the key reason
why many companies are seeking to harness the Internet. The reason is an additional source of
revenue made possible by an alternative marketing and distribution channel. The marketing
opportunities of using the Internet can be appreciated by applying the strategic marketing grid
(Ansoff, 1957) for exploring opportunities for new markets and products (Figure 1-5). The Internet
can potentially be used to achieve each of the four strategic directions as follows:
1. Market penetration. The Internet can be used to sell more existing products into existing markets.
This can be achieved by using the power of the Internet for advertising products to increase
awareness of products and the profile of a company amongst potential customers in an existing
market. This is a relatively conservative use of the Internet.
2. Market development. Here the Internet is used to sell into new markets, taking advantage of the
low cost of advertising internationally without the necessity for a supporting sales infrastructure in
the customers country. This is a relatively conservative use of the Internet, but it does require the
overcoming of the barriers to becoming an exporter or operating in a greater number of countries.
Case study 1.1 is an example of an organization using the Internet in this way.
3. Product development. New products or services are developed which can be delivered by the
Internet. These are typically information products such as market reports which can be purchased
using electronic commerce. This is innovative use of the Internet.
4. Diversification. In this sector, new products are developed which are sold into new markets.
DTI (2000) has identified different types of drivers or benefits why companies adopt ecommerce.
The main drivers for sell-side e-commerce are:
Cost/efficiency drivers
o Increasing speed with which goods can be despatched
o Reduced sales costs
o Reduced operating costs
Competitiveness drivers
o Customer demand
o Improving the range and quality of services offered
o Avoid losing market share to businesses already using e-commerce
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The Internet provides Guinness with the opportunity to provide non-core merchandising activity at a
relatively low cost. The lure of new sales and the threat of market share erosion has driven many
companies on to the Internet, but there are many other benefits of establishing an Internet presence.
Consider the example of the parcel courier companies. These companies now provide a range of
customer services over the Internet which were traditionally delivered by telephone operators, thus
reducing operating costs. In such situations, the online services may give better 24 hour, 7 days a
week, 365 days of the year customer service if measured by convenience, but some customers will
want the option of the personal touch, and phone services must be provided for this type of customer.
Many companies will also reduce the costs of the printing and distribution of promotional material,
price lists and other marketing communications. 16
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Using the Internet for new markets and products For each of the following companies identify which
strategy the company has adopted relative to Figure 1-5, Market and product strategic grid. Explain
how the new markets or products are exploited.
1. The purchase by the book retailer WH Smith of the Internet bookshop (www.bookshop.co.uk) in
1998 for 9 million.
2. The PC seller Dell Computer (www.dell.com), which now gains over 50% of its revenue from the
web site.
3. The software company Microsoft, launched a range of new sites to help consumers purchase cars,
holidays, shares and other items.
4. A UK company such as HR Johnson (www.johnson-tiles.com), which is selling tiles to
international distributors and has created an extranet to obtain orders over the Internet.
In addition to increased sales and reduced costs, the Internet can be used to advantage in all of the
marketing functions, for example:
Sales. Achieved through increasing awareness of brands and products, supporting buying
decisions and enabling online purchase.
Marketing communications. The use of the web site for the range of marketing communication.
Customer service. Supplementing phone operators with information available online and other
techniques.
Public relations. The Internet can be used as a new channel for public relations (PR) and provides
the opportunity to publish the latest news on products, markets and people.
Marketing research. Through search engines and e-mail alert services, the Internet enables more
efficient techniques for finding a range of market information. It also enables new methods for
collecting primary research online through focus groups and online questionnaires.
The Internet also changes the way in which companies do business with their trading partners as
seen in the section on industry restructuring later in this chapter. To conclude this section, the
benefits of an Internet presence can be summarised using the 6Cs of, for example, Bocij et al.
(1999):
1. Cost reduction. Achieved through reducing the need for sales and marketing enquiries to be
handled by telephone operators and the reduced need for printing and distributing marketing
communications material, which is instead published on the web site.
2. Capability. The Internet provides new opportunities for new products and services and for
exploiting new markets.
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3. Competitive advantage. If a company introduces new capabilities before its competitors, then it
will achieve an advantage until its competitors have the same capability. For example, customers
who transferred to Federal Express because of its new Internet services are likely to be less disposed
to revert to an existing courier since they are locked in to using the particular tools provided by
Federal Express.
4. Communications improvement. These include improved communications with customers, staff,
suppliers and distributors.
5. Control. The Internet and intranets may provide better marketing research through tracking of
customer behaviour and the way in which staff deliver services.
6. Customer service improvement. Provided by interactive queries of databases containing, for
example, stock availability or customer service questions.
\ How do Internet marketing communications differ from traditional marketing communications?
Internet marketing differs from conventional marketing communications because of the digital
medium used for communications. The Internet and other digital media such as digital television,
satellite and mobile phones create new forms and models for information exchange. A useful
summary of the differences between these new media and traditional media has been developed by
McDonald and Wilson (1999) which they describe as the 6Is of the e-marketing mix . Note that
these can be used as a strategic analysis tool, but they are not used in this context here. The 6Is are
useful since they highlight factors that apply to practical aspects of Internet marketing such as
personalisation, direct response and marketing research, but also strategic issues of industry
restructuring and integrated channel communications. By considering each of these facets of the new
media, marketing managers can develop marketing plans that accommodate the characteristics of the
new media. This presentation of the 6Is , is an interpretation of these factors using new examples
and diagrams to illustrate these concepts. 1. Interactivity Deighton (1996) was one of the first
authors to summarise the key characteristics of the Internet. He identifies the following
characteristics inherent in a digital medium (Deighton, 1996):
the customer initiates contact;
the customer is seeking information (pull);
it is a high intensity medium the marketer will have 100 per cent of the individual s attention
when he or she is viewing a web site;
a company can gather and store the response of the individual;
individual needs of the customer can be addressed and taken into account in future dialogues.
how traditional media are predominantly push media where the marketing message is broadcast from
company to customer and other stakeholders. During this process, there is limited interaction with
the customer, although interaction is encouraged in some cases such as the direct response advert or
mail-order campaign. On the Internet, it is usually a customer who initiates contact and is seeking
information on a web site. In other words it is a pull mechanism unless e-mail is used (this can be
considered as a push technique). How the Internet should be used to encourage two-way
communication, these may be extensions of the direct-response approach. For example, FMCG
suppliers such as Nestle (www.nescafe.co.uk) use their web site as a method of generating
interaction by providing incentives such as competitions and sales promotions to encourage the
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customer to respond with their names, addresses and profile information such as age and sex.
Hoffman and Novak (1997) believe that this change is significant enough to represent a new model
for marketing or a new marketing paradigm. They suggest that the facilities of the Internet including
the web represent a computer mediated environment in which the interactions are not between the
sender and receiver of information, but with the medium itself. They say: consumers can interact
with the medium, firms can provide content to the medium, and in the most radical departure from
traditional marketing environments, consumers can provide commercially-oriented content to the
media . The content customers can provide may be directly commercial such as auctioning of their
possessions such as via eBay (www.ebay.com) or could include comments on companies and
products submitted via a newsgroup. 18
2. Intelligence The Internet can be used as a relatively low cost method of collecting marketing
research, particularly about customer perceptions of products and services. In the competitions
referred to above Nescafe are able to profile their customers on the basis of the information received
in questionnaires. The Internet can be used to create two-way feedback which does not usually occur
in other media. Financial services provider Egg (www.egg.com) collects information about their
online service levels through a questionnaire that is continuously available in the customer service
part of their site. What is significant is that the company responds via the web site to the main
concerns from customer; if the length of time it takes to reply to customer service e-mails is seen as
a problem it will explain what the organisation is trying to do to resolve this problem. A wealth of
marketing research information is also available from the web site itself, since every time a user
clicks on a link this is recorded in a transaction log file summarising what information on the site the
customer is interested in. Since these log files quickly grow to be many thousands of lines long,
analysis software tools are needed to summarise the information contained within them. Log file
analysers, of which Web trends (www.webtrends.com) is the most widely used, will highlight which
type of products or promotions customers are responding to and how patterns vary through time.
This enables companies to respond in real time to buyer behaviour. UK e-tailor Jungle.com uses this
technique to change the offers on its home page if customers are not responding to a special offer. 3.
Individualisation Another important feature of the interactive marketing communications referred to
above is that they can be tailored to the individual unlike traditional media where the same message
tends to be broadcast to everyone. The process of tailoring is also referred to as personalisation and
is an important aspect of achieving customer relationship management online. Personalisation is
often achieved through extranets which are set up with key accounts to manage the buying and aftersales processes. Dell (www.dell.com/premierpages) has set up Premier Pages for key accounts
such as the Abbey National where special offers and bespoke customer support are delivered.
Another example of personalisation is that achieved by business-to-business e-tailer RS Components
(www.rswww.com). Every customer who accesses their system is profiled according to their area of
product interest and information describing their role in the buying unit. When they next visit the site
information will be displayed relevant to their product interest, for example office products and
promotions if this is what was selected. This is an example of what is known as mass customisation
where generic customer information is supplied for particular segments i.e. the information is not
unique to individuals, but to those with a common interest. The online booksellers such as Amazon
(www.amazon.co.uk) use this approach to communicate new books to groups of customers.
Gardeners for instance, who have previously purchased a gardening book, will receive a standard email advertising the latest gardening tome. This is again mass customisation. Personalisation
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Delivering individualised content through web pages or e-mail. Mass customisation Delivering
customised content to groups of users through web pages or e-mail. 4. Integration
The Internet provides further scope for integrated marketing communications. How it is just one of
many different media channels (these channels are also offered by intermediaries). When assessing
the success of a web site, the role of the Internet in communicating with customers and other
partners can best be considered from two perspectives. First organisation to customer 19 direction,
how does the Internet complement other channels in communication of proposition for the company
s products and services to new and existing customers with a view to generating new leads and
retaining existing customers? Second customer to organisation, how can the Internet complement
other channels to deliver customer service to these customers? Many companies are now considering
how they integrate e-mail response and web-site call-back into their existing call-centre or customer
service operation. This may require a substantial investment in training and new software. Some
practical examples of how the Internet can be used as an integrated communications tool are as
follows:
The Internet can be used as a direct response tool enabling customers to respond to offers and
promotions publicised in other media.
The web site can have a direct response or call-back facility built into it. The Automobile
Association have a feature where a customer service representative will contact a customer by phone
when the customer fills in their name, phone number and a suitable time to ring.
The Internet can be used to support the buying decision even if the purchase does not occur via
the web site. For example, Dell has a prominent web-specific phone number on their web site that
encourages customers to ring a representative in the call-centre to place their order. This has the
benefits that Dell are less likely to lose the business of customers who are anxious about the security
of online ordering and Dell can track sales that result partly from the web site according to the
number of callers on this line. Considering how a customer changes from one channel to another
during the buying process is referred to as mixed-mode buying. It is a key aspect of devising online
marketing communications since the customer should be supported in changing from one channel to
another.
Customer information delivered on the web site must be integrated with other databases of
customer and order information such as those accessed via staff in the call-centre to provide what
Seybold (1999) calls a 360 degree view of the customer .
The Internet can be used to support customer service. For example Easy Jet (www.easyjet.com),
who receive over half their orders electronically, encourage users to check a list of frequently asked
questions (FAQ) compiled from previous customer enquiries before contacting customer support via
phone.
Mixed-mode buying The process by which customer changes between online and offline channels
during the buying Process. 5. Industry restructuring Disintermediation and reintemediation are key
concepts of industry restructuring that should be considered by any company developing an emarketing strategy. For the marketer defining their companies communications strategy it becomes
very important to consider a companys representation on these intermediary sites by answering
questions such as which intermediaries should we be represented on? and how do our offerings
compare to those of competitors in terms of features, benefits and price? Disintermediation The
removal of intermediaries such as distributors or brokers that formerly linked a company to its
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customers Reinter mediation The creation of new intermediaries between customers and suppliers
providing services such as supplier search and product evaluation 6. Independence of location
Electronic media also introduce the possibility to increase the reach of company communications to
the global market. This gives opportunities to sell into international markets that 20
may not have been previously possible. Scott Bader (www.scottbader.com), a business-to-business
supplier of polymers and chemicals for the paints and coatings industry, can now target countries
beyond the 40 or so it has traditionally sold to via a network of local agents and franchises. The
Internet makes it possible to sell to a country without a local sales or customer service force
(although this may still be necessary for some products). In such situations and with the restructuring
in conjunction with disintermediation and reinter mediation, strategists also need to carefully
consider channel conflicts that may arise. If a customer is buying direct from a company in another
country rather than via the agent, this will marginalize the business of the local agent who may want
some recompense for sales efforts or may look to partner with competitors. Kiani (1998) has also
presented differences between the old and new media, which are shown in Table 1.3. Annotations to
the differences between the old and new media have been added to the table.
Reducing the risks and eliminating the threat
Whilst it is true that information security has become a greater priority in the last two years,
especially at board level, the threats have also increased substantially. Modern cryptography
techniques and services can add substantial benefits to electronic business arrangements.
These techniques can scramble data to avoid unauthorised disclosure, and also to
ensure the integrity, authenticity and legitimacy of electronic communication records and
computerised transactions. Whether or not businesses in the UK actually get this message
still remains to be seen.
There are robust, readily available solutions that can be used to protect electronic mail
and these usually consist of two distinct elements that should be used in conjunction for
truly safe practice.
1. Encryption
This is the electronic equivalent of putting a message in an envelope. It
protects confidentiality and confirms for the recipient that the message has arrived in its
original state without having been seen by an unauthorised person. Good encryption
software ensures that information is only decrypted as and when needed, and then makes
provision for the safe deletion of electronic messages. This would have the same effect that
a shredding machine has on paper that needs to be destroyed.
2. Digital signature
This is the electronic equivalent of signing and sealing a letter by hand. It
maintains the integrity, authenticity and non-repudiation aspects of an email in much the
same way as a personal hand-written signature is proof of authorship of a letter. Digital
signatures are an even greater guarantee of authenticity than their hand-written counterparts
as they cannot be forged. An email that has been digitally signed ensures that the message
cannot be repudiated or considered invalid (ie denied by the sender).
Cryptographic techniques and digital signatures, though widely available for both private
and business use and simple in concept, can nevertheless be technically difficult solutions
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to understand for someone with poor IT knowledge. This should not, however, deter users
from further investigation; for with a little effort the solution will come to light.
Misinformation or inadequate education of IT security (both in terms of possible solutions
and knowledge of what constitutes the biggest threats to that security) go some way towards
explaining the apparent reluctance to embrace the available technology.
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The dominant models now are pay-per-click advertising and search engine optimization. Search
engine optimization will be around as long as people use search engines. The promise of free traffic
is simply too glorious to ignore. Since it is fairly difficult to commit fraud in search engine
optimization, it is difficult to see any future legal issues threatening it.
Pay-per-click advertising [ppc] has a less clear future. The primary problem is click fraud. Click
fraud occurs when a ppc ad is artificially. The only intention of the clicker is to cost the advertiser
money. Some estimate the percentage of fraudulent clicks on ppc platforms runs as high as forty
percent. If true, this theoretically means you could take forty percent of your advertising budget, use
it as toilet paper and get the same sales results.
So, what is the future of online marketing in light of the above comments? In my personal view,
search engine optimization will remain the dominant online marketing method. PPC will also
continue, but will be modified into something used to conquer click fraud. I also think information
publishing in the form of free copyright articles will become more and more dominant.
Combined, these three platforms represent the future of online marketing. Of course, nobody could
have foreseen the explosion of EBay ten years ago, so we may all be surprised by where things stand
in five or ten years.
Futurist Tim Mack has made these key predictions on how the World Wide Web will evolve as it
relates to business practices:
Underhanded marketing may get worse. The Internet has plenty of both cooperation and
cutthroat competition. Because humans tend to be short-term thinkers, many e-marketers will
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Basic marketing principles will hold true. Successful e-marketers will continue to offer the
classic elements of a quality sales pitch: something new and surprising, something useful or
essential, or something that touches the emotions.
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2. Email marketers will divide into the haves and the have nots
Think about likely best practices in a few years - conforming to authentication requirements,
participation in various reputation-based programs, detailed analysis of email content and structure
to meet the varying needs of different email clients and email provider services, on-the-fly
behavioral segmentation and email customization, etc. etc.
None of that is going to be cheap. Email marketing will still make companies a lot of money, but
only given a reasonable investment of time and resources in the first place.
Physically with tools that simply accepts messages from all sorts of delivery vehicles and presents
them to the recipient in a single format they prefer.
Strategically, we will not think of email as a standalone message vehicle, but look at our marketing
from a generic viewpoint. How best to get the right message to the right person at the right time in
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the right place? How it gets there is flexible. The delivery mechanism may end up fairly irrelevant
and be handled automatically by our marketing tools.
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trigger events (you booked a pedicure with us a month ago - it's probably time to get those
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CHAPTER:-07
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Another common trick is for an online auction to be rigged by the scammers. If you are selling a
product, the scammer can enter a low bid followed by a very high bid under another name. Just
before the auction closes, the high bid will be withdrawn and the scammers low bid will win. If you
are buying a product, the scammer can arrange for dummy bidders to boost the price up.
Other online shopping scams involve the sale of a product such as a miracle cure or weight loss
productthat does not live up to its claims. It can be very difficult to get your money back in these
situations, especially if the other party is based overseas.
If you buy or sell online, you should also be aware of cheque overpayment scams.
Warning signs
The seller and any initial bidders have a very poor rating on an auction site.
The other party wants to complete the sale outside of the auction site (if you do this, you lose any
protections that the site operator offer to their users).
The other party insists on immediate payment, or payment by electronic funds transfer or a wire
service.
The online shopping website does not provide adequate information about privacy, terms and
conditions of use, dispute resolution or contact details.
Read all the terms and conditions of any offer very carefully: claims of free or very cheap offers often
have hidden costs.
Make sure that cheque have been cleared by your bank before transferring or wiring any refunds or
overpayments back to the sender.
Never enter your personal, credit card or online account information on a website that you are not
certain is genuine.
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Never send your personal, credit card or online account details through an email.
As well as following these specific tips, find out how to protect yourself from all sorts of other
scams.
Do your homework
Ask yourself if the claims made about the product are reasonable or just too good to be true. Be
suspicious of online shopping websites that do not give their full contact details (physical or street
address as well as phone and fax numbers).
Be very careful about paying by credit card and make sure the website used for payments is secure.
Look for an unbroken key or lock at the bottom of the browser window, or a web address beginning
with https//:
Also check to see if the website has a refund or returns policy and if so, if its policies sound fair. The
better online shopping and auction sites have detailed complaint or dispute handling processes in
place in case something goes wrong.
If the auction site uses a feedback rating system, check all the comments about the seller you are
considering buying from.
Decide
If you have any doubts about the product in question, or the person selling it, dont go ahead with the
deal. Online shopping and auction scams can cost you money and time in trying to sort out the mess.
If the offer looks genuine (and is not too good to be true), and the online store or auction service is
trustworthy, then you can go ahead with the purchase.
You may want to use an escrow service if you are buying something at auction. This is a service
that collects the payment from you, and only releases it to the trader or seller when you have
confirmed that the product has arrived and is what was paid for. There is usually a small fee for this
service. Only use a reputable escrow service (online auction sites may provide a list of recommended
providers).
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Report them
If you have bought something online and there is a problem, you should first try to contact the trader
or auction service. There may be a legitimate reason for the problem. If you are not satisfied with
this, and suspect that it may be a scam, you can report it through the SCAM watch website.
If you have paid by credit card, you may be able to arrange a charge-back through your bank or
credit union if there has been some sort of fraud involved. This will effectively reverse the
transaction.
You should also warn your family and friends about the suspected scammer.
Have you been scammed?
What to do if you've been scammed; Scams & the law; Report a scam
Similar scams:
Domain name renewal scams
Scams that send you a fake renewal notice for your actual domain name, or a misleading invoice for
a domain name that is very similar to your own
Spam (junk mail) offers
Spam emails usually offer free goods or prizes, very cheap products or promises of wealth. Responding to
spam emails can result problems for you computer and your bank account.
Free offers on the internet
Free offers displayed on the internet often turn out to be scams. They might offer you free access to
an otherwise restricted site, free shares, free downloads, free trials of certain products or even a free
holiday. They can appear as annoying pop-ups while you are on the net or as ads at the tops or
margins of websites. Sometimes entire websites could be set up to advertise a free offer.
Usually, the offers either require you to provide credit card, bank account or other personal details,
or they require you to pay an upfront fee to claim your free prize or product.
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Of course, there are many sites on the internet that legitimately offer free products or services and
that are not scams. The warning signs below can help you decide if an offer is likely to be a scam or
not.
When you try to find out more about a free offer, you are directed to a different website with
more advertising.
The website offering the free product does not appear to load up correctly or not all its links
work.
The website offering the free product may require you to register your credit card or bank
account details.
To claim the free product or service, you are asked to pay some sort of fee or charge .
Modem jacking
Modem-jacking scams secretly change the phone number dial-up modems use to access the internet
to an overseas or premium rate phone number. You could pay hundreds of dollars extra.
Spyware & key-loggers
Spy ware is a type of software that spies on what you do on your computer. Key-loggers record what keys you
press on your keyboard. Scammers can use them to steal your online banking passwords or other personal
information
The Web is an exciting but unstable place to do business. Both the rewards and risks are
high. Security should not be an afterthought in developing a strategy. It is an integral part of
setting up sustainable new channels of communication and business. Ignore it at your peril.
Risks to the integrity, availability and confidentiality of e-business activities come in
several forms. Some are old threats writ large, such as fraud, espionage and false identities.
Others are completely new, like hackers, viruses, spamming and denial of service. None
should be underestimated, either alone or in combination. The potential for damage or irretrievable
loss is real.
Is our information at risk?
In the US 90 per cent of organisations surveyed detected computer security breaches during
the last 12 months, and a staggering 456 million dollars was reported as having been lost by
those organisations as a result.
Inability to sell some products (e.g. high cost jewelry and perishable foods, although
supermarkets like www.Tesco.com delivers to your home)
The newness and evolution of the current technology
Many products require a large number of people to purchase to be viable
High capital investment
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Difficulty in integrating current databases and transaction processing systems into ecommerce solutions
Cultural and legal obstacles
Transmission of credit card details
Some consumers resistant to change
Laws are unclear
Shipping profile: Products with a low value-to-weight ratio that can not be efficiently packed
and shipped are unsuitable (use traditional commerce)
1.1
Source: FBI/CSI survey 2002.
Figure 1.1.1 Computer crime costs
These figures also reveal that losses from computer security incidents are at an all time
high, as can be seen in Figure 1.1.2.
The most significant area continues to be intellectual property theft, where total losses
reported amounted to US$171 million, and the average loss per organisation experiencing
these kind of incidents is now some US$6.5 million.
THE BUSINESS CASE FOR INFORMATION SECURITY 5 _
With the knowledge that only 503 organisations were surveyed, and only 44 per cent of
those organisations were able to quantify their losses, this suggests that total losses for US
organisations could run into billions of dollars.
The UK perspective
In 2002, the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU) commissioned NOP to undertake a
survey of computer crime in UK organisations. This survey, which I helped the NHTCU
commission, was based on the FBI/CSI categories of computer crime, and allowed some
new comparisons to be made between the US and UK in this area.
In the last 12 months alone, over 3,000 incidents of computer-enabled crime were experienced
by those UK-based organisations surveyed. The NHTCU survey showed that:
_ 67 per cent of organisations surveyed had experienced viruses;
_ 77 per cent had experienced laptop thefts;
_ 20 per cent had experienced a denial of service attack.
Denial of service attacks are those where the perpetrator repeatedly sends vast amounts of
data packets to flood a system or complete network with the intention of degrading
performance or shutting it down.
Virus attacks were still the most frequently occurring incidents, with 1612 incidents
taking place during the last 12 months alone.1
In the FBI/CSI 2002 survey:
_ 85 per cent of organisations surveyed had experienced viruses;
_ 55 per cent had experienced laptop thefts;
_ 40 per cent has experienced a denial of service attack.
Before making direct comparisons we need to take into account the differences in sample
populations. For example, there were 105 organisations surveyed in this initial
NHTCU/NOP survey and 503 organisations surveyed in the FBI/CSI 2002 survey.
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However, we can see that in the United States 18 per cent more organisations reported experiencing
viruses, double the number of US organisations experienced a denial of service
attack, and 22 per cent fewer organisations reported suffering laptop thefts.
The cost to UK business
The NHTCU survey did not attempt to calculate the losses to UK organisations from these
kinds of crime. However, the survey did provide us with some base data upon which certain
assumptions can be applied, making it possible to place a figure on how much we might
assume was lost by UK businesses from computer-enabled crime incidents during the last
12 months.
should be higher for the UK sample having more large organisations, and, if true, this
would inflate the US$228 million total loss calculated for UK organisations.
Even if this number is not accurate, what we can deduce is that with over 3000 incidents and
losses estimated here of some US$228 million for 105 organisations, there is a significant
threat from this type of crime in the UK, and organisations need to be prepared for such
incidents. But at what level do they need to plan, and how can we calculate the specific
threat to one organisation?
Making this specific to one organisation
To calculate this, an organisation needs to conduct a formal risk assessment. In doing a risk
assessment it is possible to determine, amongst other things, the potential impact of an
incident for the organisation, and the probability of that impact occurring. These two
figures, when multiplied together, provide one view on the level of threat that exists for
those incidents.
Probability times impact
The threat level described above (probability the impact will occur times impact) will need
to be calculated with data relevant to the organisations own environment. Before we look at
how this specific data might be calculated, we should look at how a probability times
impact model might work.
An industry generic example
If 20 per cent of UK organisations suffered a denial of service attack in the last 12 months,
then the probability of an organisation being attacked is 20 per cent. Assuming that the
average company loss for this type of incident is US$300,000 as reported in the FBI/CSI
survey 2002, by multiplying the probability of 20 per cent by the average loss US$300,000
for this type of incident we can see that the perceived threat level would be around
US$60,000.
Reading this, it is clear to a large organisation that a successful denial of service attack
would cost the company much more, and this re-enforces the need for information specific
to the company in question, something which will be covered in the next section.
Figure 1.1.4 shows the results using the same approach for denial of service attacks
with all categories of computer crime.
Tailoring this model to your own organisation
environment
Using data specific to your own organisation is essential. For example, does the average
loss from the industry reflect the impact that might be felt in your organisation? And how
can you calculate the probability without factoring in the specifics of your own organisation
and the environment it is operating in?
Calculating the probability of an impact occurring in your
organisation
To get to this organisation-specific data, let us consider the probability perspective first.
What is the probability that incidents will occur in any particular organisation? With over
3,000 incidents occurring in the UK and only three per cent of organisations not having
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experienced any incidents of computer crime in the last 12 months, you have to start by
assuming it might happen to you.
At the same time, it is not practical to assume that every incident will affect every
organisation. You have to be prepared for all kinds of incidents but an organisation
without a website would not be susceptible to a website defacement, etc.
Using a risk assessment process enables the organisation to understand a more realistic
probability of an impact occurring. My methodology for doing this takes into account many
factors including technologies used, geographical location, security policy etc to calculate a
realistic probability that the impact might occur.
business partners
Productivity
number of employees
impacted times hours out
times burdened hourly rate
Revenue
direct loss
compensatory
payments
lost future
revenues
billing losses
investment losses
Financial
Performance
revenue recognition
cash flow
lost discounts (A/P)
payment guarantees
credit rating
stock price
Other Expenses
temporary employees,
equipment rental,
overtime costs, extra
shipping costs, travel
expenses, regulatory
imposed costs etc.
return on investment (ROI) for an organisation, positive and negative benefits need to be
taken into account. The method works in much the same way, multiplying the size of the
positive impact by the probability that that positive impact will be experienced.
Forming the ROI case
The above method has introduced one way of capturing some numerical information about
the level of threat to your organisation. The next step is to decide if that is an acceptable
level of risk for the organisation. The organisation needs to make a decision as to whether it
wants to accept that risk, or put solutions in place to mitigate that risk. Security
programmes, if properly executed, will enable the organisation to reduce the impact and/or
the probability of an incident occurring, and it is against this context that an organisation
can produce a return of investment case. However, there is always a certain level of residual
risk that the organisation has to accept, even after having made its security investments.
There is no such thing as 100 per cent security.
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hacker may work as an individual or in highly organised gangs, either of whom may attempt
to gain access into a computer system in order to carry out a criminal activity. The hacker
may intend to steal information or funds, to publicise a cause (more commonly known as
hactivism) or to deface a website. Some hackers claim to hack the sites of software developers
and others in order to prove that security can be violated and to highlight security
flaws.
In January 2002 hackers cut off the website of the World Economic Forum through a
denial of service attack, disrupting a conference of world political and economic leaders.
In the previous year, the hackers broke into the site and stole details of 27,000 delegates
attending the conference. The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Report1 of April
2002 reveals that key UK government departments face an average of 84 hacking attempts
a week.
1.3
1Information Security Breaches Survey 2002, DTI. Original source: Hackers target UK national
infrastructure, Andy McCue, vnu.net.com report, 26 March 2002.
_______________________________________ THE THREAT FROM CYBERCRIME 19 _
Web sabotage is a major cause of concern for the Police. Hackers access genuine
websites and alter their appearance, change information or set up a replica website using
false information. A recent example of web sabotage involved the Red Cross website. The
site was cloned by hackers following the events of September 11th and for 36 hours all
donations made to the Red Cross were diverted to a cyber-fraudster.
Internal hackers do not have to penetrate the system from the outside. It is therefore far
easier for an internal hacker to cause damage. PricewaterhouseCoopers reported in June
2001 that 60 per cent of frauds were committed internally. It has also been reported that up
to 75 per cent of thefts and frauds have been committed by an insider.
E-theft
It was reported2 in early 2001 that an employee of an oil company managed to steal
US$473,541 through e-theft. She transferred funds from the company to her husbands
business in two electronic transactions over an 11-month period. The fraud took so long to
uncover because of the procedures adopted by the company. The broker handling accounts
never received a list of authorised accounts to which he could transfer funds, and because
duties in the company were segregated, the left hand didnt know what the right hand was
doing!
In January 2002, it was reported by Evans Data3 that 27 per cent of US and Canadian
banks suffered a hack attempt during 2001.
Netspionage
Netspionage is where confidential information is stolen from a company by hackers, to sell
to a competitor or for the use of individuals in their business exploits. Espionage was originally
limited to governments, but in the information age the rise of corporate espionage has
been rapid.
In March 2001 it was reported4 that an unidentified hacker escaped with the system
codes for satellite and missile guidance systems. The theft was not even discovered until
three days after it had happened. It was widely suspected that the information was to be
used for the purposes of industrial espionage.
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Telecom fraud
Telecom fraud is a less well-known method of committing e-theft. This method is estimated
to net organised gangs of fraudsters 40 billion a year. One method used is phreaking
which is the equivalent of hacking on computer networks. A companys telephone
exchange is penetrated using a computer program which permits the calls to be resold to
other users. Usually a cheap telephone company is set up offering international calls at a
very low cost. In one case this type of fraud cost a business 750,000 in extra telephone
calls.
A different type of telecom fraud is known as premium rate fraud. Businesses are
particularly susceptible to this kind of fraud, which involves an employee dialling a
premium rate number at night and leaving the telephone off the hook. The employees
accomplice will have set up the premium rate number and then charges the company for the
cost of the telephone call.
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Hackers
Hackers divide into two main groups. The internal hacker and the external hacker. The
hacker may work as an individual or in highly organised gangs, either of whom may attempt
to gain access into a computer system in order to carry out a criminal activity. The hacker
may intend to steal information or funds, to publicise a cause (more commonly known as
hactivism) or to deface a website. Some hackers claim to hack the sites of software developers
and others in order to prove that security can be violated and to highlight security
flaws.
In January 2002 hackers cut off the website of the World Economic Forum through a
denial of service attack, disrupting a conference of world political and economic leaders.
In the previous year, the hackers broke into the site and stole details of 27,000 delegates
attending the conference. The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Report1 of April
2002 reveals that key UK government departments face an average of 84 hacking attempts
a week.
1.3
1Information Security Breaches Survey 2002, DTI. Original source: Hackers target UK national
infrastructure, Andy McCue, vnu.net.com report, 26 March 2002.
_______________________________________ THE THREAT FROM CYBERCRIME 19 _
Web sabotage is a major cause of concern for the Police. Hackers access genuine
websites and alter their appearance, change information or set up a replica website using
false information. A recent example of web sabotage involved the Red Cross website. The
site was cloned by hackers following the events of September 11th and for 36 hours all
donations made to the Red Cross were diverted to a cyber-fraudster.
Internal hackers do not have to penetrate the system from the outside. It is therefore far
easier for an internal hacker to cause damage. PricewaterhouseCoopers reported in June
2001 that 60 per cent of frauds were committed internally. It has also been reported that up
to 75 per cent of thefts and frauds have been committed by an insider.
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E-theft
It was reported2 in early 2001 that an employee of an oil company managed to steal
US$473,541 through e-theft. She transferred funds from the company to her husbands
business in two electronic transactions over an 11-month period. The fraud took so long to
uncover because of the procedures adopted by the company. The broker handling accounts
never received a list of authorised accounts to which he could transfer funds, and because
duties in the company were segregated, the left hand didnt know what the right hand was
doing!
In January 2002, it was reported by Evans Data3 that 27 per cent of US and Canadian
banks suffered a hack attempt during 2001.
Netspionage
Netspionage is where confidential information is stolen from a company by hackers, to sell
to a competitor or for the use of individuals in their business exploits. Espionage was originally
limited to governments, but in the information age the rise of corporate espionage has
been rapid.
In March 2001 it was reported4 that an unidentified hacker escaped with the system
codes for satellite and missile guidance systems. The theft was not even discovered until
three days after it had happened. It was widely suspected that the information was to be
used for the purposes of industrial espionage.
According to recent surveys, worldwide losses suffered through misappropriation of
computerised intellectual property cost copyright owners close to US$20 billion last year.
Canal Plus is suing NDS Group plc for US$3 billion for allegedly sabotaging its
business. It is alleged that NDS obtained the security code on the Canal Plus smartcard,
which gave viewers a choice of different channels. Whilst many companies engage in
reverse-engineering to examine their competitors products, Canal Plus claims that NDS
2 All Wired Up, Electronic funds transfers are prime targets, Joseph R Dervaes, Association of
Fraud
Examiners, 2001.
3 Newsbytes, 27% of US Canadian Banking Databases Breached, Dick Kelsey, Evans Data Corp,
22
January 2002.
4 Hacker nabs top secret US space codes, ZDNet UK News, 2 March 2001.
_ 20 THE SECURE ONLINE BUSINESS_____________________________________
published the security code on the Internet, where it was picked up by international counterfeiters.
In turn, it is alleged that the counterfeiters produced fake smartcards that allowed
users to watch subscription channels free. Canal Plus says that this was a deliberate plan to
sabotage the business in which it was a market leader. The allegations have been denied.
In a report5 by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) in August 2001, six per cent
of UK respondents reported that they had suffered from netspionage, and quantifiable
losses were set at 151 million compared to 66 million in the same report in the previous
year.
A recent scam to emerge concerns domain name renewal. This has been a concern in both
the US and Europe. A victim will commonly receive an email from a sender who is
purportedly a domain name registrar. The registrar offers you an opportunity to upgrade
your website address with the new suffix .info. The email will include a hyperlink to allow
you to read more information about the upgrade; however when you enter the link the
program functions as if you had agreed to transfer your domain name. The domain name is
then transferred to their company as registrar, who claim that you requested the transfer.
Telecom fraud
Telecom fraud is a less well-known method of committing e-theft. This method is estimated
to net organised gangs of fraudsters 40 billion a year. One method used is phreaking
which is the equivalent of hacking on computer networks. A companys telephone
exchange is penetrated using a computer program which permits the calls to be resold to
other users. Usually a cheap telephone company is set up offering international calls at a
very low cost. In one case this type of fraud cost a business 750,000 in extra telephone
calls.
A different type of telecom fraud is known as premium rate fraud. Businesses are
particularly susceptible to this kind of fraud, which involves an employee dialling a
premium rate number at night and leaving the telephone off the hook. The employees
accomplice will have set up the premium rate number and then charges the company for the
cost of the telephone call.
Passwords
This may seem simple, but passwords must be employed, as well as systems armed with
screen savers that require passwords to unlock them. It is no use having implemented this
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technology if you then write the password on the whiteboard by the desk or tell all your
friends what it is. There are technologies that can help in this area, such as biometrics, proximity
badges or token-based systems, but staff education is the most effective solution.
Viruses
Apart from the well-known damage that viruses can cause, what is less-known is that some
viruses sit passively and send sensitive information back out to sites and hackers on the
Internet, or open up doorways for incoming connections. This information is often used for
more serious security breaches and, as you are generating the information internally and
sending it out, your firewall systems often pass it on unaware of its true nature. It was just
such a virus (or Trojans as they are known) that allegedly struck inside Microsoft last year,
potentially exposing some of their source code the companys crown jewels as it were
to parties unknown.
SpyWare
To continue on this theme, there are many software applications that also broadcast information
out in a similar way. Often based in games or utilities that are downloaded from the
Internet or brought into the office, they act in exactly the same way as many of the Trojan
viruses.
Internet surfing
Is it fraud to spend your employers time surfing the Internet for private use? Of people with
access to the Internet 54 per cent spend at least 30 minutes a day surfing for private
purposes. The same survey shows that 70 per cent of pornography downloaded over the
Internet is downloaded at work. Given the ability to import Trojans and viruses, and the loss
of productivity involved, Internet access should be seriously monitored and the rules of its
usage clearly understood. Managers also need to be aware that there are sites out there that
can glean a lot of information about your network by simply attaching to them or following
the downloading of objects into a web browser.
There are many packages available for managing this problem, including regularly
updated access control lists. However, they are only part of the armoury and a firm, clearly
communicated policy, with the users knowledge that auditing is available, is used and that
the companys acceptable usage policy is enforced, significantly reduces this threat.
Email
We all love to gossip, and email has certainly improved and informalised the way we
communicate with each other. With this ease and openness comes a significant threat. How
do you stop company confidential information disappearing out onto the Internet at the
touch of a button? Or stop the joke application that is sent to you by a friend downloading
information via a Trojan to a hacker on the Internet?
Virus protection certainly has to be a priority here, on both the workstations and the
mail servers. Careful consideration should also be given as to who should be able to send
mail attachments, and also to the implementation of scanners that check mail content to
stop people sending out unauthorised confidential material.
Another threat associated with email, and one that has led to well-documented cases of
very costly lawsuits, is that of email content and defamatory remarks being issued via
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corporate email to the outside world. The word policy applies here as elsewhere.
Board responsibilities
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There are now a whole host of legal and regulatory requirements detailing the responsibilities
of the board or a business owner to ensure that information stored on computers,
particularly personal information, is protected from improper use or access.
These include:
_ The Data Protection Act 1998;
_ The Human Rights Act 1998;
_ The E-commerce Directive;
_ The Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977;
_ The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000;
_ The Electronic Communication Act 2000.
The Turnbull Report, issued in 1999, provides a framework to help interpret the Combined
Code on Corporate Governance, which is appended to the Listing Rules of the UK Listing
Authority. Companies listed on the London Stock Exchange must show that they have
assessed the risks to the organisation and that policies are in place to ensure that, as far as is
practicable, the potential for damage or loss has been reduced to realistic levels. Although
directed at listed companies, the findings of the Turnbull Report are equally applicable to,
and make business sense for, other organisations.
The report states that the board of directors is responsible for the companys system of
internal control. It should set appropriate policies on internal control and seek regular
assurance that will enable it to satisfy itself that the system is functioning effectively. It
should ensure that the system of internal control is effective in managing those risks in the
manner which it has approved.1
Dependence on IT for many firms means that the financial consequences of any loss of
information or breach in security should be considered. This needs to be reviewed not
simply in terms of the information itself, but also for the cost of preventing further failures
and the impact on the companys reputation, brand value, performance and future potential
Early development
Originally, electronic commerce meant the facilitation of commercial transactions electronically, using
technology such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT). These were both
introduced in the late 1970s, allowing businesses to send commercial documents like purchase orders or
invoices electronically. The growth and acceptance of credit cards, automated teller machines (ATM) and
telephone banking in the 1980s were also forms of electronic commerce. Another form of e-commerce was
the airline reservation system typified by Sabre in the USA and Travicom in the UK.
From the 1990s onwards, electronic commerce would additionally include enterprise resource planning
systems (ERP), data mining and data warehousing.
In 1990, Tim Berners-Lee invented the WorldWideWeb web browser and transformed an academic
telecommunication network into a worldwide everyman everyday communication system called
internet/www. Commercial enterprise on the Internet was strictly prohibited until 1991. [1] Although the
Internet became popular worldwide around 1994 when the first internet online shopping started, it took about
five years to introduce security protocols and DSL allowing continual connection to the Internet. By the end
of 2000, many European and American business companies offered their services through the World Wide
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Web. Since then people began to associate a word "ecommerce" with the ability of purchasing various goods
through the Internet using secure protocols and electronic payment services.
Technological Limitations
Non-Technological Limitations
Security and privacy concerns deter customers from buying. Credit Card security is a serious issue.
People who are carrying out a transaction over the Internet are worried about the credit card security.
Many legal and public policy issues, including taxation, have not yet been resolved.
Some customers like to feel and touch products. Also, customers are resistant to the change from
shopping at a brick-and-mortar store to a virtual store.
The biggest limitation of e-commerce is the the ability to communicate face to face with the
customer. Due to this they are not able to get the feedback about the products so that they may
improvise on the products. Although online chat programs have solved this issue to some extent but it
needs to be implemented on a large scale.
In India E-commerces has been very slow track compare to other countries in olden days. Because
earlier days lack of Internet accessing knowledge and also lack of Internet facilities.
Some of the reasons which are working against the E-Shopping industry.
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CHAPTER:-08
FUTURE PROSPECTIVE
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A set of practices employed to get ranking for WebPages on relevant keywords (search queries).
SEO does this by improving a websites structure and content.
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INTERACTIVE ADVERTISING:
It involves the use of interactive media applications to promote products online. It in fact involves
the right use of text, images, Flash animations, AV clips etc. The interactive advertising platform in a
way intends to send across a personalized message by giving the readers/ viewers a visual treat.
BLOG/ ARTICLE MARKETING:
Articles and blogs can be used effectively to propagate a marketing campaign. By submitting in
various directories like Ezine and Go articles, you can hope to generate traffic through the link you
have placed on the article directing towards your website.
Moreover, in my personal opinion in a country as diverse as India, the real action in a few years of
time would lie in localization. Websites which will do business in Hindi and other local language
would do well. Its simply because contrary to the claims, for a major chunk of Indians English is
still an alien language.
Thats why the scope of internet marketing in India lies in localization of websites. Talking to people
in their own language does have its positive attributes. The indigenization of the web for the real
Indians and the correct application of the mentioned internet marketing techniques is truly the way
forward.
The Internet era has thrown open a new pathway for todays marketing. The Internet has made all
traditional modes of business outdated and generated amazing new possibilities in business. Online
marketing or internet marketing a combination of marketing acumen and technology uses the
Internet as a medium to advertise and sell services and goods. Online marketing includes affiliate
marketing, search engine marketing including search engine optimization, article marketing, blog
marketing, pay-per-click advertising, and e-mail marketing.
Today, more people are getting connected to the Internet and are ready to trade through it. This
growing tendency to use the services of Internet connectivity increases the scope of online
marketing. It also affects the operation of companies and organizations. Companies have changed
their traditional business strategies into online marketing and have become full-fledged service
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providers with the facility to offer a full range of e-commerce products to suit customer needs and
taste at any time.
Online marketing is cost effective and measurable compared to all other marketing strategies. It
benefits both customers and marketers simultaneously. Customers can shop products 24 hours a day
from anywhere in the world and interact with sellers (via sellers website) to find the product or
service information they desire. Companies can interact with customers and enable them to learn
more about customers needs, build good customer relationships, increase efficiency and reduce
costs, and gain access to national and international markets quickly.An essential component for
successful online marketing is a high traffic website. To become a successful online trader is not
easy, but it is possible through constant trial and error, regular monitoring of your website traffic,
and referral rate per click.
The term online marketing has different meanings for different kinds of people. Also known as
internet marketing, e-marketing and web marketing, it commonly refers to doing business online.
Online marketing can be associated with different business models like local internet marketing, ecommerce, affiliate marketing and lead-based websites.
To communicate about the working of the company and the products and services it offers
To conduct researches to know about the existing and potential customers, and
To sell goods and services over the internet
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Online marketing works under different methods like the one-to-one approach in which the customer
is approached personally by clicking on the keywords or entering the keywords and the business is
done under the pay per click system; online marketing is also done through appealing to the specific
interests of the target audience instead of reaching out to masses; niche marketing is one step further
in targeting specific audience as they have more specialized knowledge while geo targeting is done
by determining the geolocation of the user and offering him different good and services according to
his location which may include, country, region, internet protocol or organization.
There are certain advantages and limitations of online marketing like every mode of business. Target
audience can be reached with low costs through online marketing and the convenience of the
transactions brings more and more customers online. Also, the statistics of the business can be
measured easily; they can be traced and authenticated with less time and effort. While from the
buyers prospective, online marketing holds a limitation of checking the tangible products
themselves.
And since the internet has become a standard tool for information, entertainment and business,
online marketing is becoming dominant with every passing day. Today, more people are getting
connected to the Internet and are ready to trade through it. This growing tendency to use the services
of Internet connectivity increases the scope of online marketing. It also affects the operation of
companies and organizations. Companies have changed their traditional business strategies into
online marketing and have become full-fledged service providers with the facility to offer a full
range of e-commerce products to suit customer needs and taste at any time.
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Today most of people using Internet for banking purpose, shopping, recharge mobile, insurance and
many other purposes. So we can say that coming world is online marketing world and maximum
companies using it for their business success.
Online Marketing is new concept of promotion of products and goods to your audience through
Internet and providing them easy and suitable services used by companies to selling their products
directly to consumers through online. Simply this is a business through Internet. Since area of
Internet has now growing fast in every country and nowadays above 60% of people are working on
computers. Online business becomes easy to approach maximum people to provide them
information about their particular products by making effective use of web resources. It is a power of
Internet technology and knowledge of creating adds for promotion. Marketing in field is very
expensive and time-consuming process, its take much time to meet consumers and aware them about
your products. Companies waste lot of money on employee team and others expenses, beside it they
are not able to reach every targeted people. They need more employee and much time. Instead of it
e-marketing is easy process as well as more convenient which connecting together creative and
technical aspects of the Internet, including: design, development, advertising, and sales. ecommerce, e-business is also related terms of online work. It is less expensive and more effective
process as compare to reach target audience through field work and companies can easily interact
with lot of people in fraction of times paying less budgets. Marketer can easily measure which type
of massage or offer is more appealing for audience. Results of Online marketing on companies'
business can be determined and improving for next project.It is based on consumer's satisfactions
and easy availability of their search on search engine. Providing better platform for consumers and
merchandisers for business is main motto of this business.Most of the companies invest lot of money
on it because of effective method of proper communication with target people. Even in America it
used for election of president through networking. Today most of people using Internet for banking
purpose, shopping, recharge mobile, insurance and many other purposes. So we can say that coming
world is online marketing world and maximum companies using it for their business success.
Scope in India.
Although India having vast IT technologies, advanced computer software and web designer but still
India lags behind in term of internet business field due to lack of interest of IT companies and
peoples towards it. But according to competitions in corporate sector it's become the need of every
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company for its success and better promotion of their products and services. Some of institutes,
banks, insurance companies, airline industries etc using this process for advertisement and sale. Also
Indian professionals or businessmen can learn this Marketing techniques to increase the online
presence of their business/industry.There are many entrepreneurs who earn lot of money through
online because of its knowledge and values for companies for marketing and business. There are
huge populations in India using Internet for their need and using for booking air-tickets, railways
tickets, banking process etc., so it's easy to approaches or reach most of people in fraction of time for
companies' products and aware consumers quickly and effectively.
Review
It is growing process due to need of coming more competitive world and more convenient method as
compare to other methods. But within online business there are also competitions, therefore need
talented and skilled web designer and links which can attract more customer towards your products
or website if u design it perfectly or clear to customers and increase your customers towards your
business. Effective web designing and web promotion is important for success of your online firm.
With mammoth expand in the come to of companies entering problem bazaar, it has befall very
challenging in support of an organization to persuade marketed through ways like catalogs, yellow
pages, tube, signboards, lanterns, peddling and so on. (offline marketing), without hesitation days a
contemporary boost has been brought by online marketing. This is plus named as internet marketing.
Emerging as a noble performance of widening your problem it has gained popularity in online
marketing. Taking part in down-to-earth language: Internet marketing is the employment of internet
in marketing activities to persuade exposure in support of an organization, result or service amongst
internet users. These activities possibly will include bazaar examine, result pricing, result
positioning, brand development, advertising, free relations, media planning and many other things.
Typically analyzed information tells with the purpose of the majority of the part of marketing is
listening carefully towards advertising. A copious audience is forever under attack by a dealer to
donate their messages to. Marketers are plus increasingly being asked to determine the performance
of their marketing campaigns and bare activist returns on their marketing finish. The Internet offers
the unsurpassed opportunity in support of both of these.
Classification of online marketing
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Since in offline marketing, multiple channels are presented to promote to you stretch to your
customers, on internet plus in attendance are multiple channels to avail an relaxed access to your
customers. Internet Marketing is broadly classified into Search Engine Marketing, email Marketing,
Affiliate Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Article Marketing, Online Classifieds, Online Lead
Generation and universal Online Media Marketing. Each service differs from others in aspects like
form, process, outlay, targeting, stretch to and price. With period, in attendance has been a rapid pace
growth of internet habit in expressions of both users as well as amount of period spent. This habit
has reached the mark of around 70% of population in industrial countries. Internet is used in support
of various purposes. People read the news and articles online, receive email online, search in support
of and compare products & services online, pay for products & services on the internet, socialize
online & cope their not public finances online.
Through online marketing, this audience is under attack and presented ahead of by various products
and services. This proves not at home to be an operational method of feat group. Websites mostly
visited by group offer advertising opportunities to companies.
Performance measurement
Unlike big methods of customary media, internet marketing has presented mechanisms in support of
more accurate measures to the performance of marketing campaigns. This capability helps marketers
in monitoring; trying and tuning campaigns in support of achievement of most returns on their
marketing expenditure. The websites which offer advertising opportunities plus avail tools to track &
boom on performance. There are several third faction vendors with the purpose of offer a variety of
internet marketing tools with like capabilities. Business type and size are the things of veto problem,
solitary can benefit from Internet Marketing as long as the target customers employment internet.
Experimentation with the channels is the unsurpassed way to search not at home which channels
piece unsurpassed in support of your problem.
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Since a conclusion, it is correct to say with the purpose of, online marketing has provided a newer
time to marketing. Going in extra details includes study of classification of online marketing;
opening with Search Engine Marketing.
Changing mind of customers
We must change our mindset from the traditional marketing strategy to that of online
marketing.Because the scope of the internet market is limitless, its important to understand the
potential for infinite consumer traffic and infinite competition.Give the consumer the idea that her
needs are your main objective with online tools that relate to her overall sense of product reliability.
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Welcome to the wonderful world of online marketing. Your first task will be to alter your mindset
from the offline marketing ideology to online. The days of marketing face to face, though still vital,
are being tested by online communication. With this transition comes the challenge of relating to the
people to which youre trying to market your product.
Our objective is to open our network to the world whilst still maintaining a personal rapport with
whomever were relating. The task seems relatively simple: change your mindset to fit the limitless
potential of the online marketing world. However, the average online consumer is cautious and not
easily convinced that a product is perfect for them if they dont feel as if the merchant can relate to
their necessity.+
The first step, of course, is to understand that the internet has virtually no ceiling. Be very aware that
with the potential for more consumers there is just as much, if not more, competition. Offline you
were aware of your competition because your area and market tastes were a level playing field.
Online the scope has widened and your potential clientele has increased exponentially. You must rein
in your ambition and concentrate on the particular needs of one consumer at a time.
Thinking of your audience as one consumer eases the mind. Relating to one person gives you room
to concentrate your strategy on one marketing ideal. You also want to think about what the internet
audiences main objective is. When someone searches for a product, they want clear answers to allay
their fears of the unknown. Approach the market as someone who has walked that road. When
someone visits your website, you want her to feel as if she can trust you. Create an atmosphere with
a personal touch, write about it as if it were something that you would use. Embrace social
networking tools such as blogging and product videos. The more the consumer can visualize your
product in their day to day life, the more willing shell be to give it a shot.
On a broad level, online marketing isnt incredibly different from offline you still want to give
your customer the feeling that they arent another sale. Give them something to relate to and theyll
be more willing to accept your services.
It was a time of past to spared your business in market by conventional methods. Old market is today
converted in high tech markets. Today if you want to purchase any item from abroad you need not to
go or you need not to call them for a sample. You can find their products and see the catalogue on
internet. Internet enables you to shop throughout world from the comfort of your home. Internet has
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some special characteristics which no other medium have. Only internet can provide you such
special information even no salesman can help you as internet helps. Countless people can see
products at a single movement, as well as they can purchase the product same time. You can
compare various product and choose which is more useful for you, You have the facility to visit
websites as much as you like no restriction on you here you will find approximately all world class
brands and their products you have the facility to compare them, arrange according to many types
like by price, by size, by category, by most salable item and many more. This facility enables you to
choose. This way of shopping provides a new way of shopping.
You get to identify the products, compare the prices and quality and view the products from different
angles. Testimonials and reviews are the unique feature of shopping where you can share your
experiences with other users/consumers. The most exciting aspect of internet shopping is that it is a
24x7 affair! And youre free to shop on your leisure hours and even holiday are useful for shopping
for you. Your time is best valued here. You need not to go market so no tension of conveyance,
pollution, traffic etc.
The other dimension is that you directly purchase the items from original merchant in online
shopping no mediator comes between you and merchant so it becomes cheaper to purchase item.
Fewer mediators less price. Merchant will also save his money by selling of goods on internet.
merchant need not to spent for staff, showroom, other shop expenses. He can sale by less resources
and less expenses, some online store do not have their physical showroom they display their product
and services online and deliver goods on customer 's door such merchant save a lot of expenses and
they work in less capital thats why they are able to sale goods on low prices.
Internet has a very bright future. If you want to increase your business and cross the boundaries of
region you need to take help of internet. Without going online you cant think about your progress
worldwide. In this regard you can see all large scale business. Big brand, big shopping store are
online. Online shopping is the demand of todays modern time. Time and quality is the main subject
of online shopping. Today everybody is running to save time and who saves time automatically save
money. Day to day needed item is now available on internet and people prefer to shop online. Not
only for progress but also to survive in this competition era business internet help.
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A foundation of newfangled world, with unexampled and fresh trends that were never imagined
before!!Online shopping trend has introduced new dimensions with the rapidly changing
requirements of the people all over the globe.It has highlighted novel concepts with modernized
tinge before the world and thrown a huge bunch of opportunities and facilities.India ranks on third
position in terms of internet users all over the globe, which is equally giving a quick rise to the
online shopping trend in India.
We can see a huge scope in online shopping as it has a great potential to become big in India and of
course all over the world too.
It saves the wastage of time that is consumed when one goes for shopping in the store, meeting other
different huddles on the way like traffic, vehicle issue, jams, and many others.
A common man who hardly gets time to relax on weekends, online shopping would serve as the best
option for him as he wont need to plan going out for the items that are easily available online with
utmost gratification.
The online shopping trend is popping up as a boon in disguise for many small and medium
enterprises by giving them golden opportunities to expand and flourish their business and along with
joining hands with major Indian online portals to display their products and advertise their services.
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We can term online shopping as A hunt of new world where all your searches ends at one
destination.This destination not only enables you to satisfy your needs in terms of clothing,
electronics, ticketing and other items but also in terms of jewellery where you can view wide range
of jewellery products and buy them with a complete satisfaction of the services ensuring their
originality, safety and security.
Another great benefit of Online shopping over the globe is that one can often find great deals online
that are not available when you visit the stores.One can make money every time while shopping at
any online store through different schemes, exciting offers and free prizes or gift coupons that the
sites, brands or online stores offer when you purchase online.Online shopping trend in India is
increasing with good pace because India is also developing and changing with the change of trends.
One of such popular jewellery site is Johareez.com, which swings you to the amazing and alluring
world of jewellery by providing the high qualitative products and services with latest styles, and
vogues dipped in modernized fashion and flair.It enables you to purchase the products through
Online shopping, which keeps you relaxed within the walls of your room and boundaries of your
home. No pain at all!!
Johareez.com provides you with a wide assortment of sterling silver jewellery where you can
discover diverse jewellery of different contrived designs crafted with multi gemstones.The collection
is sure to capture your heart, mind, body and soul and you will treasure them for the time
undefined.Johareez.com not only ensures with the standardized products but also make sure that
each customer of it receives the most valuable and desired customer services.Moreover, it gives you
complete surety in regard to your monetary transactions which of course is a matter of great worry
when you opt for online shopping.The other best part about Johareez.com is that it gives you a
complete right of choice in regard to payment, where in you can not only pay by credit card, net
banking, cheque, demand draft, and money order but also by another amazing facility that is Cash
on Delivery which removes your fear regarding money loss, damaged products or misuse of any
card.With the payment facility of Cash on Delivery, you will only make the payment of the products
or services at the time of actual delivery rather than paid-for in advance. A sure shot surety of
security!!
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It believes you to render with best, not something but everything that makes you fall in love with and
an experience that remains within you forever.So, now you can relax and go for Online shopping for
any of your coveted products that you have been wishing die heartedly without any worries and
tensions. Almost all us who use the Internet to make day-to-day transactions, sales and purchases of
products and services are familiar with the term, Internet Marketing. It is also commonly referred as
Online Marketing or by the broader term eMarketing. Internet is home to around a billion users and
eMarketing has become the most valuable business tool these days but comes with its own set of
drawbacks.
Lets see if the hype of internet marketing is justified and if it really has become an indispensable
commodity for the working of a modern business.
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Cost Effectiveness
Owing to the low cost of marketing and advertising together with the wide customer base that you
can have through your online business, you are sure to end up with more money. The profit margins
will considerably increase once you start marketing your products and services online.
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For instance, if youre looking for shoes are they casual or dress? What sizes do you need? Do you
have a preferred brand?
If at all possible, you should not only have a general idea but a specific description of what you want
to find. For instance, if youre looking for a pair of shoes it could be Nike running shoes, size 7.
Once you have a clear idea of what you want to find you can start browsing to get a specific model
number.
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Amazon is also a good place to start shopping for deals because they offer an extensive array of
product choices at very good prices. Their marketplace allows for users to sell used and new items
individually at competing prices as well. This can help to drive the price for an item down.
Some fantastic deal sites to check for any item are Slickdeals, Dealnews and Fatwallet. These sites
are not as easy to navigate as a shopping site but they can yield significant savings if you know
exactly what youre looking for and dont mind taking some time to search around their listings.
Google also offers their Product Search tool, which is a cross between a shopping comparison site
and a deal finder. It will show you the best deals available as well as the seller ratings for stores.
Other popular comparison shopping services include Shopzilla and PriceGrabber, which will search
the web for your product and display the retailers that offer it, the reviews of the products and the
reputations of the sites that are selling them.
providing balanced reviews, this can aid you in trusting their review of the product that youre
looking at.
If the review seems overly negative and they have left little or no other reviews, its likely that they
had a singularly bad experience with the item. If opinions left by other people are largely positive
then its probably safe to disregard that one.
Remember that most of the time the reviews youre reading are from people with opinions about the
item that may be more related to their feelings about the brand or their lack of understanding than
with any real problem.
Check reseller ratings
Once youve found a site that you think has the right item at the right price, pause for a moment and
do your homework on that retailer. If its a well-known site that you have purchased from in the past
or is a major retailer, then youre probably fine making your purchase.
If youre buying from a site that is new to you or doesnt look like a major chain then it is probably
worth your while to check the customer satisfaction ratings of that seller. This can prevent you from
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losing money and time purchasing from an online retailer with a reputation for delivering poor
product or terrible customer service.
ResellerRatings is a good site to use to check the reputation of an online store. They have detailed
reports from customers that have purchased from them or used their services. This can help you
determine whether a sites deals are too good to be true or if theyre on the level. UK shoppers
should try out Shopsafe
Have fun shopping more efficiently online
Shopping online can save you money and time and help you choose from a much wider selection
than you can find in any store. As you purchase items from resellers online, you should also
bookmark those sites where you have a good experience. This will help you to build a list of trusted
sites that you can rely on to deliver you a good product at a good price.If youre cautious about who
you buy from and do a bit of comparison shopping beforehand, you can make your shopping
experiences much more efficient and relaxing.
Plastic money promotion
The net has been around in India considering that quite some time now. Even so, e-commerce has
picked up only recently. Shopping online is gradually expanding up in India too. Even so, due to the
comparatively slow penetration of the net in numerous part of the nation, on the web shopping is
restricted to only significant metros in India. Let us inquire about on-line purchasing trends in this
aspect of the world.
Ecommerce can be believed of as an activity wherein the consumer makes use of the web to order a
item or service. In most circumstances, the transaction may possibly occur on the internet also. Online shopping locations a demands on the heavy use of the web. One particular main hurdle that
online shopping faces the security of transactions, given that it is necessary for shoppers to submit
their financial particulars on the internet too.
Presently, only a restricted quantity of merchants are undertaking company on the internet due to the
difficulties related to technologies. The key hurdles faced are reduced penetration of computers in
India, lesser quantity of credit or debit card holders, and many adverse taxation guidelines. Also,
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several net users are reluctant to reveal their economic details on the web, which hampers the growth
of the online enterprise.
Conversely, on the web buying has a fantastic potential to turn out to be big in India. According to
many ecommerce observers, ecommerce has the possible of reaching $ 100 billion in the year 2008.
Accordingly, many enterprises both massive and tiny, are opening to the concept of getting their B2B
and B2C portals on the web in a massive way.
The world wide web is also proving to a boon in disguise for a lot of little and medium enterprises,
which are joining hands with major Indian on the internet portals to display their products and
advertise their services. Analysts predict that in the subsequent 18-24 months, numerous national
brands and retailers will have their on-line shops prepared for B2B and B2C transactions. This
indicates that the total quantity of merchants on the internet would go up to practically 50,000 and
the total number of users would go up to about 50 million. Analysts also predict that the on-line
purchasing industry could go up to virtually USD $ 50 million.
One particular way of hunting at online shopping trends is examining the figures - air and rail tickets
estimated at INR 30 crore (INR 300 million) are sold on the web in India every single day. Already, a
jewelry piece sells every single five minutes, and a mobile handset each eight minutes, and a car
every nine hours on the popular commodity site eBAy.com. An additional common site
Indiamart.com materialized company more than INR five, crore via leads generated by it. Right now
several Indians purchase goods like books, electronic gadgets, air and rail tickets, apparel, gifts,
mobiles, computer peripherals, audio cassettes and CDs. There are a lot more goods which are
capable of being sold over the web. A lot of folks nonetheless locate information on the internet, but
buy their goods offline at classic stores. This indicates that people still are lacking in confidence to
acquire products online. This trend can be countered by offering secure web sites for transactions,
and prompt buyer service.
On the internet purchasing is genuinely catching on in India, classic brick and mortar retailers are
also getting the hand of undertaking business online. The trends demonstrate that standard retailers
will maintain on carrying out adequate enterprise even though the on the web shops boost their
virtual presence on the net.
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sell if they are not seen in the Internet world. This is why online stores get Web services like search
engine optimization and Web hosting so they can have more visitors than that of their competition.
. Also, in 2005 online shopping in USA contributed more than 5% of all non-travel retail sales:
Shoppers stop, Pyramid, Lifestyle, Westside.. are you listening?
It is sure over the next 18-24 months we would see several national brands / retailers having their
online shopping offerings. In the same timeframe, I estimate that the total number of merchants
online would reach 50,000 and the total internet users around 50 million. Once this happens, I
estimate that the B2C online shopping will scale up to US $ 500 million.
Indias online retail saga
Before going into the details and dissecting the online retail scenario in India I would like To clearly
state that Indians do not buy online. Yes its in their nature. They may buy a gift online, they
compare prices online and mostly they gather information on their options through internet. Rarely
will you find someone choosing the online mode before the various formats of retail India offers.
Indians do prefer to gift online as it makes their life much simpler. They can avoid the hassles of
selecting; packaging and posting the gift through the online channel. Many Indians also like to do a
brief online research on the products they might like to buy, but eventually they buy it from regular
stores. This is very much evident from the fact that Network 18s comparison site clocks more hits
than its E-tailing website. Some leading Indian e-tailing websites have also positioned themselves
differently like: Infibeams tagline start with Gifts to India , Naptol Online shopping and price
comparison India.
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No surprise that Indias online retail industry is trailing at Rs 1105 crores ($ 0.23 billion) whereas
UKs online retail market stands at a whooping 9 billion($15 billion). Despite of the small size and
its seasonal nature (Diwali, New Year, Holi, Rakhi etc ) in Indian online retail we cannot discount it
as a niche business. The online retail has seen a 30% increase year on year from the last few years.
With India poised to have third largest net users by 2013, the growing economy and worsening
traffic conditions; we certainly would have more online purchasers in India. Hence all the largest
business houses in India have either entered or are planning to enter the online retail space. We
already have Reliance Rmoneymall, Pantaloons Futurebazaar.com, Videocons eDigiworld.com,
Vishalmarts Vishalmegamart.com and we have Tata coming up with its own e-mall.
Despite of the small market size we have lot of players in this online space due to the small market
barriers. Let me cover the top ten Indian retail websites ranked according to daily page views
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CHAPTER:-09
SWOT ANALYSIS
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SWOT Analysis:SWOT stands for Strengths Weakness Opportunities Threats. SWOT analysis is a
technique much used in much general management as well as marketing scenarios.
SWOT consists of examining the current activities of the organization- its
Strengths and Weakness- and then using this and external research data to set out
the Opportunities and Threats that exist.
Today (2006-07) the figures are touching Rs. 2200 crore, but are expected to increase by 150 percent
by 2007-08
The race for new retail outlets and skyline-altering malls notwithstanding, Mumbaikars legendary
love for shopping is slowly but surely shifting to the Internet, if an industry analysis is any
indication.
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The recent survey conducted by Nielsen, India has emerged as the 3rd biggest nation when it come
to online shopping and using a credit card online. Drawn by the facilities offered by the Web and the
diversity of products available on it, Indian citizens have emerged as the third biggest credit card
users globally for online purchasing, next only to the Turkey and Ireland.
The survey shows more than 85 per cent of Internet users in the world are purchasing goods or
services online, with credit cards as the most used method of payment
Books are the hottest selling item on the internet (no messing around with quality here!). In fact most
products bought and sold off online are: electronic gadgets 53%, Computers & Peripherals 42%,
Home Appliances 35%, these are the top three categories in Indian online shopping .
However, people are also buying clothes, , books,
railway tickets.
peripherals, and a few are buying home tools and products, home appliances, toys, jewelry, beauty
products and health and fitness products.
4.1 Mumbai and Delhi
In fact, the population of e-shoppers in just two Indian metros of Mumbai and Delhi was 24 per
cent and 20 per cent, respectively, of all the Citizens that made an online purchase in 2006-07. the
reason behind these : convenience must be the major reason. Both the cities are spread out over a
large area and the best stores in both these cities are often concentrated in certain posh areas. In
Mumbai for example there are certain items you get only in Crawford market which is at the other
end of town in South Mumbai. And demographics show that the population of Mumbai is now
concentrated in the suburbs. Of course, huge malls have come up in the suburbs as well, and one of
Indias biggest mall Nirmal Lifestyle is in far-flung Mulundbut often you find a better choice of
sizes and styles choice in other malls, say Phoenix (central Mumbai). And though both Mumbai and
Delhi have transport systemsfew people like to travel for two hours just to get to a shop at the
other end of town. Clearly the transport systems leave much to be desired. In Delhi, safety is also an
issue for women traveling alone in the evenings.
4.2 Metros contribution to online shopping
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Actually, a major reason why metros are contributing to e-shopping growth are literacy ratesand
the cities internet savvy population. Most cities in India have a higher literacy rate as compared to
the national average of 64.8 percent. In fact Mumbai has a highest literacy even amongst the cities
(86 per cent). Delhi too has a high literate population (81.2 per cent). Oddly, although Bangalore has
a higher literacy rate than Delhi, at 83 per cent, the citys share of e-commerce is not very high.
Kolkatta too has a literacy rate (80.8 per cent) and so does Chennai (80.1 percent.) If one compares
these rates to literacy rates of cities like Patna (62.9 percent), Jaipur (67 percent), Indore (72 percent)
or Warangal (73 percent) its clear why its the metros which are going to continue to lead e-shopping.
Another reason for such traffic of online shopping in these cities is the population
Mumbais population is about 18 million (2006), Delhis 13.7 million (2001), Kolkatas 4.5 million
(2001), Bangalores 6 million (2005), Patnas 1.8 million (2001), Jaipurs 2.3 million (2001) and
Warangals about .5 million(2001). Therefore if Mumbais share of the e-shopping pie is about four
times that of Bangalore, its because its population is about three times! Population cannot explain all
the
difference,
but
certainly
its
very
important
factor.
Items that featured at top on their e-shopping lists were electronic gadgets 53%, Computers &
Peripherals 42%, Home Appliances 35%, these are the top three categories in Indian online
shopping, designer and even simple apparel along with tickets for railways, airlines and movies, are
also in high demand.
Electronic Business Technology: a friction-free economy?
Rapid technological progress in information and communication technologies (ICTs) along with their widespread
diffusion have led to speculation about frictionless economies in which transaction costs are nearly zero,
barriers to entry and contestability disappear, and markets clear instantly. Some think that electronic commerce,
with producers selling directly to consumers over computer networks such as the Internet, will eliminate existing
intermediaries (disintermediation) and drastically reduce transaction costs.1 These lower production costs will
encourage the entry of new businesses and thus increase competition and pressure to pass lower costs on to
consumers as lower prices. In addition, consumers will be able to search among thousands of merchants for the
lowest prices, thereby increasing the downward pressure on prices and leading to a shift in market power from
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producer to consumer. In general, it is thought that electronic commerce can significantly improve the efficiency
of economies, enhance their competitiveness, improve the allocation of resources, and increase long-term growth.
Because electronic commerce is still at a very early stage in its development, much of this thinking is based on
speculation or anecdotal evidence. This chapter begins to analyse these claims by looking first at price declines in
key technologies that enable electronic commerce: information processing, communication, and data storage. The
price declines in these supporting technologies allow firms to replace old inputs and processes by new, less
expensive inputs, thereby changing the firms production function and reducing its production costs. Because
these are information and communication technologies, the main impact is on transaction costs. However, given
the intangible nature of e-commerce, new transaction costs are generated, many of which are associated with
creating trust and managing some of the risks perceived to exist on the Internet. The impact of e-commerce on
transaction costs is analysed both for firm specific transaction costs and for costs incurred between firms. Equally
important is the redistribution of some of these costs among the various parties, including consumers. Finally, the
potential impact of changes in firms costs on prices is examined. Changes in these costs have a direct impact on
business models and market structure.
Fibre optics technology, and radio and satellite transmission as well, have also fuelled large price declines in
communications costs .However, because of the networked nature of the communications sector and its regulatory
environment, the overall drop in phone call prices has been more modest .Segments that are exposed to
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competition, such as the tariff basket for business communication charges in competitive markets and the price of
leased lines (1.5/2 Mbits per second), have seen annual average declines of 4.1 per cent and 6.6 per cent,
respectively, between 1990 and 1996 (OECD, 1997a). Likewise, the average price for Internet access charges in
the OECD area, based on 20 hours of usage a month, fell by more than a factor of three, from $68 in 1995 to $20
in 1996, where it has since stabilized (OECD, 1997a). New technologies such as digital subscriber lines (DSL),
continued liberalization of regulations, the arrival of new entrants, and the addition of significant new capacity
have led some to suggest that communication prices may begin to follow a similar performance-to-price path as
information technologies.
The Internet and electronic commerce use a mixture of information and communication technologies (routers,
ATM switches, the existing communications network) to connect PCs to servers. Many of these contain huge
databases and maintain sophisticated software applications that ensure that the entire system operates smoothly.
Thanks to the digital capability of this network and its packet switching protocol, data, voice, audio and video
transmission can use the same system simultaneously, thereby vastly increasing the capacity and flexibility of the
current communications system while undercutting the costs and prices of traditional modes of transmission. For
example, the Internet can support a manufacturing EDI system at about one-quarter the cost associated with using
a value-added network over a leased line; the price of an Internet switched telephone call is approximately 20 per
cent that of a traditional phone call .
From developments observed to date, however, the societal outcomes of electronic commerce appear to be of
substantial interest to policy makers in several areas. For instance, some electronic commerce applications are
emerging as effective means of enhancing the social infrastructure. Moreover, like other aspects of information
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technology, electronic commerce may affect the individual and society in a more general way. One of the more
important of these broader social impacts, the effect on the use and management of time, is discussed below.
Computer-based training has clear advantages over traditional training programmes in terms of providing
information when it is most relevant and immediately applicable. For instance, Oracle, the database software
giant, is building a virtual campus. This educational application is meant to assist staff in determining which
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skills are currently needed for particular aspects of their work and how their current capabilities can be most
effectively upgraded with courses available on line. This kind of flexibility allows for just-in-time learning,
which makes it possible to learn the specific characteristics of a particular
software product just before using it .
In addition to enhancing the possibilities for lifelong learning, the Internet can make a second important
contribution to long-term vocational development. In OECD economies, applications aimed at matching peoples
skills more effectively with the needs of the labour market are emerging. They improve the ability of employees
and employers to meet the specific needs of a complex, sophisticated economy and labour market.
Health
In 1990, world-wide public and private expenditures on health services amounted to about $1 700 billion,
approximately 8 per cent of total world product. This expenditure is under increasing pressure, owing to
government cutbacks and downsizing. At the same time, however, populations are demanding a higher quality and
level of health care. It is well established that a populations overall health is closely related to its economic
prosperity. Improved health conditions and access to health information contribute significantly to economic
growth, because healthier workers are more productive. Government policies that promote health education help
people lead healthier lives by increasing their access to and use of relevant information. When combined with
policies to ensure effective and accessible health services and those that generate income growth, a virtuous cycle
is created in which economic growth and improvements in health reinforce each other (World Bank, 1993).
Information technologies and electronic commerce health-care applications can play an integral role in the
promotion of this virtuous cycle. They can help realise cost savings while broadening the reach of the health-care
system (Industry Canada, 1998). In addition, ICTs can assist the overall health system to become more costeffective through structural and functional rationalisation of the delivery system, and the wide-scale
implementation of ICTs will result in improved availability and quality of health services (European
Commission, 1996). Information technology can play a positive role in expanding services and service delivery
options while creating cost efficiencies in the administration and management of health services and therefore
lead to greater economic prosperity. This is particularly true if access to these new and better services is extended
to the most disadvantaged segments of society, as they have the most to gain from improved health conditions.
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A sense of community
Electronic commerce and ICTs abolish distance and alter the concept of community. Many of these changes are
positive creating links with new people, maintaining closer ties with far-flung friends and family members,6 and
creating new online communities with potentially global membership. There are potential costs as well, such as
those incurred in some countries with the arrival of automobile dependent suburban shopping malls and the
demise of urban pedestrian shopping. Likewise, as firms production facilities and customer base become global,
their loyalty to a particular area is likely to erode.
There are concerns that because of the new technology, people will no longer have to live in built-up regions and
urban centres will decline. However, as much of the infrastructure for effective high-bandwidth communication is
found in the traditional built-up areas, a technology-driven exodus from the city is unlikely in the near future.
Cyber-links may allow some rural communities to strengthen their social and economic situation and reverse
lower growth trends and shrinking populations. In general, electronic commerce and ICTs tend to reduce the need
for direct physical interaction between people. More time and research will be needed to see to what extent people
are willing to forego such interaction and to see the broader economic and social implications.
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the
biggest
category
of
.sources-
Internet
purchases
Visa
globally.
card
"Consumers in India are clearly following the global trend as airline tickets continue to remain the most
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popular choice among consumers for online purchases,'' as per Indian Consumer Report study, conducted by
AC Nielsen. The number of online shoppers in India rose 7% to 3.49 million in the first half of 2008 from
3.27 million a year earlier
Access to faster Internet connections is also encouraging online sales. High-speed connections in India more
than doubled to 1.92 million at the end of October from 690,000 in the year earlier, according to the Indian
telecommunications regulator. India had 37 million Internet users at the end of September, according to a
study by researcher IMRB for Internet and Mobil Association of India, up from 33 million at the end of
March.
India was set to become the fastest-growing air travel market in the next decade,. The South Asian country's
air travel market would grow at an average annual 7.7% pace until 2025 compared with China's 7.2% and the
global
average
of
4.8%,
sources - Airbus .
16.27 lakh rail tickets booked online till the first half of 2008 which ultimately suggests that many Indian
consumers are making use of online to book their tickets.
tremendous
growth.......................................................................................................
Whats more, the paper predicts that, with e-shopping gaining in popularity all the time, the total value of
products and services lapped up online by citizens is likely to grow by 150 per cent to touch Rs 5,500 crore
this fiscal year.
This is over and above the Rs 2,200 crore notched up last fiscal year. Share of Delhi e-shoppers will go
beyond
30
per
cent
but
Mumbais
share
would
be
even
better
at
40
per
cent.
This expansion in e-shopping would be on the back of changing lifestyles and shopping habits, supported by
a
large
number
of
people
and
merchants
becoming
net-savvy.
Products that will gain in popularity on online shopping sites would include gems and jewellery, books,
accessories, apparel, gift products, music and movies, hotel room bookings besides tickets for transportation.
Of all online shoppers, Chennai accounted for 7 per cent in 2006-07, which is projected to go up to 11-12 per
cent in the current fiscal year
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ASSOCHAM Predicts that these time e-shopping during diwali season likely to catch up by 130%
With such a booming Indian market for online shopping many company have come-up with these
such as future group has launched futuregroup.com.
Some Facts and figures
A piece of jewellery sells every 3 minutes in an online marketplace.
A mobile handset sells every 4 minutes.
An MP3 player sells every 14 minutes.
A watch sells every 15 minutes.
A book sells every 20 minutes.
A digital camera sells every 28 minutes.
4.5 Major players in India for online business
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
eBay India
Rediff
Indiatimes
Yahoo
Others
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E-bay due its popularity among many individuals and also due to word of mouth, advertisement publicity it is
amajor player in Indian online business with a share of nearly 43%, followed by rediff 23%, indiatimes 18%,
yahoo 4% , while others such as baaze, ezeego have a share of 14% altogether
4.6 Consumer for online shopping
In general, shopping has always catered to middle class and upper class women. Shopping is
fragmented and pyramid-shaped. At the pinnacle are elegant boutiques for the affluent, a huge belt of
inelegant but ruthlessly efficient discounters flog plenty at the pyramids precarious middle.At its
base are the worlds workers and poor, on whose cheapened labor the rest of the pyramid depends
for its incredible abundance. Shopping has evolved from single stores to large malls with different
services such as offering delivery, attentive service and store credit and accepting return.These new
additions to shopping have encouraged and targeted middle class women.
Table
1:
How
Respondents
Locate
Online
Shopping
Sites
Percentage
67
67
Word of mouth
54
49
Advertisements on television
47
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Advertisements in magazines
47
Radio
19
Other
18
Billboards
11
The above table clearly suggests that those consumers who are familiar with the stores are preferred first.
Keyword search are also taken into consideration by many consumers, by browsing through search engine.
Word of mouth as many consumers find it more convenient, to hear from the mouth of good or experienced
person. Also advertisement on Television, Radio,Magzines are also preffered by many respondents
Advantages
of
E-Business
Worldwide Presence:
This is the biggest advantage of conducting business online. A firm engaging in e-business can have a nationwide or a
worldwide presence. IBM was one of the first companies to use the term e-business to refer to servicing customers and
collaborating with business partners from all over the world. Dell Inc. too had a flourishing business selling PCs
throughout the US, only via telephone and the Internet till the year 2007. Amazon.com is another success story that helps
people buy internationally from third parties. Hence, worldwide presence is ensured if companies rethink their business
in
terms
of
the
Internet.
Firms need to have a competitive strategy in order to ensure a competitive advantage. Without an effective strategy, they
will find it impossible to maintain the advantage and earn profits. The strategy, that the firms can pursue, can be a be a
cost strategy or a differentiation strategy. For instance, till the year 2007, Dell Inc. was selling computers only via the
Internet and the phone. It adopted a differentiation strategy by selling its computers online and customizing its laptops to
suit the requirements of the clients. Thus, e-business resulted in Dell Inc. managing to capture a vast segment of the
market
using
the
differentiation
strategy.
Disadvantages
of
E-Business
Sectoral Limitations
: The main disadvantage of e-business is the lack of growth in some sectors on account of product or sector limitations.
The food sector has not benefited in terms of growth of sales and consequent revenue generation because of a number of
practical reasons like food products being perishable items. Consumers do not look for food products on the Internet
since they prefer going to the supermarket to buy the necessary items as and when the need arises.
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transactions. EDI refers to the structured transmission of data between companies by electronic means. It is
used to transfer electronic
documents from one trading company to another trading company electronically.
Online Shopping - the scope of information and activities that provides the customer with the
information they need to conduct business, and make an informed buying decision.
2.
Online Purchasing - the technology infrastructure for the exchange of data and the purchase of a
product over the Internet.
The Potential
: The potential for this type of business venture is great. Manyof the Bangalore companies are
growing and adding employees quickly. The reason there issuch a global demand for this kind of
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work is because companies want to have their documentsin a digital format. This conversion may
include scanning the document into the computer andthen going one-step further and tagging and
indexing them in HTML SGML or XML so that itcan be put on the Internet and easily retrieved. The
entrepreneurs who are willing to jointventure with Indian partners to start up a business like this will
not only make money but will be doing a great service for India by providing high quality skilled
jobs.
The Downside
: The risk is in, not maintaining top quality work for the client.This has been a complaint of many
clients.
5
.
STARTASOFTWARECOMPANY
- There is nothing new about this. There are plenty of success stories. Bangalore already has atleast
600 software companies. Most of these are Indian owned and non-resident Indians havestarted a few
of them. For a list of Bangalore software companies you can go to resource page.Government of
India and especially Karnataka (the state in which Bangalore is), isencouraging foreign involvement
and investment and has turned on the green light to hi-techcompanies. They have even created some
tax incentives for this industry.
The Potential
: The potential is for the development of quality software usingthe extremely intelligent labor force
in India at a lower cost. Cost savings can be found in rent,insurance etc. High quality programmers
can be hired for 25%-50% of the cost of the samesoftware programmers in the West. For a good
example look at gseindia.com and read thehistory of this high end Swedish/Indian Software
Company.
The Downside
: The downside is that there are inefficiencies related toworking in India i.e.: erratic power,
government bureaucracy, poor Internet connections etc.27
Unless the cost saving is considerable, many of the problems related to doing business in Indiawill
offset the benefit.
WHY GO TO THE WEB?
The Web opens up a whole new market for goods and services. It creates opportunity for
amultifaceted arena that offers new efficiencies for sales, marketing, customer service,
shipmenttracking, inventory monitoring.Choice has always been the Holy Grail for consumers.
Todaysconsumers have a wide variety of commerce choices: traditional businesses, mega
discountstores, catalogs or direct market mail, and the Web. The Web, taken as a whole, is a
powerfulmedium where consumers browse, research, compare, and then buy online or, after doing
their window shopping online, make the purchase at a brick-and-mortar business. Businesses
thatkeep in mind the consumers desire for choice, and integrate into their website the
appropriatemeans for customer interactions, will succeed.28
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This being said, the Web will not open vast new markets for every business. However, it canextend a
significant degree of power to businesses that recognize how to leverage the efficienciesof this new
arena. A good example is 3Com (www.3com.com) which, through its website:
Offers software downloads including drivers, updates and fixes, which prior to thewebsite would
have been mailed to the customer.
Provides an educational center with online courses.In short, 3Coms business and customer base
didnt change the Web changed the way3Com services its market it did not create a new market.
Still, overall, 3Coms business isenhanced by its web presence.Big companies with plenty of
technical expertise and bucketsof money have always been able to build their own e-commerce
systems, complete with asecure server, a high-speed Internet connection, and custom software.
Internet software was generally designed with security as an afterthought.
Unfortunately the consequences can be disastrous, warns Sam Green of Zeus
Technology.
History
Security holes in business-critical software are a significant threat to organisations.
However, vulnerabilities in Internet-related software can be disastrous. In a recent survey,
respondents said that 70 per cent of their security attacks occurred through their Internet
connection.
Ironically, Internet software was generally designed with security as an afterthought.
Networks were largely considered to be either private and therefore physically secure, or
public and therefore inherently open. With the enormous growth in the Internet as a medium
for business, this assumption is extremely dated; and coupled with a limited understanding
of the requirements for truly securing an online offering, we are currently paying the price
for a history of non-secure software design.
In some areas this mindset still has not changed. For example, wireless local area
networks (LANs) became popular and cost-effective in 2001, and with their rise in popularity
it was only a matter of time before hacking tools for this medium were created. On 12
April 2001 WEPcrack was released. WEP is the encryption method used to protect data
sent across a wireless link, and through the use of WEPcrack an attacker can quickly
compromise security on a network. WEP is a modern design, but it highlights the fact that
software designers still see security as an afterthought.
The amount of private information transmitted across the Internet increases daily. It is
now an integral part of most peoples lives, ranging from buying books at Amazon on a
2.2
credit card through to making money transfers and payments via an online bank. For businesses
it is even more ingrained; organisations typically use the Internet to sell goods and
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services and to perform stock control via trusted links to supply chain partners.
Potentially there are numerous reasons for the growth in security attacks; but one trend
that is undeniable is the growth in the number and sophistication of hacking tools.
Historically attackers required detailed understanding of the systems that they were
attempting to compromise, and performing an attack could be a time-consuming operation.
The sophistication of tools such as NMAP, BackOrifice and other similar tools has brought
about a rise in the number of novice attackers (sometimes referred to as script kiddies).
These attackers have very little understanding of system security, attack methods and
avoiding detection; however, with modern hacking tools this is largely irrelevant.
Statistics show that over 300,000 hosts were infected by Internet worms like Code
Red and Nimda during the past two years. The cost of Code Red is estimated to be
approximately US$2 billion, making it the second costliest outbreak ever (Information
Security, September 2001). These two worms are not the only ones; in fact there is a long
history of similar events.
The first recorded Internet worm was released in 1988. It used a buffer overflow in the
finger service on UNIX systems. Written by a student, this worm severely affected 6,000
systems and the entire Internet came to a near standstill.
For many years, writing worms and viruses was a secret activity until Aleph One wrote
an article called Smashing the Stack for Fun and Profit, which was published in Phrack
magazine. His paper described in great detail how to exploit buffer overflow problems on a
UNIX system. Many people started writing their own viruses and worms to attack other
systems, especially open source software, because the source code was available and
problems could be found by reading the code. In 1997 and 1998, almost weekly updates of
widely used software like the mail server Sendmail were common.
In 1999 the list of known exploits had continued to grow, but for the first time there
were exploits aimed against Microsoft products. Microsoft was shielded from these
problems because the operating system and all its applications were written in a completely
different style to applications for UNIX; and, at the time, Microsoft was largely focused on
desktop operating systems or basic workgroup functionality rather than being a credible
Internet server operating system which had traditionally been UNIX hackers operating
system of choice.
There also was no source code available to read to find security vulnerabilities.
Dildogs paper on how to exploit Microsoft applications opened the door to many hackers.
Initially it might have been harder to find weaknesses in Microsoft applications, but once
they were found it was possible to use almost any functionality that the Windows operating
system provided in order to spread the virus or worm. Because the process and security
model in Microsofts operating systems was very easy to break into and exploit coupled
with the explosion in PC users it quickly became very popular to write viruses and other
tools to exploit all these weaknesses. Tools like Back Orifice and NetBus became very
popular and allowed a large number of amateur hackers to create havoc on the general PCowning
population.
_ 62 THE SECURE ONLINE BUSINESS_____________________________________
________________________________________________WEB SECURITY 63 _
The threat
Today security is a bigger problem than ever before. PCs are everywhere; every organisation
has some form of Internet access, and home users have permanent connections
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Some worms install backdoor services to give hackers access to machines. They are then
able to control the system remotely and use it for future exploits, such as distributed denial
of service attacks. Code Red, for example, checks if the web server is running with the
English (US) language pack installed and then defaces the website with a banner saying
Hacked by the Chinese. This is a relatively obvious payload and one that is likely to be
detected relatively quickly. A potential payload could be far more sinister and could surreptitiously
transmit important data, such as credit-card details, to a remote machine.
Search for new systems
In order to be able to infect other systems every worm needs some form of reproduction
mechanism. It needs to find new servers to which it can spread by investigating the
addresses of potential targets. Due to the very unbalanced nature of 1Pv4 address space it
would make very little sense to work through the entire Internet in a step-by-step process.
Worm developers have been creative when it comes to engineering an efficient algorithm to
find as many likely targets as possible. Currently, the most efficient mechanism is to write a
program that is able to behave differently on every infected host; ideally every infected host
would have completely different lists of hosts it tries to attack. Most search algorithms are
based on the infected hosts IP address and network. Code Red focused on attacking servers
on the same subnet, which created large amounts of traffic across backbone networks. In a
number of cases this surge in traffic created denial of service attacks. Another interesting
approach would be to use external resources that gather details of web servers such as
MediaMetrix or Netcraft to find as many web servers as possible this was suggested by
Nicholas Weaver in a recent paper on Internet worm propagation.
Optional: Attack other systems
Many worms have built-in attack routines. For example, Code Red tried to perform a
distributed denial of service attack on an IP address belonging to the White House website
(www.whitehouse.gov). The target server was moved to a different location after the worm
was dissected by forensic security analysts, with the result that the attack failed. However,
the worm could easily be rewritten to dynamically gather attack data from a number of
sources that would overcome this limitation. Far more dangerous are worms that install a
distributed denial of service slave that goes instantly to sleep and does not affect other
local services on the machine. These slaves can then be activated by remote controllers,
thereby causing large floods of attacks within a few seconds.
_ 64 THE SECURE ONLINE BUSINESS_____________________________________
Business implications
The web is a vital component of an organisations infrastructure. Companies cannot afford
downtime, public defacement or leakage of confidential customer and company information.
The financial implications can be enormous and the impact on customer confidence
can be catastrophic.
The solutions
As with the security for your business premises, an intruder will always look for the easiest
way in; if you can make it sufficiently secure then they will go elsewhere. Internet security
is not a matter of installing one system, but of looking at all the components in your systems
to see if they offer any holes. Installing systems that are secure in the first place obviously
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means less work than installing insecure ones and then trying to secure them.
Over the past 24 months there have been so many high-profile attacks on Microsoft IIS
servers that Gartner has advised organisations that take their web infrastructure seriously to
look at migrating away from IIS. More recently, worms have been released to attack Apache
servers running under UNIX.
If your business relies on its website, then you should talk to an organisation like Zeus
Technology who specialise in advising organisations about their Internet infrastructure,
including issues of security. Dont wait to install the locks until after youve been burgled!
CHAPTER:-10
FINDINGS
SUGGESTION
LIMITATION
CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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WORD OF THANKS
CONCLUSION
After conducting the research, Researcher found that there are two categories of retailers. The first
one is of those retailers, which just want to increase their assets, for them the sale doesnt matter
according to them they can only increase the sale if the company will invest in them or in their
shops. These types of retailers will only work for the company, which invest in them hugely. And if
at any moment they found company has lost or lowered their interest in them they will again shift to
other major player. Other kinds of retailers are those who are more bothered about working hard and
build their reputation in the market. These types of retailers are using the merchandising assets to
their optimum level. And sometimes if they are unable to do so its because of the irregularity of the
salesman (when the salesman on the route gets changed) or because of the shortage of the different
products/packing.
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There is a requirement of the company professionals to visit these retailers continuously. So,
that they can understand the market and suggest changes accordingly. Despite of this,
salesman and other company professionals who visit these retailers must not do the false
promises. Due to this retailers loose their confidence in the company.
There is also the need of the transparent schemes and marketing mix that the retailers can
understand more properly.
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Research Methodology:-
To find out the importance of every department in company and how they contribute in providing
strength.
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Research Methodology:-
2 METHODOLOGY
1.2.1 Understanding Phase: This being the primary phase of the study involves the
understanding of the basic factors that affect discounting. In Online businesses, there are many
factors that affect the discounting policies directly or indirectly and it is essential to have the
knowledge of all these factors to understand the discounting system. Every company has their
own terms and ways of doing things. It is essential to have an in depth knowledge about
everything to understand different prospective of business. This phase includes three stages:
Stage1: To have the knowledge of all the factors that affects the discount to be given
to different schemes. This includes factors like sales, competitors strategy,
negotiation, etc.
Stage2: To collect the data of sales and discounts of different Companies. This
includes the collection of data of sales and discounts for the year 2006 and 2007 of
different Portals being served by the company. It includes direct as well as indirect
Selling.
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1.2.2 Analysis phase: After being familiar with the basics of the business, the next part of the
project work includes personal market visits and visits through route rides to detect any kind of
wrong practices being adopted by the strategy and by the different portals. to fetch out their own
personal benefits from the discounting system. It also includes analyzing the discounts given to
the short listed customer and to make a comparative study of the discount and sales volume of
the companies.
Research in common parlance refers to a search for knowledge. One can also define research a
scientific and systematic search for pertinent information on a specific topic. Infect research is an art
of scientific investigation. According to Redman and Mory, systematic efforts to gain new
knowledge. According to Advanced Learner, A careful investigation or inquire specially through
search for new fact in any branch of knowledge.
RESEARCH DESIGN
The objective of this project is such that it required descriptive research has helped me to know
about the company documentation in shipping department.
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Limitations:-
1-UNCERTAINITY OF MARKET:
In Online companies have uncertainty of environmental effect? Its
difficult for future of different products. Mostly products are
selling in different season. So company have risk of all others seasons.
Competitors of the company show new products in this period.
gifts for customers. New products of the company. Company price of selling products. Tax rate of
the products .
3-HIGH COMPETITION:
The Different companies have always threat of his competitors.
market competition between different companies is very high.
Customer requirement is show market possession of the company.
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Data Collection Method:For the purpose of study both primary as well as secondary data have been used.
1- Primary Data
Primary data have been helpful to explore the opinion of general public and their
future distribution plans with the company. On the basis of information extracted
from the primary data various measures are found which would be helpful to it in
making new strategies in near future.
Primary data was collected from the distributors and general public by
interviewing them and filling the questionnaire.
2- Secondary Data
The secondary data have been collected from various magazines, newspapers, company annual
reports, and websites. For the collection of primary data structured and undisguised questionnaire
has been used.
For the purpose of knowing where about of the company in the present beverage market secondary
data has disclosed many important information as- market share of the company and its potential
before the beverage market leaders on the basis of various attributes.
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BIBILOGRAPHY
Reference:
Books
Authors
Marketing Research
:Naresh Malhotra
Marketing Management
:Philip Kotler
Research Methodology
:C. R. Kothari
Websites :
www.quickmba.com
www.indiacom.com
www.yellowpages.com
www.tradeindia.com
www.indiamart.com
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WORD OF THANKS
I take the opportunity to pay hearty regards to Dr. D. K. GARG (Chairman) and
Mr. M. K. VERMA (Dean) for lending us their kind support for completion of my
project. We would like to thank all those who directly or indirectly supported us
morally, financially and through providing knowledge by which We could
complete my project. Also I would like to thank our seniors for their support and
cooperation. We are thankful to Mr. Sushil Kumar Singh (Project Guide) who was
our guide and mentor for this project and supported us a lot and encouraged us
to ahead with this project. We would also like to thank Ms Sandeep Singh ,who
is Chief Technical Head and he had given us special attention and guided us
from time to time. we would also like to thank our parents for their support
which encouraged us to complete this project. Last but not the least we would
like to thank god for giving me strength and his blessings for the completion of
the project
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