REPORT ON

COMMERCIAL
E-COMMERCE AND
PORTAL SYSTEMS

Prepared by: Samiyah Omer

Roll No. BR546640

Group: M.Com (1 s t Semester

Submitted to: Sir XIAGHAM ABBASS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
It is a great opportunity to prepare a report on “Commercial E-
Commerce and Portal Systems”.

Firstly I am grateful to Almighty Allah for enabling me to complete this

report. I acknowledge with gratitude my E- Commerce teacher Sir
Xaigham Abbass , who has always been sincere and helpful in guiding
and letting me understand the concepts of e-commerce and the main
purpose of report writing . I also place on record, my sense of gratitude,
to my family and to one and all who, directly or indirectly, have lent
their helping hand in this venture.

I have worked hard and soul to gather all the relevant information that
has been required; however, there might be some shortcoming which I
will try to overcome in future.

Thank you

Samiyah Omer
An Abstract
This report helps in understanding e-commerce and web portals and
the way organizations use web portals to enhance its businesses . E-
commerce is a subject which researches how to use electronic and
information technology to promote the traditional business process to
change profoundly. The report is divided in to two part .The first part of
the report helps in understanding the meaning of e-commerce , its
scope and types of e commerce .

The second part of the report emphasizes on the importance of web

portals in e- commerce as they are the gateways or the entry point of
information. Portals are among the most frequently visited sites on
web, often they are the home page to which many users point their
browser on start up. Most commonly use web portals are google
,yahoo, e-bay etc.
INTRODUCTION

E-COMMERCE:
If we do any type of trading or commerce electronically then it is called
e-commerce. Simply, we can say that e-commerce or
electronic commerce is the process of buying or selling goods,
products or services over the electronic medium. Here internet is used
as the primary electronic medium or network to do this type of
transaction. In other words, e-commerce is a medium of trading for
goods and services between buyers and sellers through an electronic
medium.

E-commerce is also referred as a paperless exchange of a business

information using EDI, Email, Electronic fund transfer etc. For
example, Amazon, eBay, Flipkart etc are the world’s leading e-
commerce websites. E-payment systems are widely used in those
electronic commerce sites. Here we generally use various e-payment
method like credit/debit card, internet banking, e-wallet for buying or
selling products.

Hence;

Electronic Commerce is an emerging concept that describes;-

 the process of buying and selling

 exchanging of products, service information

 Via computer network including the internet.

 Electronic Commerce is a methodology of modern business which
addresses the need of business organizations, vendors and customers
to ;

 reduce cost and improve the quality

 and services while increasing the speed of delivery.

Electronic commerce encompasses the entire online process of

 Developing

 Marketing

 Selling

 Delivering

 Servicing

 Paying for products and service

It relies on the Internet and other information technologies to support

every step of the process,
Nature of E-Commerce:

E-Commerce is the part of the business where we can buy and sell
goods & services. The following characteristics which help you for a
better understanding of the nature of ECommerce.
Economic Activities
It is taken up with the important note to provide a motive to earn
profits and not the activity, activity deals with both economic and
non-economic.
Exchange of goods & services
E-Commerce involves an exchange of goods & services for profits
from other sources. The main purpose of goods is to resell them.
Earn Motive
The main motive for trading activities is to earn a profit. Profit is
the reward for understanding commercial activities.
Creation of utility
Commerce creates a place and time utility in goods. The goods may
not be spent at the place of production. They are supposed to be
needed at different places.
The regularity of transaction
The transactions should be regular. No isolated transaction will be a
part of commerce.
The scope of E-Commerce:
E-Commerce has a wide scope , it deals with not only the activities
which are related to transfer of goods & services but also with the
enhancement and marketing of trade business. The study of trade will
include internal and external (foreign trade), wholesale and retail trade,
agents associated with trade & etc.

Electronic Commerce is more than just buying and selling products

online. It also includes the entire online process of developing,
marketing, selling, delivering, servicing and paying for products and
services. There is a tremendous growth in the E-commerce segment, as
more and more people are shifting towards e- commerce
There is a major breakthrough E-commerce success stories particularly
in e-retail in Consumer Electronics & Fashion Apparel & Home
Furnishing segments. E-commerce creates new opportunities
for entrepreneurial start-ups. Ease of Internet access, Safe and secure
payment modes coupled with aggressive marketing by E-Commerce
Giants has revolutionized this segment. Rapid development in mobile
technology has given way to Mobile Commerce with many E-Commerce
companies shifting to App only model.
The Scope of E-Commerce
Major Types of E-Commerce
 Market relationships

 Business-to-Consumers (B2C)

 Business-to-Business (B2B)

 Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C)

 Technology-based

 Peer-to-Peer (P2P)

 Mobile Commerce (M-commerce)

B2B (Business-to-Business)
B2B e-commerce can be simply defined as the commerce between
companies. In Business-to-Business type of electronic commerce
system, companies do business with each other. For say, a
manufacturer selling a product to a wholesaler, a wholesaler selling a
product to the retailer. Here manufacturer, wholesaler and retailer all
are doing their separate businesses.

Above diagram illustrates the B2B model. There are 3 businesses-

wholesaler, manufacturer and the retailer. Here manufacturer has a
website using which wholesalers can purchase products from the
manufacturer. When a wholesaler places an order on the website, the
information regarding the order will be received by the
manufacturer through the website. Then after processing the order, the
manufacturer will send the product to the wholesaler. After receiving
the products wholesaler can sell it to the retailers. This type of business
is called B2B model.
B2C (Business-to-Consumer)
B2C model works as its name suggest. In this model, the company sells
their products, goods or services directly to the consumer online. Here
the customer can view products on the website that they want to buy
and can order it. After receiving the order details, the company will
process the order and then send the products directly to the customer.
For example, Amazon, Flipkart etc are this type of e-commerce
business model which we are using in our daily life.

We can view products on the websites like Amazon, Flipkart and can
order it. After receiving the order, the selling company of the products
processes it and send it to us. Here a business company is selling their
products to the customer with the help of an e-commerce website.
C2C (Consumer-to-Consumer)
Here a consumer sells products, goods or services to other consumers
using the internet or the web technologies. The C2C business model
helps us to sell our assets or properties like a car, house, bike,
electronics etc via online to other consumers. OLX, Quickr etc are this
type of business model.

Here, if consumer-1 wants to sell a product then he/she can publish the
details of the product on the website like OLX or Quickr. The consumer-
2 can view the details of the product on that website that consumer-1
wants to sell. If consumer-2 is willing to buy the product that consumer-
1 is selling, then the buyer can directly contact the seller and the
product will be sold. Here products are selling directly from a consumer
to another consumer via the website.
P2PCommerce
A peer-to-peer (P2P) is a decentralized platform whereby two
individuals interact directly with each other, without intermediation by
a third-party. Instead, the buyer and the seller transact directly with
each other via the P2P service.

Some peer-to-peer services don't involve an economic transaction, such

as buying and selling, but they do bring together individuals to work on
joint projects, share information or communicate without
intermediation.

When a third party is removed from the transaction, there is a greater

risk that the provider of the service may fail to deliver, that the service
will not be of the quality expected, or that the buyer may not pay. This
extra risk is often defrayed by reduced transaction costs and lower
prices. Often, businesses are created with the intent of facilitating P2P
transactions and reducing risk for both buyer and seller. The majority of
P2P services today are offered online.

Peer-to-peer services bring together individuals, as opposed to bringing

together businesses (B2B) or a consumer to a business. Some popular
examples of P2P services are:

 Open-source Software – anybody can view and/or modify code for

the software
 Bit Torrent – a popular anonymous file-sharing platform where up

loaders and downloader’s meet to swap media and software files.

 Air BnB – allows property owners to lease all or part of their

property to short-term renters.

 Uber – a platform for car owners to offer livery service to people
seeking a taxi ride
  Spotify – uses P2P networking to efficiently stream real-time audio
content on-demand
 eBay – a marketplace for private sellers of goods to find interested
buyers.

M-Commerce
It is also called as Mobile Commerce involves the online
transactions through the wireless handheld devices such as
mobile phone, laptop, palmtop, tablet, or any other personal
digital assistant.
It does not require the user to sit at the computer that is plugged in and
perform the commercial transactions. Through M-Commerce, people
can perform several functions such as pay bills, buy and sell goods and
services, access emails, book movie tickets, make railway reservations,
order books, read and watch the news, etc. by downloading apps
through Google or Apple play store.
PORTAL SYSTEMS (WEB PORTALS)

INTRODUCTION:
They are gateway to information.

Portals are the most frequently visited sites on the web, as they are
often the home page to which many users point their browsers on start
up.

Web portals are large multi-service web sites designed to be

comprehensive one stop destination for users.

A web portal or public portal refers to a website or service that offers a

broad array of resources and services such as e-mail, forum, search
engines and online shopping malls.

The initial function provided by portals such as Yahoo, Excite ,Alta vista
and later Google was to index Web page content and made this content
available to users in a convinient form.

Web portals are organised gateways that help to structure the access to
information found on the internet .Much more than a simple search
engine, the web portals usually includes customizable access to data
such as stock reports , local , regional and national news and email
services.

Most of the better known portals are commonly identified as search

engines, although they offer much more than simply the ability to
search the internet. Examples of public web portals are AOL(America
online) MSN(Microsoft network) and Yahoo etc.
  Web Portal such as yahoo Offer aggregated services including e-
mails, maps, news, photo sharing and search to mobile users via
especially designed for mobile device users.

 The top five search engines are Google, Yahoo, MSN,AOL and
ASK.com.

TYPES OF PORTAL
 There are following types of portal:

1. Vertical Portals

2. Horizontal Portals or Functional Portals

3. Market place Portals

4. Search Portals

5. Media or knowledge Portals

6. Corporate Portals or Enterprise Portals

The portals can be differentiated on the basis of their content and

intended users. There are different types of portals; it is important to
know what type of portal you want to build. They can be categorized
into
1.Vertical Portal:
These are also referred as destination sites or Vortals

These are web portals which focus only on one specific industry,
domain or vertical. Vertical portals provide tools, information, articles,
research and statistics on the specific industry or vertical. As the web
has become a standard tool for business. There are innumerable
possibilities for establishing special vertical portals on the market. A
vertical portal covers a particular market such as construction with
news and other services.
Examples:
Construction Plus (www.constructionplus.com)
Chemical Industry (www.chemindustry.com)

2.Horizontal Portal:
These are web portals which focus on a wide array of interests and
topics. They focus on general audience and try to present something for
everybody. Horizontal portals try act as an entry point of a web surfer
into the internet, providing content on the topic of interest and guiding
towards the right direction to fetch more related resources and
information.
Examples:
Yahoo (www.yahoo.com)
MSN (www.msn.com)
3.Market place portals:
Market space portals exist to support the business-to-business and
business-to-customer e-commerce, software support for e-commerce
transactions and ability to find and access rich information about the
products on sale also, ability to participate in discussion groups with
other vendors and/or buyers. They may be vertical, horizontal or
geographical in type.

Example:

EC21 (www.ec21.com)

eBay (www.eBay.com)

4. Search portals:

Search portals aggregate results from several search engines into one
page. Here the main focus is on search.

Example:

Google (www.google.com)

Ask Jeeves (www.ask.com) .

5. Media Portals OR Knowledge portals:
Media portals focus on entertainment, business or consumer news.
Popular media portals update users on current news, affairs and
information. Some media portals provide access to local and foreign TV
programs such as soap operas, sports and live events.

Examples:

BBC (www.bbc.co.uk)

Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk)

6.Corporate or Enterprise portals

A corporate portal is a website that contains a company’s internal
enterprise-wide information and content accessible to both customers
and employees. In a corporate portal, users can access the status of
their questions and requests, research the knowledge base and find
updated content.

Examples:

Uniliver(www.unilever.pk)

MCB bank(www.mcb.com.pk)
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Functions of Portals
The ideal portals relies on the following functionality areas:

 Search and Navigation

 Personalization
 Notification
 Task management and workflow
 Collaboration and groupware
PORTAL BUSINESS MODEL
Following are the portal business model:

Business-to-Consumer Portal
A business-to-consumer portal should consist of the following portals:

• Products browsing

• Information pages browsing

• Shopping cart port let

• Tell a friend

• News subscription

• Mailing list

• Negotiation agent

The attributes information of products is alterable with the unique

generic data structure. The information pages are create-able and
editable via the WYSIWYG editor, which provides great benefits for
users without skills of Web programming.

Content Management System Portal

A Content Management System portal should include the following
modules:

• Category management

• Product management
• Web contents / pages presentation management

• Customer management

• Subscription management

• Mailing list campaign

• Order / transaction management

This portal provides the user a full control over the content, description
and cosmetic appearance of the online store. The attributes are fully
customized with the generic data structure. The generic architecture
will be explained in the section Generic Multimedia ERP Architecture.

Business-to-Business Portal

The business-to-business portal is an additional portal and can be

activated if a B2B relationship exists in the company. The B2B portal
provides an advanced infrastructure and complicated functionality
that supports a range of B2B activities such as:
• Wholesale customers management

• Supplier management

• Wholesale customer online login management

• Shipping / purchase order / order receive management

• Stock inventory / product faulty management

• Reserve/ invoicing system

• Payment transaction tracking

• Credit notes management

• Login account management

• Retails shop account management

• Customized reports such as profit and loss, outstanding delivery

• Calendar and communication module

These modules should be integrated in the B2B portal and designed

with supply chain concept and workflow. In the next section, this article
will explain the technique of generic multimedia ERP architecture that
achieves adaptability, extensibility and reusability of data structure.
Typical Portal Revenue Sources
Portal receive income from a number of different sources. The revenue
base of portal is changing and dynamic ,with some of the largest
sources of revenue declining.

Portal Revenue Description

Sources
General advertising
Tenancy deals
Commission on sales
Subscription fee
Applications and games
Charging for impression delivered
Fixed charge for guaranteed
number of impressions, exclusive
partnerships, sole providers.
Revenue based on sales at the site
by independent providers.
Charging for premium content.
Games and apps are sold to users;
advertising is placed within app.
E-Commerce Portal Development
Features
 ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF
PORTALS

Advantages of Portals
 Flexible content and layout
 Easy to use design interface
 Powerful collaboration tools
 Powerful back end with discovery server
 Easy for users to customize personal places
 Based on open portal standards
 Sales to enterprise
 Real time personalization
 Single sign on using authentication proxy

Disadvantages of Portals
 Somewhat complex to setup.
 Require some work to integrate existing back-end database.
Conclusion
Generally, web portals give a user customizable interactive web
interface that is useful in accessing information and services that the
user needs or wants.

Companies now a days would like an active and simple data access
system ,so that the customers will get all the data they need in one
place , this helps to retain the attention of customers too.

Firms who do not meet the new criterion of user expectation lag behind
and then disappear altogether. Example, pet.com, boo.com etc

Recommendation
The survival strategy for general purpose portals in the future is to
develop deep, rich, vertical content in order to reach and engage
customer at the site. This involves hiring professional journalists rather
than relying on bloggers who write listicle articles, and offering more
quality entertainment in the form of movies, TV series and music. The
strategy for much smaller vertical market portals is to put together a
collection of vertical portals to form a vertical portal network, a
collection of deep, rich content site. The strategy for search engine site
such as Google is to obtain more content to attract users for a long time
and expose them to more advance pages(or Screen).
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page No.

E-commerce
INTRODUCTION ……… 5

NATURE OF E-COMMERCE ……… 8

SCOPE OF E-COMMERCE ……… 9

MAJOR TYPES OF E-COMMERCE

PORTAL SYSTEMS

INTRODUCTION ……… 11

TYPES OF PORTALS ……… 12

FUNCTIONS OF PORTALS …….. 21

PORTAL BUSINESS MODEL ……… 22

TYPICAL PORTAL REVENUE SOURCE ……… 22

E-COMMERCE PORTAL DEVELOPMENT FEATURE

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF PORTALS

CONCLUSION

RECOMMENDATION