Strategies for successful Electronic Commerce

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Strategies for successful Electronic Commerce
February 22, 2000 - Dr. Al Bento - University of
Baltimore
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E-Commerce Information Systems

• 1960s and early 70s - batch and transaction
  oriented systems
• late 70s and early 80s - on-line, customer
  oriented systems
• late 80s and early 90s - on-line, business to
  business systems (IOS, EDI)
• late 90s and early 00s - on the Web, global
  business customer oriented systems (GEC)

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E-Commerce roots

• Electronic funds transfer (EFT) the oldest
  large-scale e-commerce root. Banks have been
  exchanging financial transactions through
  Automated Clearing Houses for decades.
• Transaction automation (TA) consumers and
  businesses have been using TA in a variety of
  Point of Sales (POS) applications, like
  credit-cards, purchase scanning, etc. Verifone
  was the pioneer.
• Inter Organizational Systems (IOS) business to
  business commerce over proprietary networks
  particularly for order entry and purchasing,
  using Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
  technology and standards.
• Electronic Commerce today business to business
  (B2B), business to consumers (B2C), consumers to
  consumers (C2C).

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E-Commerce Technologies

• Traditional technologies
• Operating Systems scalability, portability,
  security, interoperability
• Networking telecommunications bandwidth,
  reliability, scalability, security
• Data bases dynamic catalog management and
  display, order entry, fulfillment and delivery.
• New technologies
• HTML Web Design and store-front tools
• Web programming Server management CGI
  programming

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E-Commerce Strategies

• Strategic E-Commerce Areas
• Marketing
• Operations
• Business models
• E-Commerce Critical Success Factors

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Strategic Areas Marketing

• design
• presence
• visibility
• catalog development
• price availability
• description, image
• order entry
• billing
• credit cards, etc
• customer service
• FAQ
• returns

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Strategic Areas Operations

• supplier ordering and receiving
• partners
• JIT (just-in-time)
• distribution centers
• warehouse(s)
• packing
• shipping
• order-tracking
• internal
• external
• delivery services

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Strategic Areas Business models

• extranet
• firewall
• tunneling
• Web front-end outsourcing
• store-front tools
• outsourcers
• extranet Web front-end outsourcing
• combination of above

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GEC Critical Success Factors I

• target the right customers
• who are your customers?
• who are your prospects?
• Which customers are profitable?
• Choose target customers and design the your E-C
  site for them
• own the customers total experience
• deliver a consistent branded experience
• focus on saving customers time and irritation
• give customers control of their experience
• work with partners to deliver consistent service
  and quality

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GEC Critical Success Factors II

• streamline processes that impact customers
• look at the process from the customer perspective
• streamline the process for your target customer
• improve process based on customer feedback (be
  sure you have a place for feedback)
• provide a 360-degree view of the customer
  relationship
• provide one-stop shopping for the customer
• keep a memory (profile) about the customer
• ensure everybody in the company has access to the
  complete customer picture

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GEC Critical Success Factors III

• let customers help themselves
• be aware of customer types browsers and
  searchers
• let customer check orders, pay or adjust bills
• let customers interact using whatever media they
  choose (Web, phone, fax, mail)
• help customers do their jobs
• learn how your customers do their jobs
• design your processes and products to make it
  easier for your customers to do their jobs
• give access to detailed order information,
  price, billing, etc

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GEC Critical Success Factors IV

• deliver personalized service
• be aware of issues of personalization and privacy
• let customers specify and modify their profiles
• provide information and services based on profile
• give access to their transaction histories
• foster community
• the Internet naturally fosters the sense of
  community
• let customers share their experiences, but be
  aware of pros and cons
• create Web discussion forums, E-mail discussion
  lists or newsgroups