1. E-Business and E-Marketing. 2
2. World-Wide Web. 3
3. Marketspace. 4
4. Customer Relationship Management 5
5. Datawarehousing/Datamining: 6
6. E-Business Infrastructure Model (2005 onward) 7
7. Open-source. 7
8. Podcasting. 8
9. Grid Computing. 8
10. Viral marketing. 9
11. 3G Mobile services. 10
12. VOIP. 10
13. Digital Television. 10
14. Search Engine Marketing. 11
15. Web Services: 11








E-Business and E-Marketing

Electronic business, or "e-business", may be defined broadly as any business process that relies on an automated information system. The term "e-business" was coined by Lou Gerstner, CEO of IBM

E-business is more than e-commerce. IT involves business processes spanning the entire value chain. Electronic purchasing and supply chain management, processing orders electronically, handling customer service and cooperating with business partners. Special technical standards for e-business facilitate the exchange of data between companies. E-business can be conducted using the Web, the Internet, intranets, extranets, or some combination of these.

Ebusiness includes:

Internal business systems
Enterprise communication and collaboration
Electronic commerce.

Electronic Commerce has changed over a period of time. Originally electronic commerce referred to facilitation of commercial transactions electronically, using technology like Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) which was introduced in the late 70’s to send commercial documents like purchase orders or invoices electronically.

The electronic or e in ecommerce or ebusiness refers to technology/systems; “commerce” refers to traditional business model.

Few years later activities precisely termed as “web commerce”, which was the purchase of goods and services over World wide web via secure servers with shopping carts and electronic pay services like credit cards, e-cash, etc.

Ecommerce according to Wikipedia, consists “primararily of distributing, buying, selling, marketing and servicing of products or services via electronic systems such as the internet or other computer networks”

According to Rayport and Jaworski, “ecommerce is technology-mediated exchanges between parties as well as electronically based intro or interorganizational activities that facilitate such exchanges.

The essence of e-commerce is characterized by several attributes:

It is about exchange of digitized information between parties
It is technology enabled
It is technology mediated.
It includes intra and interorganizational activities that support the exchange.
Ecommerce consists of four categories:

B2B – DELL, GE etc
B2C – Amazon, Yahoo, etc
C2C – ICQ, Monster.com
C2B – Speakout.com.

According to Wikipedia, E-marketing is a type of marketing that can be defined as achieving objectives through the use of electronic communications technology such as Internet, e-mail, Ebooks, database, and mobile phone. It is a more general term than online marketing which is limited to the use of internet technology to attain marketing objectives.

World-Wide Web

A hypermedia-based system for browsing Internet sites. It is named the Web because it is made of many sites linked together; users can travel from one site to another by clicking on hyperlinks. Or "The World Wide Web is the universe of network-accessible information, an embodiment of human knowledge." - Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web.

On the World Wide Web, a client program called a web browser retrieves information resources, such as web pages and other computer files, from web servers using their URLs and displays them, typically on a computer monitor. One can then follow hyperlinks in each page to other resources on the World Wide Web whose location is provided by these hyperlinks. It is also possible, for example by filling in and submitting web forms, to post information back to a server to interact with it. The act of following hyperlinks is often called "browsing" or "surfing" the Web. Web pages are often arranged in collections of related material called "websites."

At its core, the Web is made up of three standards:

the Uniform Resource Locator (URL), which is a universal system for referencing resources on the Web, such as Web pages;
the HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP), which specifies how the browser and server communicate with each other; and
the HyperText Markup Language (HTML), used to define the structure and content of hypertext documents.


Marketspace

Traditionally, ‘marketplace’ referred to the physical place where buyers and sellers met for transactions. Today, most transactions at the marketplace are managed or mediated not so much through human contact but largely by technology. Hence the term ‘marketspace’ refers to the digital equivalent of a physical world market place. Hence, the success of the business depends on how well screens and machines manage customers and their expectations. The marketspace offering could include a product, service, information or all of the above and the business model decisions need to be based on the forces unfolding in the marketplace. Due to this shift from activities and capabilities in the physical world to a combination of marketplace and marketspace activities, resource systems for many companies are now modified to a combination of the physical and virtual asset bases.
Rayport, Jeffry, Sviokla and John (1995b: 75) define the marketspace as "a virtual realm where products and services exist as digital information and can be delivered through information based channels". It is also defined by Bloch and Segev (1996) as the buying and selling of information, products, and services via computer networks. Markets are primarily Internet-based, and all business is done with Electronic Commerce (EC), from gathering, selecting and synthesizing information, to finally distributing the information. The marketspace has resulted in changed processes used in trading and supply chains. Additionally, the marketspace has increased effectiveness due to the speed of transactions, lower transaction and distribution costs, and markets are more efficient. (Turban et al 2002)

In the marketspace, members of the value chain are able to manage their relationships more directly and the following activities, identified by Turban et al, (2002) can take place:
 Consumers can search for detailed information in a matter of seconds, at any time of the day. They can easily compare products, for example, if one supplier is out of stock or is too expensive, there is no need to drive miles to a competitor, they are just a “mouse-click away”. Consumers are additionally able to bid or negotiate prices online.
 Sellers can use websites as marketplaces to provide, update, sell and receive information. Service sellers can sell direct from their Web site or from electronic markets.
 Intermediaries, on the other hand, can create and manage online markets, match buyers and sellers, provide infrastructure services and aid transactions.
 Infrastructure companies generally provide hardware, software and EC support.
 Content creators create and maintain websites, which are used as marketing tools by the sellers.
 Business partners collaborate on the Internet along the supply chain


Competition in the marketspace differs from that in the traditional marketplace: it is far more intense for the following reasons.
Firstly, electronic markets reduce the cost of searching for information. This enables customers to rapidly compare prices.
Secondly, the marketspace allows for differentiation and personalization.

In marketspace, information replaces physical goods as the content of the transaction. The context of marketplace transaction, face-to-face meeting, is replaced by on-screen communications and the infrastructure of marketspace consists of computers and networks instead of buildings and documents.

The traditional marketplace interaction between physical seller and physical buyer has been eliminated. Infact, everything about this new kind of ytransaction what we call a marketspace transaction is different from what happens in the marketplace.

The content of the transaction is different: information about the products replaces the products themselves.
The context: in which the transaction is different. An electronic, on screen auction replaces a face to face transaction.
The infrastructure that enables the transaction to occur is different: computers and communication lines replace retailers.

Eg: AUCNET.com

Customer Relationship Management

It enables a company to provide customer service in real time by focusing on relationship development with each individual customer through the effective use of individual account information. A better understanding of customer behaviour patterns can enhance the long term profitability of the lifetime value of a customer’s relationship with the company because it will lead to more sales, better service and higher customer retention rates. Shift from product-focus to customer-focus.
Successful CRM is defined as an integrated sales, marketing and services strategy that depends on coordinated actions by all departments within a company rather than being driven or managed by one single, functional department. The goal is to achieve long running customer dialogue across all customer access points to provide more effective cross-sell and up-sell to increase customer retention and loyalty to increase customer profitability, to achieve higher responses to marketing campaignsand to provide extraordinary service and support.
CRM is defined as an all-embracing approach, which seamlessly integrates sales, customer service, marketing, field support and other functions that touch customers. When using this approach, by integrating people, process and technologies and leveraging the Internet, the relationships with all the customers including e-customers, distribution channel members, internal customers and suppliers are maximized. Basically, CRM is a notion regarding how an organization can keep their most profitable customers and at the same time reduce the costs; increase the values of interaction to consequently maximize the profits
CRM is a multi-dimensional construct consisting of four broad behavioral components: key customer focus, CRM organization, knowledge management, and technology-based CRM. From a marketing perspective, it identifies and targets best customers based on frequency and monetary scoring. It helps manage marketing campaigns with clear goals and quantifiable objectives.
From sales perspectives, CRM solutions improve telesales, field sales and sales management through real time information sharing among multiple employees.
From the field service perspective, customer satisfaction and retention are ensured by solving customer problems quickly. The management of people and materials within the service organization are smoothly integrated.
From the perspective of customer support, shared relationships with individualized customer care based on specific customer history and preferences are strengthened

Datawarehousing/Datamining:

A data warehouse is a subject oriented, integrated, time-variant, non-volatile collection of data in support of management decisions.

It can be viewed as an information system with the following attributes:

A database designed for analytical tasks, using data from multiple applications
It supports a relatively small number of users with relatively long interactions
Its usage is read intensive
Its content is periodically updated (mostly additions)
It contains current and historical data to provide a historical perspective of information
It contains a few large tables
Each query frequently results in a large result set and involves infrequent full table scan and multiple table joints.

Data mining:

Data mining is not specific to any industry. It requires intelligent technologies and the willingness to explore the possibility of hidden knowledge that resides in the data. Most organizations engage in data mining to do the following:

Discover knowledge: Goal of knowledge discovery is to determine explicit hidden relationships, patterns, or correlations from data stored in an enterprises’ database
Visualize data: Analysts must make sense out of huge amount of information stored in corporate databases. Prior to any analysis the goal is to humanize the mass data they must deal with and find a clever way to display the data.
Correct data. While consolidating massive databases, many enterprises find that the data is not complete, and invariably contains erroneous and contradictory information. Data mining techniques can help identify and correct problems in the most consistent way possible.



E-Business Infrastructure Model (2005 onward)


Open-source

Open Source requires the source code of computer software to be made available openly for study, modification and improvement in its design through the availability of its source code under an open source license (Wikipedia, 2005). An open source license is certified by the Open Source Initiative (OSI) which is an unincorporated non-profit research and educational association with the mission to own and defend Open Source trademark and advance the cause of Open Source Software (OSS).
Open source does not only mean access to source code. The distribution terms must comply with the following criterion
Free Redistribution ( by constraining the license to require free redistribution, short term gains are eliminated in favour of long term gains)
Source Code ( access code facilitates modification and hence evolution of programs)
Derived Work ( modifications and derived work must be distributed on the same terms as the original work)
Integrity of the Authors Source Code
No Discrimination against People and Groups
No Discrimination against Fields of Endeavour
Distribution of License
License must not be specific to a product
License must not restrict other software
License must be technology neutral
(Open source Initiative, 2005)
The open source business model has its focus on creating value. The profits are centered on the service of the products (as opposed to the selling price of the product) with different revenue sources and different pricing strategies. This strategy makes sense if your value proposition is not in the software itself but the service and expertise associated with the software.






Podcasting

Podcasting" is a compound word coined in 2004, that combined two words: "iPod" and "broadcasting."

Podcasting is the method of distributing multimedia files such as audio programs or music videos over the internet using formats suitable for playback on mobile devices and personal compueters. The host of a podcast is called podcaster. A podcasters website may often offer direct download or streaming of files.

Benefits:

· Allows listeners to time-shift and place-shift media consumption
· 100% efficiency, since episodes are only downloaded by listeners on an opt-in basis
· Easily accessible to a global audience that is not defined by geographic boundaries
· Access to an educated, influential audience with a high disposable income
· Ability to leverage electronic programming without an outside news media filter
· Most cost effective electronic media distribution channel available
Shortcomings:
Advertising content must be relevant and meet the needs of the podcast audience. As audience have full control over what they want to hear and see.
Difficult to measure advertising return on investment.

Grid Computing

Grid computing is an emerging computing model that provides the ability to perform higher throughput computing by taking advantage of many networked computers to model a virtual computer architecture that is able to distribute process execution across a parallel infrastructure. Grids use the resources of many separate computers connected by a network (usually the Internet) to solve large-scale computation problems. Grids provide the ability to perform computations on large data sets, by breaking them down into many smaller ones, or provide the ability to perform many more computations at once than would be possible on a single computer, by modeling a parallel division of labour between processes

One well-known example of grid computing -- sometimes called distributed or clustered computing -- is the ongoing SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) project, in which thousands of users are sharing their unused processor cycles to help search for signs of "rational" signals from outer space.

Benefits
Improved productivity and collaboration/More flexible, resilient operational infrastructures
Allowing widely dispersed departments and businesses to create virtual organizations to share data and resources
Instantaneous access to compute and data resources to "sense and respond" to needs
Leveraging existing capital investments, which helps to ensure optimal utilization of computing capabilities
Avoiding common pitfalls of over-provisioning and incurring excess costs

Viral marketing

Viral marketing and viral advertising refer to marketing techniques that seek to exploit pre-existing social networks to produce exponential increases in brand awareness, through viral processes similar to the spread of an epidemic. It is word-of-mouth delivered and enhanced online; it harnesses the network effect of the Internet and can be very useful in reaching a large number of people rapidly.

Viral marketing is sometimes used to describe some sorts of Internet-based stealth marketing campaigns, including the use of blogs, seemingly amateur web sites, and other forms of astroturfing to create word of mouth for a new product or service. Often the ultimate goal of viral marketing campaigns is to generate media coverage via "offbeat" stories worth many times more than the campaigning company's advertising budget.

Egs.
· Hotmail, promoted largely by links at the bottoms of emails sent by its users, is the classic viral marketing example
· Tupperware parties
· Gmail – invitation only email.

3G Mobile services

3G is short for third-generation technology that provide high speed bandwidth to mobiles. The services associated with 3G provide the ability to transfer both voice data (a telephone call) and non-voice data (such as downloading information, exchanging email, and instant messaging).

Music downloading and Video telephony on mobile has often been used as the killer application for 3G, which led to huge spectrum-licensing fees in many countries.

These networks must be able to transmit wireless data at 144 kilobits per second at mobile user speeds, 384 KBPS at pedestrian user speeds and 2 megabits per second in fixed locations
For example,
The successful 3G introduction in Japan shows that music downloading and peer 2 peer connecting are strongly demanded.
Adoption from 2.5g or 2g to 3g by 40% of the japan market.

VOIP

Voice over Internet Protocol. The technology used to transmit voice conversations over a data network using the Internet Protocol. Such data network may be the Internet or a corporate Intranet

VoIP is free or costs less than equivalent service from traditional sources

Skype, for example, offers international phone calls from anywhere to anywhere for an average cots of just 2.1 cents per minute.

In the Skype business teleconference tab, users can call contacts by just clicking them and the Skype presence feature shows if they are online or not. It has added features like language interpreting and messages recorded in writing for later recall.

In short – it increases productivity at the same time as it saves company money.


Digital Television

Digital television (DTV) is a telecommunication system for broadcasting and receiving moving pictures and sound by means of digital signals, in contrast to analog signals in analog (traditional) tv. It uses digital modulation and data digitally compressed which is decoded by specially designed television sets.

Tivo is a popular brand of digital video recorder.

It allows users to capture tv programme into their internal hard disk storage for later viewing.
Online scheduling: Schedule recordings from the Internet
Download shows to laptop or easily burn to DVD
Online services: Yahoo! weather, traffic & digital photos, Internet Radio from LiveFM, Podcasts, & movie tickets.

Customers benefits from having more control on when and what they want to watch, having choices and personalisation, and more interactive functions.

For Marketers, in order to reach audience, they have to be creative – interactive ads, pop up ads, brand funded content, brand integrated sponsorship.



Search Engine Marketing

SEM is a set of marketing methods to increase the visibility of a website in search engine results pages. The three main methods are:

Search engine optimization, or improving rankings for relevant keywords in search results by rectifying the website structure, and content such that they could be easily read and understood by the search engine's software programs.

Search engine advertising, or paying the search engine company for a guaranteed high ranking or an ad displayed aside the results (commonly known as pay per click advertising).

Paid inclusion, or paying the search engine company for a guarantee that the website is included in their natural search index.

For example, Google offers a service called AdWords, which allows companies, for a set structured fee, to have a link to their website featured when a user searches a specific keyword.

Web Services:

A collection of Web and object oriented technologies for linking Web-based applications running on different hardware, software, database, or network platforms. For example, Web services could link key business functions within the applications a business shares with its customers, suppliers, and business partners.

Web services are characterized by their great interoperability and extensibility, as well as their machine-processable descriptions using extensible markup language (XML).

Web services are a powerful business tool, allowing unprecedented customer integration and partnering opportunities.

Coles use the web services to connect between their inventory system, warehouse mgt system, customer ordering system, supplier ordering systems, and logistic system with XML.

Web services allow each of these systems to share information via the Internet, regardless of back-end software that the application is using. When a customer brought something, the implications for Coles inventory, cashflow and every stock on the shelves can be tracked in one step.



Web services can be defined as modular Internet-based business functions that perform specific business tasks to facilitate business interactions within and beyond the organization. By this definition Web services reflect and refer to loosely coupled reusable software components that are able to semantically encapsulate discrete functionality and are programmatically accessible over standard Internet protocols.
Web services aim to bring requesters, providers and brokers together, as they are advertised (in a service repository) by service providers and used by service requesters, thereby promoting match making among the stakeholders.
Web service components represent business modules with generic templates of services that aim to provide the desired functionality such as, service discovery, negotiation and delivery of the service.
The dynamic nature of the Web services architecture on the Internet presents new opportunities for technology trust building.
Benefits of Web services include
• faster time to market,
• convergence of disparate e-business initiatives,
• significant reduction in total cost of ownership,
• and ease to use software tailored for trading partners.
• reduce the risk that organizations end up using obsolete technologies, third party utilities and
• reduce risk on the reliance on external application providers to offer the latest technologies.