E-Business E-Commerce M-Commerce

E-Commerce in the digital age is not just buying and selling a product online, and a product

information system as it was perceived a few years back before, Rather than encompasses

the entire online of Developing, marketing, selling, delivering, serving and playing for

products and services transacted through the internet, e-Commerce broadly includes the

following tasks:

Product information
Requirement of the customer
Purchase transaction
Delivery of the product
Digital platform as a service for customer

Thanks to digital transform, Role of the internet has been the major driving force to make

e-commerce possible. Thought e-commerce provides a number of benefits to the companies,

still, the majority of the commercial transaction take place through the traditional channels.

E-commerce has come a long way in the last decade, but there is a still a long way to go.

There are many dot-com companies in mid of 2000 had failed due to lack of infrastructure

and awareness, but now in digital age, now it can say that this is e-commerce age in digital

transformation. Today, millions of companies including large and small, are somehow

involving in e-commerce activities. Few giant companies such as Amazon, Alibaba, Flipkart,

Snapdeal and Wal-Mart etc, in e-commerce have captured the domestic and global

consumer and business market too.

E-commerce also used to reduce the transaction cost, improve customer services, speed up

the flow of information from the manufacturing to the supplier to customer.

1. Categories of e-Commerce

B to C: Business to Customers (B2C): This is meant for household customers. This model is built around providing convenience, quality and best value for money to the end users. eg: Flipkart
B to B: Business to Business (B2B): This model is meant for the wholesalers and retailers who need some items which are unavailable in the local market. Eg: Alibaba
C to C: Consumer to Consumer (C2C) In this model consumer selling directly to another consumer. Eg: eBay
B to G (e G): Business to Government (B2G): In this model wholesalers directly sell or supply to the government

Where day to day smart-phone users are increasing, in mobile age for purchasing goods and

services electronically is also known as mobile commerce or m-commerce.

2. E-Commerce life cycle Business Model

Buying Process

This process allows users to search and buy different products listed by sellers.

Selling Process

3. Revenue Model of e-Commerce

Registration Fee

Manufacturers or Distributors pays the annual rent for registering to Storeyo.com. In order

to enlist their products or to put any kind of advertisements, the companies must be

registered. This is a fixed rent.

Listing Fee

Manufacturers or Distributors pays the annual rent for listing each product. This is a

variable rent calculated keeping the cost and various other factors in mind.

Service Charges

Shipment
Maintenance
Discounts

Advertisements

The company allows different advertisements which are also a source of revenue.

4. Operations Model

A). Stock it yourself model

In this we are maintaining our integrated warehouses that are able to handle shipments to

web customers, so by keeping the warehouses, we are fulfilling the orders. Through this, we

have full control over the fulfillment process.

B). Outsourcing warehouse model:

In this, we can use logistics specialists which do the work of stockpiling and shipping web

orders. So once an order comes into our site it is automatically transmitted to its warehouse

and directly shipped to the customer through courier.

Firefly (customer profiles) as Seller agents They will make markets more accessible to

providers CyberCash & payU

They are payment enablers which handle purchase transactions and their related fund's

transfers, as well as risk management.

Time slots for delivery

           You may have different time slots depending upon the demand of the customers. They are

           categorized as for example:

2-3 days

5-7 days

Types of inventory

This is a key term in terms of cost effectiveness. It is the direction and control of activities

with the purpose of getting the right inventory in the right place at the right time in the right

quantity in the right form at the right cost.

A). Fluctuation inventory

This is introduced in our inventory management with a purpose of preventing disruptions in

deliveries to customers.

B). Lot size inventory

We are purchasing items in quantities greater than needed to take advantage of quantity

discounts, to reduce shipping and setup costs.

C). Cross docking

In this strategy, we can move our goods directly from our warehouses to consumers. This

distribution strategy we have applied in which the customers and distributors are supplied

(in the case of B2C & B2B) by central warehouses which act as coordinators of the supply

process and as transshipment points for incoming orders from distributors and consumers

but in this strategy we are not keeping any stock.

D). Refresh inventory

We are constantly refreshing our inventories through the received orders and products

coming from the distributors. When a new lot of product comes to the warehouses then we

send those products to the customers which are already present in our warehouses and

through the various time slots we are continuously refreshing our inventories.

E). Transportation cost

This includes the cost of moving the items from the warehouse to warehouse and warehouse

to consumers. As seen from the diagram given below we have two slots for the

transportation costs. The overall transportation cost is thirty-one percent of the total capital

estimation.

i) Warehouse to warehouse

It includes the cost of moving the items from one warehouse to other. This will mainly occur

when the cost of moving goods from distributor to warehouse is high than the cost of moving

products among the warehouses. Example, when one consumer demand for any variety of

products and it’s not available in the nearby warehouse, then we order the product from the

nearby warehouse to avoid the high cost of ordering product from the distributor.

ii). Warehouse to customer

This includes the cost of shipping the products from the warehouse to the customers. As

shown in the graph we have warehouses in the areas where the demand is high and if some

item will not be available in the nearby warehouse then we will ship that item from the next

nearby warehouse. If the time slot is in 1 day or 2 days then we will ship the items directly

from the distributors using the cross-docking strategy.

5. E-commerce Infrastructure:

i). Hardware:

A web server hardware platform is one of the main e-Commerce technology infrastructure

components.There are many features the web-server such as the storage capacity and

computing power etc,. depend upon the software that run on the server and the volume of

the e-commerce transactions to be proceed. The main guiding principle remains that there

must be adequate hardware back-up to avoid a major business disruption in case of a failure

of the primary web server.

ii). Software: Categorizes in two parts

            a) Web-server:

A large number of functions such as identification retrieval and sending of webpage, website

tracking, website development,and web page development, the website must have

web-server software.

     Example:

Database

Application Server

Web Server

Web Browsers

b) E-Commerce:

Catalog management

Product configuration

Shipping Cart

E-Commerce Transition

Web Traffic Data Analysis

E-Commerce applications:

Retail and Wholesale
Marketing
Finance
Manufacturing
Auctions

Electronic payment system:

Electronic cash (e-Cash)
Electronic Wallets (e -Wallets)
Online Payment
Plastic Money
Cash on delivery (COD)

6. Management Challenges and opportunities

New Business model:

In mid of 2000, sudden burst of dot.com age. Termed as bubble burst. Doing business over

the internet is not necessary more efficient or cost effective than traditional business

model. Nowadays due to technology advancement and reform in business industry

e-commerce industry become a very ease to the business.

Required changes in business Process:

It should bechanges accordingly. Rule, regulation, polices and procedure should be

transparent and fare.

Channel Conflicts: Sometime distributor supplies product directly to the buyers.

Taxing, Legal and Regulatory for e-commerce:

E-commerce presents a major challenge for tax administrations, given the often multi-

jurisdictional nature of the transactions and the potential anonymity of the parties and it is

country specific.

E-commerce transactions should be legally straightforward. You get money up front for the

sale, in return for delivery of a product as described within the timeframe specified.

A standard set of terms and conditions should cover the vast majority of transactions.

E-commerce is not only challenging traditional business methods but is also having a

massive impact on consumers’ habits. The growing importance of e-commerce and the

spreading of the Internet, which is having profound changes on almost all aspects of our

society and life, has recently called for the drafting of new legal instruments, both at global

and European level, in order to put the regulation of the Net on a more solid foundation and

to better regulate the activities carried out through this medium. It allows companies to

establish a global presence, which is of paramount importance for relatively small and newly

established entities who want to engage in cross-border trade. It offers competitive

advantages in respect to traditional methods of doing business. Forward-thinking companies

have grasped this truth and have opened their own website, confident of increasing and

enhancing their business and efficiency.

Security and privacy:

In an online business, everything is dependent on technology proper measures should be

taken to protect it from attackers or hackers. Several technologies can be employed to help

reduce the risk to companies and their customers when completing e-commerce

transactions.

Managerial opportunities:

E-Commerce provides a wide range of opportunities to the organizations. Managers can get

many advantages with the use of this technology. Internet revolution really reduces the

transaction cost: exchange of sales of goods and money bank guaranty.

Conclusion

Today e-commerce is not buying and selling a product or service platform online but it is big

information center or we can say that it becomes a big search engine for the most of the

things. E-Commerce technology infrastructure is very important is the key to successful

e-Commerce. Today e-Commerce is very advance and provides many

safeguards and secure in term customer and vendor too. E-Commerce provides huge

opportunities and ways of doing business online. In spite of that, there are many challenges

of pre to post sales and service.