Business Topics and E-commerce

Business Topics
and E-commerce
• Some on-line resources on topics…
• Business Plans
• Someone’s site on E-commerce techniques
• Startup Case Studies website
• Marketing and E-Commerce
1
University of Virginia
Business Plans
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US Small Business Administration
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Free on-line short courses:
http://www.sba.gov/services/training/onlinecourses/index.html
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In general, the courses are all self-paced and should
take about 30 minutes to complete. Most of the
courses require a brief online registration.
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Small Business Primer: Guide to Starting a Business
How to Prepare a Business Plan
Technology 101: A Small Business Guide
2
University of Virginia
Business Plans website
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US SBA site (previous slide)
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Commercial website: http://www.bplans.com
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Ecommerce sample business plan:
http://www.bplans.com/e-commerce_startup_business_plan/executive_summary_fc.cfm
3
University of Virginia
Palmer Web Marketing
http://www.palmerwebmarketing.com
 Some interesting resources
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Handout for discussion:
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But caveat surfer!
Top 10 eCommerce Startup Mistakes
Free e-book (79 pages, lots of whitespace)
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eCommerce Roadmap
4
University of Virginia
eCommerce Roadmap contents

Palmer Webmarketing has a free e-book
http://www.palmerwebmarketing.com/e-commerce-ebooks/ecommerce-tips-ebook.php
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Contents are:
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Landing Page Optimization
Site Navigation Optimization
Site Search Optimization
Category Page Optimization
Product Page Optimization
Shopping Cart Optimization
Checkout Process Optimization
Customer Service
eCommerce SEO Tactics
5
University of Virginia
Startup Review: Case Studies
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http://www.startup-review.com/blog/about/
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a blog that profiles successful Internet start-ups in a
case study format
Created through interviews with early employees at
the companies profiled and industry experts
Advertising.com, Betfair.com, Craigslist, Digg.com, eCRUSH
Network, eHarmony, Facebook, Flektor, Flickr, Greenfield Online,
Grouper Networks, Homegain, HotJobs, HOTorNOT.com,
iStockphoto, Jumpcut, Jumpstart Automotive, Linkshare, LoopNet,
LowerMyBills.com, Marchex, MyBlogLog, MySpace, Newegg,
Reddit, Rent.com, Rotten Tomatoes, StepUp Commerce,
Userplane, Wallstrip, Xfire, YouTube, Zappos.com
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University of Virginia
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University of Virginia
Marketing
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A definition of marketing:
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strategies and actions a firm takes…
to establish a relationship with a consumer…
and encourage purchases of its products or services.
Marketing issues include:
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Understanding customers
Products and brands (branding)
Segments, targets, positioning
And more…
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University of Virginia
Knowing About your Customers
community, culture, lifestyle
 how they shop
 frequency, barriers (e.g. trust), facilitators
 where they get information about products
 behavior on-line
 behavior once on a site

9
University of Virginia
Internet Marketing Techniques
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An e-business has new ways to learn about
customers and behaviors. Examples:
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Analyzing behavior of customers on your website
Storing shopping cart info, orders, etc in databases
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Datamining
Customer registration info
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University of Virginia
Analyzing Behavior on Website
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Let’s look at
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Analyzing weblogs
Web bugs
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University of Virginia
Web servers log access
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Web logs can record:
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IP address of visitor
Time-stamp
URL requested (page, image, script)
Servers response
URL from which visitor came to this site
Browser and OS info
12
University of Virginia
From Logs We Can Analyze:
Day, time and time-of-year info
 What people requested
 The "clickstream" -- a trace of pages they went
through
 Where they came from
 What kind of computers they use
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13
University of Virginia
Companies and Technologies
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WebTrends (www.webtrends.com)
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"Analytics" product:
http://www.webtrends.com/Products/WebtrendsAnalyt
ics8/Datasheet.aspx
They say: "Analytics allows you to measure all
aspects of your organization's online presence, from
static site content to what customers are doing on
your blogs. Enhanced support for open standards lets
you connect aggregate online data with purchasing,
sales and other enterprise systems to get one view of
your customers and data."
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University of Virginia
Companies and Technologies
Google Analytics
 Free Service, http://www.google.com/analytics/
 They say: “[GA] is the enterprise-class web
analytics solution that gives you rich insights into
your website traffic and marketing effectiveness.
Powerful, flexible and easy-to-use features now
let you see and analyze your traffic data in an
entirely new way. With Google Analytics, you're
more prepared to write better-targeted ads,
strengthen your marketing initiatives and create
higher converting websites.”

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University of Virginia
Google Analytics
GA can track visitors from all referrers, including
search engines, display advertising, pay-perclick networks, email marketing and digital
collateral such as links within PDF documents.
 How's it work:
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A "page-tag" included on each web page.
A bit of Javascript
Collects visitor data, sends it to Google data
collection servers.
Reports done hourly (with some lag)
16
University of Virginia
More User Info
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In addition to logs, there are:
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Cookies
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You know about these.
Can identify a returning customer (new or repeat visitor)
Can say how long since they were here, etc.
Not completely accurate. (why?)
Web bugs
17
University of Virginia
What’s a Web Bug?
A graphic image on a Web page or in an Email
message
 A link to an external site, not an image
embedded in your message
 Designed to monitor who is reading the Web
page or Email message
 May be invisible (size 1 pixel by 1 pixel) or not
 Sometimes knowns as a "clear GIFs", "1-by-1
GIFs" or "invisible GIFs“
 (More info:
http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Marketing/web_bug.ht
ml)
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18
University of Virginia
How’s This Work?
Web bug: on some other server
 Remember: when a server delivers a HTML file
or an image file, it logs this
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A page or an email can have an image that’s stored
on some external site
Thus the server there logs delivery of that image
(even if it’s invisible to you)
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University of Virginia
Examples (in HTML)
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<img
src="http://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/pixel.quicken/N
EW" width=1 height=1 border=0>
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<img width='1' height='1'
src="http://www.m0.net/m/logopen02.asp?
vid=3&catid=370153037&email=SMITHS%40tia
c.net" alt=" ">
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University of Virginia
What Info Can Be Gathered?
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Again, the server where the bug lives will log:
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The IP address of your computer
The URL of the page that the Web Bug is located on
The URL of the Web Bug image
The time the Web Bug was viewed
The type of browser that fetched the Web Bug image
Also possible: Info from any cookie that's on
your machine
21
University of Virginia
Web Bugs on a Web Page
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Using personal info in a cookie, ad companies
can track what pages you view over time
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Stores this info in a database
Later used to target specific banners ads for you
How many people view a website
22
University of Virginia
Web Bugs Used in an Email
Tells if and when a message was read
 Links email address with the IP address of
machine you read mail on
 Within an organization, can tell how often a
message is forwarded and read
 In spam:
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How many users have seen the spam message
Allows spammers to detect valid email addresses
23
University of Virginia
Web Bugs: Legal, Ethical?
Controversial! Attempt to monitor you without
your knowledge
 Legal? Not clearly illegal
 They are used on the websites of legitimate
companies
 Privacy policies for websites generally don't
mention these
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University of Virginia
Web Bugs: What can you do?
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You can't easily identify web bugs
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New email clients (e.g. Mozilla Thunderbird) do
not display images in email that are links to files
on external sites (see next slide)
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Firebug can help you find them!
(Images embedded as part of email message are OK)
You can click "Show Images" button
Also nice not to see some images in spam
Helps to disable and delete cookies
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University of Virginia
An Email Client Blocks Remote Images
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University of Virginia
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University of Virginia
Advertising
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Establishing a relationship with your customer
means:
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attracting and getting customers
Therefore, ads!
Previously: TV, radio, newspaper, magazines,
direct mail
 Now also: advertising networks (e.g.
DoubleClick), affiliate marketing, blog
marketing,…
 Search engines: SEO; pay for placement and
rank
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University of Virginia
Ads Moving On-line
On-line advertising growing 20% per year
 Intel:
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Proctor and Gamble (world's largest advertiser)
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35% now on-line
Nike:
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has moved 50% of its marketing budget to the online
channel
only 35% in traditional channels
the rest on-line and events
(Numbers reported as of 2007.)
29
University of Virginia
Advertising Networks
Participating sites (publishers) agree to display
ads
 Thus the Advertising Network has an inventory
of available slots
 Database info, customer info, etc. used to sell
slots to those who match the site
 Also, customer movement tracked from site to
site to discover customer interest
 Also, you identity may be known (from some
site’s registration), so ads matching your
demographic are shown
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30
University of Virginia
Big Business
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DoubleClick
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24/7 Real Media’s Open AdStream
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First SW released in 1996
Bought by Google in April 2007 for $3.1 billion
Bought by WPP for in June 2007 for $649 million
Aquantive
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Bought by Microsoft in May 2007 for $6.1 billion
31
University of Virginia
Big Business: E.g. DoubleClick
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60 billion ads per month
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About 24,000 a second
100 million user-profiles
 Relies on databases, servers, cookies, web
bugs
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See diagram
32
University of Virginia
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University of Virginia
Other Marketing Approaches
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Web 2.0 leads to marketing on…
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Blogs, social networks, viral marketing
34
University of Virginia
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Most major search engines allow companies to
pay for their ads to be shown in response to
specific searches
 But steps you can take may help
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Register with search engines (if allowed)
Make sure your keywords match common queries
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Links: links to your pages, links to other pages
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Especially in title, headings, meta, top-level pages
Increasing in-links? Affiliate relationships, ads, dummy
websites
Hire a pro
(PalmerWebMarketing’s e-book has some suggestions too.)
35
University of Virginia
Much much more…
Handout from textbook:
E-commerce: Business, Technology, Society
by Kenneth C. Laudon and Carol Guercio Traver
 Covers:
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Ads (on-line, banner, video)
Costs, effectiveness
Email, spam
Terminology for ads/on-line marketing
Etc.
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University of Virginia