E-commerce and its impact in logistic management: A state of art

Logistics management is defined as that part of the supply chain process that plans, implements, and controls the efficient, effective flow and storage of goods, services, and related information from the point of origin to the point of consumption in order to meet customers' requirements. Traditional logistical issues may be amplified by an e-commerce venture. Adopting e-commerce may greatly expand the marketplace. The organization needs to be concerned with its ability to deliver its product to potential customers. Realizing the importance of E-commerce in logistic management, an attempt has been made in this paper to review the existing literature with the objective to gain insights into the impact of E-commerce in logistic management. The advantages of the E-commerce in logistic management are offered. Finally, summary of findings and calculations are presented

The Adoption of e-commerce in SMEs: An Empirical Investigation in Egypt

The Adoption of E-commerce in SMEs: An Empirical Investigation in Egypt It is recognised widely that e-commerce can offer substantial opportunities for Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs) to compete in the global market. In developing countries, e-commerce opportunities can be a meaningful approach for SMEs to be able to compete with large businesses and to access, with lowest possible costs, international markets. However, the current situation shows that SMEs continue to lag behind in maximising their capabilities in taking these chances. Universally, they are reported to be slow adopters of new technologies as a result of limited financial resources and lack of expertise. The importance, of SMEs, emerged from their positions since they contributed more than 90% to many developed or developing countries’ economies and they were considered to be the backbone of any economy. Hence, the main purpose, of conducting this research, was to increase the body of knowledge about the process of the adoption of e-commerce. This was done by a primary empirical focus on small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Egypt. SMEs represented about 90% of all Egyptian businesses (ITP, 2012). This study aimed to investigate the factors which could influence the SMEs’ adoption of e-commerce. In order to accomplish this objective, the researcher investigated the previous studies, on the same approach, in order to identify the gap, within the literature, regarding the adoption of e-commerce amongst SMEs. Additionally, the researcher integrated existing theories on the adoption of innovation in order to develop a conceptual framework for the determinants of the adoption of e-commerce in the SMEs sector. The researcher reviewed the Diffusion of Innovation (DOI); Resource Based View of the Firm (RBV); Technology–Organization–Environment (TOE) Model; and Technology Acceptance Models (TAM) to give constructive information about the firm and decision makers, within the firm, who were believed to have an impact on the adoption of innovation. 3 The proposed model was tested using quantitative research data. The data was collected by means of an online questionnaire survey and, subsequently, due to the high rate of non-respondents, changed to a face-to-face survey. A total of 130 usable responses were generated for purpose of analysis. The study contributed to the existing research by providing valuable information about the factors which influenced the SMEs’ adoption of e-commerce. As the results showed, there were 6 groups of factors which impacted mainly on the adoption processes. Namely, these were: Decision maker characteristics (education level, position within the firm, management support, management attitude); organisational characteristics (firm activity, firm size, firm’s assets/capital, firm age, employee’s IT knowledge, firm marketing capability); innovation characteristics (Perceived Relative Advantage); e-readiness (Individual and organisation e-readiness); government support; and barriers to e-commerce. This study’s findings offered important information for Egyptian government, policy makers and managerial participants; those were the people who encouraged the Egyptian SMEs to adopt e-commerce. These findings could be generalised to be applied to other countries with similar conditions to Egypt, as well as being applicable to Egyptian SMEs in other sectors

Surfacing Meta-categories of Web-designers’ Criteria for B2C Website Evaluation: A Qualitative Study Using the Repertory Grid Technique

Many businesses today are using the World Wide Web (WWW) to create a compelling presence and this phenomenon is projected to sustain in the near future. Organizations are increasingly using websites not only to capture but also to build relationships with their desired markets. However, research into the effectiveness of B2C websites remains highly fragmented and user-centric, ignoring the views of web-designers. This study therefore aims to investigate what web-designers consider as attributes of “effective” B2C websites. Twenty web-designers were interviewed using Kelly’s (1955) Repertory Grid Technique in order to elicit factors that they consider important when designing or developing B2C websites. Using Grounded Theory approach, these elicited data were then classified into 14 meta-categories. The intensive nature of the interviews eventually gave rise to a comprehensive set of factors that broadens the base of existing literature on website effectiveness

The Customer-Centered B2C Literature through the Lens of Activity Theory: A Review and Research Agenda

A multitude of published research studies investigate the B2C phenomenon from the customer point of view. At this point, making sense of such a large number of studies is a difficult task. The aim of this paper is to organize the literature to provide a clear depiction of what we know and what we don\u27t know about it in order to identify specific areas where future research efforts are needed. A review of the B2C literature of the past seven years yielded 115 papers investigating the phenomenon from the user/customer perspective, 74 of these were empirical. This literature is organized according to the Activity Theory framework, allowing for an enhanced understanding of the phenomenon through a social context perspective. Future research directions are identified and discussed

Social Media Marketing Strategy and Marketing Performance: Evidence from E-Commerce Firms in Thailand

Undeniably, social media has come to a higher degree of popularity in the online world. Currently, most businesses have been utilizing any social media platforms for social media marketing in their strategy. Yet, in this sense it still has to be explored concerning how social media marketing strategy affects marketing performance. Therefore, this paper aims at investigates the relationship between dimension of social media marketing strategy (SMMS) and marketing outcomes. The questionnaires of 298 e-commerce firms in Thailand were collected. Regression analysis was employed to verify the hypotheses. The evidence highlights that market response timeliness orientation has the strongest positive significance for all marketing outcomes. Both product diversity presentation awareness and proactive competitor learning capability are significantly positive to marketing operation excellence. Furthermore, the findings also suggest that each dimension of SMMS required either marketing operation excellence or increased customer satisfaction as a mediator variable effect on marketing performance. The finding not only provides contributions but also recommendation for future research

Overcoming Language Barriers in Business-To-Consumer Electronic Service

Communication has been described as one of the determinants of service quality. However, communication is only effective when the parties involved speak the same language. This is almost impossible to achieve in Business-To-Consumer (B2C) Electronic Commerce (e-Commerce) given the diversity of languages used on the Internet. This paper seeks to explore the possibility of using current advances in technology to bridge the communication gap among entities on the Internet

Advertising On The Internet: Perspectives From Advertising Agencies And Advertisers

While a significant portion of companies have invested in Internet advertising and clearly digital media continues to grow in popularity, a noteworthy segment of corporations is still uncertain of Internet advertising efficiency. The purpose of this study is to gain insights into the perceptions of both advertisers and advertising agencies of the Internet as an advertising medium in order to record the factors that inhibit or reinforce the integration of new technology into their strategies and to spot future changes and trends. One hundred twenty-four managers participated in this study and their responses indicate that currently Internet advertising is a questionable and ineffective marketing channel; however marketers and media planners are willing to exploit the targeted nature of Internet advertising in the short run

Developing a social media strategy for Hilti Singapore

CEMSAs many B2B businesses, Hilti Singapore has not yet implemented social media as a business tool, despite its known effectiveness. The underlying work therefore aims at elaborating the potential of creating a social media presence for Hilti Singapore. By assembling the insights gained from a competitor, customer and employee analysis, the authors then propose five guiding steps for a successful strategy implementation. Further academic research underlines the influence of social media on brand management and describes the prevailing paradigm shift in marketing

Ethical Behavior of Firms and B2C E-commerce Diffusion: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Customer Orientation and Innovation Capacity

Despite the increasing significance of IT innovations and corporate ethics, we lack research that has investigated whether and how the extent to which firms in a country behave in an ethical manner relates to the rate at which B2C e-commerce diffuses among them. Drawing on the ethical climate theory, the stakeholder theory, and the resource-based view of the firm, we posit that firms’ ethical behavior positively relates to B2C e-commerce diffusion and that their customer orientation and innovation capacity will mediate the relationship. We validated our research model using publicly available archival data from 128 countries. Our findings suggest that 1) ethical conduct leads to higher B2C e-commerce diffusion among a country’s firms, and 2) customer orientation and innovation capacity serve as the underlying mechanisms that explain this relationship. We discuss crucial implications for research and practice