Integrating Social Media into Electronic Commerce Applications

In this chapter, the author takes a look at how organizations can integrate Social Media technology into their current electronic commerce environment. While electronic commerce technology has been around for many years, social media technology is emerging as the dominating force in commerce itself. Organizations must evolve their online environments in order to progress to the next level of service delivery. Social Media provides the basic technology for creating a network of customers who are passionate about the company’s product offering. The key here is the commitment of the customers throughout the business lifecycle. Social Media includes a variety of technologies and concepts such as social networking, weblogs, wikis, Really Simple Syndication (RSS), social tagging, mashups, information markets, and user defined content. This chapter will review several different examples where organizations have added Social Media to their environment and impact that integration is having to the entire business model.

E-Frameworks to Optimize Public Administration Services

Public administration is subject to major changes affecting many countries, such as the need to implement the European Union Services Directive within the entire EU area. This chapter presents theoretical and practical approaches to developing e-Services and e-Government solutions and real experiences in developing two successful projects with great potential to improve complex Government procedures. The Point of Single Contact is an electronic means through which service providers can find information and complete the formalities necessary to doing business there. Each EU member state must have its own PSC, which should be a reliable source of electronic processing of information that should facilitate the interaction of citizens with the public administration. The design and implementation details of an e-Framework for optimizing the relationship between Governments and citizens using eServices will be presented. Evaluation results obtained by integrating a real-life workflow for opening a business in the Romanian environment are shown. Also, in order to optimize automatic data transfers, document workflows, and business reporting of business organizations, an e-Services system is used.

Online Security and Consumer Protection in Ecommerce An Australian Case

Given the nature of the e-market, both regulatory and self-regulatory measures have been employed by Australia to protect e-consumers. However, the efficiency and effectiveness of the current framework of e-consumer protection have not been sufficiently evaluated. This chapter aims to (i) discuss the current approaches to protect e-consumers in terms of security in Australia, (ii) find out the level of awareness, the view and attitudes of e-consumers regarding online security and institutes involved in e-consumer protection, (iii) investigate how e-consumers protect themselves from online incidents, and (v) discuss policy implications for protection of e-consumers in terms of security. Overall, this chapter provides a better insight of how e-consumers are protected regarding security in Australia. It will help relevant stakeholders in developing and fine tuning policies to ensure a secure e-market for all. Finally, it will elicit further research on how to better protect e-consumers in the e-market.

Ubiquitous, Mobile and Pervasive Services

The growing demand for wireless technology and related applications has impelled companies to invest profoundly in a wide range of wireless products such as laptops, notebooks, cellular phones, etc., to meet needs of broad range of customers’ requirements while maintaining high efficiency and data integrity. The Mobile Customers (MC) should be able to access the desired information such as news, weather reports, traffic updates, financial information, stock prices, etc. whenever and wherever they desire, but it is possible that they may have inconsistent data as they are not physically connected to the servers and hence they maintain a local cache that stores some amount of data that has been sent by the server. They may also prefetch data from the server for caching, depending on history for future use. The cached data should be consistent with the data in the data server in order to correctly serve the user. The critical constraints of a mobile device like limited network bandwidth, low battery power and low processing power of mobile devices make them more susceptible to inconsistencies. Broadcasting is the natural method for disseminating information in media: namely, shared Ethernet, optical networks, short-range wireless and wireless links, including satellites. It has the highest priority to disseminate information on the wireless network. Multicasting supports an enormous range of applications within a network and is an effective method to guarantee scalability of bulk data transfer in wireless environment. In a Multicast scenario, a single source sends data items, which are then replicated within the network infrastructure to reach a large client population (group). Therefore, it can be used to guarantee scalability, reliable data dissemination, timely and consistent content distribution.

Business Model

Today’s world of business is increasingly witnessing exemplary firms which introduce new business models, exploit new markets and disrupt established firms in order to create a unique competitive position. Although the theoretical and conceptual posture of this phenomenon is well grounded and explained in the extant literature on disruptive innovation, little is known about strategic logic of this phenomenon. In other words, the managerial paradigm or cognitive and mental model that underlies the orchestration of micro- and macro-organizational mechanisms of a disruptive move, such as market and technological knowledge, have surprisingly received little attention. In this sense, an analytical review of literature suggests that strategic logic of a disruptive technology can be well presented through the lens of business model (BM) and its innovation. Accordingly, it is argued that business model represents a mental model which underlines activities such as acquisition of market and technological insights, opportunities and requisite actions required for transforming a disruptive idea into a disruptive market movement. This view offers new insights into the study of disruptive phenomenon. It addresses the managerial (i.e. mental model) underpinnings of disruptiveness, instead of market, economical and technological dimensions. Business model innovation (BMI) is a disruptive change in the core logic of value creation and capture. It is a value-revolutionizing framework which explicitly delineates the strategic processes of a disruptive strategy. Thus, it is essentially a paradigm for strategizing the craft of disruptive innovation (technology). Given this view, this chapter conceptually explicates this contour and shows how BMI effectuates a disruptive technological phenomenon by presenting four propositions. Finally theoretical and managerial implications of this view are illuminated in order to furthering the practice and enhancing future research in this growing field of inquiry.

Agile Service-Oriented E-Business in a Collaborative Networked Environment

The goal of this chapter is to explore potential IT support for collaborative networked organizations encompassing both the service and network orientations of e-business environments. First, it is argued that the main reason for collaboration among organizations is the need for a competitive advantage, leading to the concept of Collaborative Networked Organization (CNO) proposed as an appropriate organizational structure supporting the collaboration of organizations. Then, the concept of Service-Oriented Virtual Organization Breeding Environment (SOVOBE) is presented as a means to support CNO creation and operations, while emphasizing both the network and service orientation of SOVOBEs. Next, a feedback loop encompassing adaptation, business processes, monitoring, and networks is proposed as a means to provide SOVOBE members with support for agile collaboration within CNOs. Finally, implementation concerns are discussed, with an introduction of the ErGo system supporting organizations willing to cooperate in an agile service-oriented manner in collaborative networked environments.

Scams and the Australian E-Business Environment

This chapter highlights the risks and benefits of transacting business within a virtual environment. It becomes evident that e-business has changed the face of consumer/business interactions. Substantial competitive advantage can be gained by a business engaging in well-managed e-business transactions, while consumers can receive benefits such as cheaper prices, a wider range of products, and more convenient shopping via the internet. The chapter commences with a review of the current literature on scams and online fraud, including an introduction to the role that social networking sites can play in facilitating online scams. Statistics regarding e-business transactions for small and medium-sized Australian enterprises are presented followed by the exploration of two specific types of scams: overpayment scams and online shopping scams. Reported financial loss within Australia during 2010 as a result of these scams totalled AUS$29,710,420. The chapter concludes with the identification of some preventative measures to ensure the transactions occurring in any e-business environment are legitimate, followed by some directions for future research.

E-Tailing

E-tailing is gaining momentum in Australia as traditional retailers are moving towards the adoption of a clicks and bricks strategy. Electronic retailing or E-tailing can be described as selling goods to customers directly through electronic means. Although this Business-to-Consumer phenomenon is not new, it is helping retailers to conduct business online with virtual storefronts and to reach local and global customers who are disadvantaged by geographical and other distinct barriers. This chapter starts by detailing the current state of e-tailing with supporting statistical figures from recent research with a specific emphasis on Australia. Overall growth in Internet accessibility rates across Australia clearly demonstrate e-tailing’s importance to online customers. Literature review once again proves the fact that Internet not only creates opportunities for retailers but also poses many challenges. Further discussion provides an understanding of the suitability of the retailing channel for different products and services. This study then analyses the usability of Australia’s top twenty-five retailers’ websites focussing on website usability factors, such as navigation, searchability, purchasing, layout and clarity, information content, and web browser compatibility. Australia’s e-tailing initiatives might be lagging behind most developed markets, however recent research indicates that there is a significant growth in this online activity and it will continue to attract more and more online customers in the coming years as retailers jump on the e-tailing bandwagon.

E-Banking Operational Risk Management using Soft Computing Tools

Electronic banking (E-banking) systems provide a promising solution for breaking geographical, industrial, and regulatory barriers. Improved technology could help with creating anytime, anywhere services and new market opportunities, but does not necessarily ensure a risk-free transaction environment. A main aim for E-banking adopters is to include E-banking risk management to their overall risk management strategy. They must identify the tools and techniques available for managing such risk. In this chapter we provide an overview of E-banking and identify the various risks which exist within the system. The chapter focuses on analyzing state-of-the-art risk management tools and techniques, paying attention to models for internally managing E-banking operational risk. It discusses several soft computing techniques applied to E-banking operational risk as causal modeling tools. The tools include: Decision Trees, Artificial Neural Networks (ANN), Fuzzy Inference Systems, and Bayesian Networks. Some examples are presented to describe the models developed.

The Contradictions and Complementarities of Combining ERP Systems with Enterprise 2.0 Supported Informal Systems

The chapter discusses both the complementary factors and contradictions of adopting ERP based systems with enterprise 2.0. ERP is characterized as achieving efficient business performance by enabling a standardized business process design, but at a cost of flexibility in operations. It is claimed that enterprise 2.0 can support flexible business process management and so incorporate informal and less structured interactions. A traditional view however is that efficiency and flexibility objectives are incompatible as they are different business objectives which are pursued separately in different organizational environments. Thus an ERP system with a primary objective of improving efficiency and an enterprise 2.0 system with a primary aim of improving flexibility may represent a contradiction and lead to a high risk of failure if adopted simultaneously. This chapter will use case study analysis to investigate the use of a combination of ERP and enterprise 2.0 in a single enterprise with the aim of improving both efficiency and flexibility in operations. The chapter provides an in-depth analysis of the combination of ERP with enterprise 2.0 based on social-technical information systems management theory. The chapter also provides a summary of the benefits of the combination of ERP systems and enterprise 2.0 and how they could contribute to the development of a new generation of business management that combines both formal and informal mechanisms. For example, the multiple-sites or informal communities of an enterprise could collaborate efficiently with a common platform with a certain level of standardization but also have the flexibility in order to provide an agile reaction to internal and external events.