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What can a small business do to get started in electronic commerce without a lot of money to invest?
eProfits Made Simple believes as the Internet and digital economy continue to shift, vendors and service providers will continually try to find unique ways to provide low-cost services to small businesses. One quick example is the numerous websites offering free development and hosting.
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eProfits Made Simple for example, the sites offer a web development application in a "wysiwyg" (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) style that allows each person the ability to create their own type of website. Other options include participation in an online marketplace. These mechanisms are roughly designed to simulate a real marketplace that will attract customers due to a shop-at-once mentality instead of surfing the Internet for different goods and services. A fast developing theme among new and old participants in the digital economy is the use of ASPs (application service providers). These service providers allow you to purchase many of the off-the-shelf operating applications that you may use to run your business (finances to human resource management to inventory processing) at a much lower cost as well as have someone else manage and host the data. It also reduces the time and labor force necessary to run such types of operations. A final recommendation is the notion of partnering. Finding similar organizations that can share resources and expenses can help you achieve your goals in the digital economy. The key role of the digital economy and electronic commerce is to help streamline your traditional organizational processes and daily routines and automate them through the Internet. Sharing the burden of making that happen can help minimize the expense and difficulty and stimulate a potential relationship for furthering business behavior.
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What is Electronic Commerce (the ‘EC’ part of EC/EDI)?
eProfits Made Simple Electronic Commerce (EC) is the paperless exchange of business information using Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and related technologies. |
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You are probably familiar with Electronic Mail (E-Mail), computer bulletin boards, facsimile machines (faxes), Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), and the like. These are all forms of EC. All EC systems replace all or key parts of paper-based workflow with faster, cheaper, more efficient, and more reliable communications between machines. In today's Defense Department procurement arena, however the most important EC technology to know about is Electronic Data Interchange, or EDI.
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When did the age of electronic commerce begin?
eProfits Made Simple Business-centered electronic commerce began more than two decades ago with the introduction of electronic data interchange (EDI) between firms (sending and receiving order, delivery and payment information, etc.) Even consumer-oriented electronic commerce has a rather long history: each time you use automatic teller machines or present your credit cards, you transact business electronically. These EDI and ATM, however, operate in a closed system; they are of a more convenient communications medium, strictly between the parties allowed in. The World Wide Web (WWW), the Internet's client-server, opened up a new age by combining the open Internet and the easy user interface. WWW was created at the CERN Lab for Particle Physics in Geneva in 1991 (with its Mosaic, the predecessor of Netscape). It took two years for Mosaic to penetrate the Internet, and another two years before businesses and the general public took notice of its potential.
Is EC here to stay? Will it be here but gone tomorrow?
EC and the Internet, are not fads because of their widespread effects. Some may find it useless to open a web store, but web stores do not make electronic commerce or the digital economy. There will be new types of interfaces (browsers and protocols) and new (privatized) networks, but what the WWW represents is our march toward the digital economy and knowledge-based society. Technologies, the Web and other processes are but a means of achieving that goal.
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Will EC be limited because not many people can afford PCs and/or access to the Internet?
eProfits Made Simple Today's EC processes are based on personal computers because of their origin within the Internet, a network of computers. First stage of EC expansion is that within the installed base of computer users (more connected users). The second wave will come when more people get access to computers (via lowered computer prices or cheaper devices). The third and more important, expansion is predicted to be from those with non-computer access to the global network: through broadcast TVs, cable TVs, telephone networks and new appliances. A widespread use of these cheaper access media represents the phase of bringing workplace computers into the living room. However, the affordability of these devices, the easiness of use or the mode we access the network is less of an issue than how we will use these devices. Turning the computer into a convenient device like a TV is a goal in itself. For example, the speech-to-text technology will eventually make manual inputting unnecessary. In terms of productivity, it is hard to convince that computer hardware and software have met our expectation for making our work and life easier or more productive during the last decade. But what will we do with new gadgets when we get them? Delivering the same information but more conveniently? Selling the same entertainment and TV programs but with more pizzazz? The limiting factor will be our limited vision about the electronic future. |
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New Web Site -
eProfits web site uses our MyItsEasy Builder with a custom design. |
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Training Videos for Builder - |
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Training videos will soon be available for MyItsEasy assisting you in creating your web site. |
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