Mobile eCommerce - success means doing it right

The promise, hype and expectation of South African eCommerce fulfillment, fuelled by the realisation that online procurement and supply-chain management could potentially trim costs and improve customer relationships, even after 10 years has fallen short.

In 2007, World Wide Worx study of internet shopping, predicted a contribution of at least 20% to the holiday shopping spend and that the trend showed that consumers were beginning to gain confidence in online gift shopping specifically.

Two years later and South Africa has still not perfected the formula nor managed to successfully bring online purchases mainstream. Approximately only half of the current internet users shop online. It is still very much a developing market with statistics predicting that internet usage figures alone are set to grow by a further 13% during 2009, providing some hope that with it, so will online shopping. Although online browsing has increased significantly with consumer's easily performing product price comparisons, most purchases are still taking place offline.

Although it is still a developing market, this year it seems that a new trend is being adopted by internet commerce-potential institutions. It is as if South Africa decided to skip completing the eCommerce cycle and jump straight onto mCommerce. For the South and larger African market mobile commerce would be a step in a potentially lucrative direction as the mobile platform is the most accessible form of internet access on the continent.

But how successful can this channel be if we consider that we've hardly scratched the surface on eCommerce?

Obstacles faced in eCommerce

Up to 2003 the biggest obstacle to eCommerce was the lack of a robust online payment platform and costs involved to create bespoke commerce solutions put many companies off from investing in developing this on their websites. Six years later the complications have finally mostly been ironed out, but the hesitation to leverage these systems still remains.

Bandwidth was another technical barrier, which also mostly lead to shopping carts and payment systems that were in place to time-out, leaving would be purchasers with the fear that their credit card would be doubly charged.

From the design and usability side, commerce websites in South Africa are not up to the commonly accepted Western Standards. When a website is not user-friendly and simple to navigate, drop-off rates are high, which result in the site not generating enough revenue.

Some companies also encountered delivery issues, and with the era of instant gratification for those individuals that were already net savvy, waiting for up to six weeks versus immediate satisfaction of store purchase was no contest.

Although by no means the only obstacles, having learnt from these, how can we make both eCommerce and mCommerce a success, and can we do this jointly?

Development considerations for e+mCommerce

It is hugely important to ensure that a website is initially built correctly. Don't have an add-on wish list for later, unless you are 200% sure that all the ‘wish-list' components will work with the existing website functionality. For example some might develop commerce functionality, but consider mobile commerce functionality as an afterthought. Ideally if the site is created on a XHTML platform, it would not require a full redevelopment at a later stage and could save companies fortunes.

Consult with usability and conversion experts and conduct user-group testing on the platform to ensure that it can cater to both ‘newbies' and ‘techperts'.

Ensuring that your website has a robust and simple ‘shopping cart' will minimise the purchase drop-off rates. One does not need to invest in bespoke carts to achieve this. There are many “off-the-shelf” products that cater to this and won't break the bank. By using “off-the-shelf” products can save up to 35% on maintenance and license fees alone. Commerce software products that have proven functionality include Magento, OSCommerce and Zend Cart.

Achieving success through Mobile Commerce

Mobile Commerce,, or mCommerce, include applications and services that are accessible from internet-enabled mobile devices (cellphones).

Mobile is the most accessible form of internet access on the African continent, therefore products and services in theory have a much wider chance for adoption if they are accessible through this platform.

Achieving success in mCommerce as with eCommerce very much relies on a sound technical structure. Making your website mobile friendly does not necessarily mean that you need to build an entirely separate website primarily for mobile. It is of course ideal to own a .mobi in addition to the .com or .co.za domain extensions indicating that your website is focussed and viewable on a mobile device.

There are dedicated mobi search engines, which can be utilised from both the desktop as well as mobile device. As with websites ensuring the structure is accessible by these search engines will also ensure that you gain increased visibility. XHTML hierarchies have ensured that both desktop and mobile search engines are easily able to read the content and classify it. Also, the website should automatically be enabled to transform itself to the mobile screen if developed in this coding structure.

Understanding mobile devices and their capabilities to render this structure is of vital importance. Ensure that it is compatible with the most prevalent cellphones and that updates for new phones could easily be implemented.

As with most things online, the marketing would be the biggest factor in achieving success. Comprehensive campaigns including press articles, social media and search are the primary channels to use to increase adoption rate.

FormFunction Digital Consultants Pty Ltd is one of the leading digital exploration and implementation companies in South Africa and takes pride as a strategic consulting business first and foremost. Understanding and hands-on experience with various web and social application platforms, successful eCommerce websites deployment in technologies including Magento, OSCommerce and Zend, and experience as one of the first agencies to create an iPhone application make them a natural forerunner in the field of mobile commerce in South Africa.

To understand how your company could potentially benefit from creating an eCommerce or mCommerce presence, contact FormFunction to arrange an objective and informative consulting meeting.

Source: http://www.bizcommunity.com/Article/196/16/36419.html

Who will benefit from the ecommerce boom in China?

Implications

Chinese ecommerce grew over 120% last year, projected to grow very rapidly in the next 3-5 year. who will benefit from the ecommerce boom in China? Portals like sina/sohu? search engine like baidu? any other potential players in the market?

Analysis

Chinese ecommerce grew over 120% last year, projected to be in high growth for the next 3-5 years. Now large companies such as Mcdonald, KFC, Haier, Gome, Lancome are all going ecommerce, who will benefit from the ecommerce boom in China? consumers of course, some businesses as well.

Companies that are already in this industry will no doubt thrive on the growth. Alibaba, who is not only the largest B2B ecommerce platform in the world, but also owns the largest C2C website in China - Taobao.com, though Taobao is not very proftable due to the free listing strategy(beats ebay out of China this way), it does have dominant position and could quickly turn into a cash machine once good model is implemented. Its new ad system had a pretty good feedback. Other large ecommerce companies such as dangdang.com and 360buy.com will likely to be on a short list of future public companies.

Baidu, and other search engines will be the largest indirect benefitors. They has been largely replying on advertising dollar from traditional SMEs. It's all going to start to change once ecommerce takes off. Google has hugely benefited from ecommerce. Chinese search engines will probably do the same. However, a couple of minor drawbacks for baidu are its technology and some doubtful business practices. SEM for ecommerce is very much data-oriented. Baidu need to have better technology to support advanced bidding and optimization. Baidu is also notoriously known for its somewhat bad practices such as, dont allow tracking, high fraud clicking, blacklist etc. They have to change before its too late. the only good thing is that they do have a very strong position in the market, and consumers dont have any other good alternatives to go to. (well google.cn is good, but its so damn hard to spell for Chinese )

Portal and vertical media will benefit as well. A lot of ecommerce companies will have to rely on advertising on portal sites to build their brands. Verticals are very good places to advertise to their target audience. We have already seen that the search engine traffic is not enough for ecommerce businesses in China. therefore portals and verticals could become good complimentaries of traffic source for large ecommerce businesses.

Networks, mostly performance based will experience a large growth as well. Analaytics, SEM based companies, leads generation and web consulting companies will somewhat benefit from ecommerce boom as well.

In a way, the nature of ecommerce, will bring Chinese online advertising to a new level where data became much more important. In the past, this area is hugely underdeveloped.

Source: http://www.glgroup.com/

B2B marketplace tool targeted at SMEs

BANGALORE, INDIA: MyTradeBook.com has announced the launch of a free Web-based B2B marketplace tool that allows businesses to build networks, engage in interest groups, buy, sell and advertise products and services, recruit human resources and partner with organizations related to their business ecosystem.

The tool will be initially launched in India and United Kingdom followed by other English speaking countries.

Given the current economic scenario, this tool which is targeted at the small and medium enterprises (SME) segment offers Indian businesses a free online platform that helps create new markets and reach out to potential global customers.

Announcing the launch, Richard Tunstall, managing director, MyTradeBook.com said: "There are many SMBs that have products and services with global appeal, but are constrained with limited marketing budgets, which becomes even more pronounced in the current economic scenario. MyTradeBook.com is designed to cut through the clutter of the existing B2B marketplaces by offering users with effective ways to reach out, collaborate and showcase their products and services in a much more targeted fashion. What's more important is that they can do it for free."

Amalgamating the concepts of business networking and B2B marketplace, this unique tool allows users to join as well as create interest groups. This facilitates collaboration and discussion between users on their areas of interest opening up avenues for generation of new ideas and business leads.

Users can also advertise their products and services for free in the Trade Pages of the tool and these posted advertisements can be linked to various interest groups and can be viewed by other members offering users with an opportunity to target their ads at the most relevant people.

Apart from offering users with the ability to search Trade Page ads, crucially MyTradeBook.com, also allows users to share Trade Page posts with other social networking sites, creating viral marketing opportunities. Presents unique blend of B2B marketplace and social networking concepts.

Source: http://www.ciol.com/

Hydraulic distributors in Kolkata

The word ‘hydraulic’ refers to the exertion of liquid pressure on something to provide mechanical force. There are different types of heavy machines and tools where hydraulic pressure is used to provide them the power required to perform certain functions. It may sound very simple, but hydraulic pressure is capable of generating huge power which helps machineries perform heavy duties. Hydraulic machines and tools are very common in the mechanical industry and are largely used in construction works. Real estate developers are among the biggest takers of the hydraulic machines and tools because they work much faster than ordinary machineries and help constructors meet their deadline. These days, hydraulic machines and tools are of high demand all over the world and the distributors are earning heavily from their supply business.

Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal is among the most developed cities in India. In the recent times, the city has encouraged a number of real estate developers. Hundreds of real estate projects have come up in different corners of Kolkata and many more are under construction. Thanks to the continuous rise in the population in the city, the demand for house is at an all time high here, which has brought smiles on the faces of the developers. Just like all other places in the world, hydraulic machines are largely used in construction works in Kolkata. There are several hydraulic distributors in Kolkata who supply equipments to the developers on a huge scale.

Kolkata is a large city and hydraulic distributors have their shops in different parts. For a person who is not familiar with the streets and lanes of the city, finding out a hydraulic distributor’s shop is not very easy. Yellow pages do provide information on distributors of machines and tools but depending on such data is not a very smart thing to do as information on such books are not regularly updated. Internet is better.

You will find a number of B2B (Business-to-business) portals on the web that provide detailed information on all kinds of business-related topics. There are several Kolkata-based B2B portals from where you can get a clear overview of the city. Planned specially to cater to the needs of the business-class people, these portals are the best guides to the city. These B2B portals actually create a supply management chain for different entities of a business. They are a medium of communication between buyers and sellers, manufacturers and traders, dealers and wholesalers and of course between suppliers and consumers. As internet can be accessed at any time from any place, more people are opting for these B2B portals for their advantage. They are enlisting their names and profiles on these portals to make sure every time somebody search for people like them, they find their names on the lists.

If hydraulic distributors in Kolkata are what you are looking for just search for it on any city-based B2B portal and you will be provided with a list of names on your computer screen.

You will not only find their names and contact numbers but their full profile which will help you to take fast decision. Besides, you can make use of the interactive tools like live chat and free SMS to communicate directly with the distributors and get going with your business.

Source: http://www.bignews.biz/

Consumer M2M: The Approaching Mass Market-Beecham Research

The rapidly emerging M2M (machine-to-machine) market is already a $50bn business with strong growth prospects. Traditionally a B2B (Business-to-Business) solutions/services market, a new report by leading analyst firm and M2M specialist Beecham Research (www.beechamresearch.com) predicts the coming of age of a growing Consumer market for M2M products and services that will rapidly catch up to the traditional business. The report entitled "Consumer M2M: The Approaching Mass Market" forecasts over 100m consumer M2M products being shipped within the next 5 years - with most of them being connected to cellular mobile networks.

"A fundamental change in the M2M arena is now under way", explains Georg Steimel, lead author of the report. "Today the M2M market is dominated by individual business solutions serving the needs of individual users. In contrast, the developing consumer market requires integrated solutions that offer simplicity and one-stop-shop availability that is easily enabled. To get to this requires new and innovative business models".

According to Beecham Research, the M2M market is still small compared with the worldwide mobile handset business. Nevertheless, new network connections for mobile handsets are rapidly slowing in many markets - particularly in Europe and North America. On the other hand, those for M2M are speeding up. "Mobile Operators need this business", says Robin Duke-Woolley, Founder and CEO of Beecham Research.

Yet M2M is very different to the mobile handset business, even for consumer products. Although using less airtime, it offers low cost of sale and low churn together with stable revenues and margins. "M2M is all about creating new service opportunities, even when it comes to consumer products", continues Duke-Woolley. "What we are beginning to see is highly innovative, new ideas being translated into new product and service opportunities over the next few years that will change our lifestyles."

Further details and the report itself Consumer M2M: The Approaching Mass Market are available through Beecham Research's website, at www.beechamresearch.com/reports.aspx or by e-mail to info@beechamresearch.com.

About Beecham Research:

Beecham Research (www.beechamresearch.com) operates globally and is focused exclusively on the M2M market - Remote Device Management and Services, also known as "The Internet of Things". Headquartered in London, UK, the firm also has offices in Boston MA, Bonn Germany and Milan Italy. The firm offers standard reports as well as tailored research and business development services, with staff who have long experience of business management in high technology supply and service companies as well as in consulting and market analysis.

Source: http://www.americanchronicle.com/