HI5013 Assignment 1: E-business and E-commerce Case Study Analysis

This report delves into the roles of e-business and e-commerce in the contemporary business landscape, emphasizing their transformative impact on global economies. It defines e-business as online commercial transactions and e-commerce as the process of buying and selling products through electronic means, highlighting their interchangeable yet distinct meanings. The report underscores how these trends have reshaped markets, reduced costs, and enhanced marketing efficiencies through IT skills and social media. The analysis includes a case study of Alibaba, illustrating how the company leveraged e-commerce to expand its market reach, predict consumer behavior, and provide personalized services. The report concludes by emphasizing the equal opportunities e-business and e-commerce provide to companies, breaking geographical barriers, increasing profitability, and improving payment processes, with references to support the arguments.

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Managing Across Borders 1
“What is your opinion of e-business and e-commerce and their roles in today’s world of
business? Analyse a case study to support your ideas”
Electronic business commonly known as e-business is a kind of business that initiates
commercial transactions across internet. In the e-business industry, the commerce activities
implemented online that means the products and services are sold by companies to customers
through online platform. Further, e-commerce refers to the process of buying and selling of
products by electronic means like mobile applications and internet. It should be noted that e-
commerce and e-business are new trends present in the environment that initiate sales through
online means. Introduction of this type of technology has provided help to people to purchase
products while sitting at their home. E-commerce has significantly changed the environment and
converted the physical market to online market (Huang, et. al., 2017).
Although both the terms e-business and e-commerce are used interchangeably but they have
different meaning in the industrial environment. E-business refers to the activity conducted by
business online by using internet and digital media technologies. E-commerce is a part of e-
business where goods and services are sold and received. This has initiated circulation of income
in the business environment. All companies have shifted their focus from brick and mortar to
online business to as to initiate sales through two ways. The e-business plays the key role in
shaping the global economy, as the learning, commerce, backing etc. industries have also shifted
towards electronic mode. Company in the global environment work to satisfy the customers
through the products and services that they offer, thus it can be said that e-business is also a
process that increases the satisfaction of customers due to which companies have started
adopting it (Choshin, and Ghaffari 2017).
E-business and e-commerce are trending in the environment because they have started to reduce
the fixed cost of the company and provide comparatively more market base to target. Companies
nowadays do not need to rent a flat or purchase furniture to initiate business activities in the
environment. The e-business activities make use of IT skills and techniques in the environment
that significantly make the people make use of technology as well. Social media tools and
platforms are used by the organization to promote the business function in the market and
advertisement of social media is comparatively feasible for a firm than an advertisement on
hoardings (Wang, Jia, Schoenherr, and Gong 2018). Companies like Walmart, Alibaba.com,

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JD.com etc. grew and increased productivity in the environment because of its presentation in the
e-business industry. These are few companies that have attained stupendous profitability in the
environment because of e-business in the market. This industry has helped the companies in
reducing the business cost as now the salesman do not need to several location to show the
sample of the products, the customers can look at the features of the product online and can place
order. Secondly, the role of e-business in the environment is that it has increased the efficiency
of the marketing activities. Earlier, the businesses did not made use of effective marketing
strategies to promote the business and attract the customer but e-business helped the companies
to develop search engines through which they can attract prospective customers looking for the
product in the market (Maxwell, and Khan 2018).
This activity has also provided a common platform for all the companies to initiate sales. Thus,
so small and medium companies can also attract the same customers in the market. Modern
technologies like smart data activities etc. help the companies in implementing repeated sales in
the market and increasing the brand value as well. This process helps the organization to target a
larger market segment without expending more in the market. The e-business and e-commerce
strategies increase the efficiency in the inventory control process in the environment. This
process helps the e-commerce companies to track their logistics online and provide them to right
customers on time. The e-business and e-commerce services in the environment help the
company to provide better level of satisfaction of the customers in the market. Through the e-
commerce website of the company, the customers can see the picture of the product; they can
identify the specifications of the products and how to use it (Giuffrida, et. al., 2017).
The website also provide feedback and refund services to customers if they do not like the
product or services. Taking an example of a case of Alibaba Company, it should be noted that
the company used online platform to increase their sales in the worldwide market. The company
was among the first few companies that used innovation and technology present in the
environment to build e-commerce industry. The company initially developed a platform so as to
connect with several manufacturers present in the market. The organization utilized the e-
commerce platform to contact with the business present in the worldwide market, even the
companies that were present beyond the geographical reach of the company. The company
welcomed these merchants to come and sell their products to the customers through their

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website. Resulting in which, the customers started to find all the products at one website due to
which they started initiating sales in the market (Wang, Cavusoglu, and Deng 2016).
Increased sales attracted more customers as well as manufacturers for the business, thus, in this
way, the company utilized the e-commerce platform to grow and increase its sales in the market.
Unlimited list of products attracted the customers and increased the profitability as well. The
company make use of real-time online data to predict the consumer wants so that they can target
customers on the basis of consumer purchase history. Thus, it should be noted that the company
utilized the information technology tools to attract customers and provide them personalized
services as well (Gregory, Ngo, and Karavdic 2017).
With the increasing traffic on social media website and online platform, the business also
emerged the need to present their activities on this platform. The role that e-business and e-
commerce plays in today’s environment is that it provides equal opportunity to all the companies
irrespective of their size or formation to grow and initiate sales in the environment. E-business
activities break the geographical barriers and let the companies target people present in different
parts of the world. The business is cost-efficient due to which it increases the profitability of the
companies as well. The e-commerce activity creates a link in the business world and let the
people enhance their buying behaviour as well (Tan, and Ludwig 2016).
The payment process also becomes efficient as authentic channels are used to pay and receive
income. All the monetary transaction are conducted online making all the transaction white.
Coupons and voucher discounts let the people purchase products at low rates and the customer
can return the product if they do not like it. The customer can perform all such functions while
sitting at their home (Laudon, and Traver 2016). Thus, in the limelight of above mentioned
events, the fact should be noted that the above mentioned paper evaluated details about the role
of e-business and e-commerce in modern world. The paper utilized the case study of the
company Alibaba to express the role and use of e-commerce and e-business to attain revenue and
grow in the market.

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References
Choshin, M. and Ghaffari, A., 2017. An investigation of the impact of effective factors on the
success of e-commerce in small-and medium-sized companies. Computers in Human
Behavior, 66, pp.67-74.
Giuffrida, M., Mangiaracina, R., Perego, A. and Tumino, A., 2017. Cross-border B2C e-
commerce to Greater China and the role of logistics: a literature review. International Journal of
Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, 47(9), pp.772-795.
Gregory, G.D., Ngo, L.V. and Karavdic, M., 2017. Developing e-commerce marketing
capabilities and efficiencies for enhanced performance in business-to-business export
ventures. Industrial Marketing Management.
Huang, Q., Chen, X., Ou, C.X., Davison, R.M. and Hua, Z., 2017. Understanding buyers' loyalty
to a C2C platform: the roles of social capital, satisfaction and perceived effectiveness of e‐
commerce institutional mechanisms. Information Systems Journal, 27(1), pp.91-119.
Laudon, K.C. and Traver, C.G., 2016. E-commerce: business, technology, society.
Maxwell, S. and Khan, A.M., 2018. ELECTRONIC CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP
MANAGEMENT (E-CRM): A STUDY OF ITS ROLE, INFLUENCE & BENEFITSTO E-
COMMERCE. Management Dynamics, 18(1).
Tan, J. and Ludwig, S., 2016. Regional adoption of business-to-business electronic commerce in
China: Role of e-readiness. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 20(3), pp.408-439.
Wang, S., Cavusoglu, H. and Deng, Z., 2016. Early mover advantage in e-commerce platforms
with low entry barriers: The role of customer relationship management capabilities. Information
& Management, 53(2), pp.197-206.
Wang, Y., Jia, F., Schoenherr, T. and Gong, Y., 2018. Supply Chain-Based Business Model
Innovation: The Case of a Cross-Border E-Commerce Company. Sustainability, 10(12), p.4362.