E-Business Report: Analysis of E-Business Models and Web Design

This report provides a comprehensive overview of e-business, examining the environment in which it operates, including the types of business transactions, benefits, and barriers to online processes. It assesses security and legislative issues, explores communication modes, and delves into internet technologies and their impact on e-business success. The report analyzes various e-business models, evaluating their revenue-generating capabilities and reporting on future developments. It also covers key elements of good web design and the impact of a well-designed website, concluding with an assessment of website usability issues. The report utilizes ASOS.com as a case study to illustrate the concepts discussed.

E-Business

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
1.1 Describe the environment in which E-Business is conducted and types of business
transaction...................................................................................................................................1
1.2 Explain the benefits and barriers to businesses considering an online process....................2
1.3 Assess the security and legislative issues facing an online business organisation................3
1.4 State the modes of communication available to an E-Business and their applications.........4
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
2.1 Internet technologies and its value in making an E-business successful..............................4
2.2 Explain the main features of HTML. ...................................................................................5
2.3 Analyse the functions of client servers and browsers, and the role of the search engine.....7
2.4 Evaluate the use of intranets and extranets within business communication........................7
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................8
3.1 Explain various E-Business models that can be used to generate revenue for a business....8
3.2 Analyse each model in terms of its capacity to generate revenue.........................................9
3.3 Report on future developments in E-Business models.........................................................9
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................10
4.1 Explain the key elements of good web design structure.....................................................10
4.2 Describe the impact of a well designed website to an E-Business.....................................10
4.3 Report on the issues concerning website usability..............................................................10
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
E-business is the new way of providing the information and using communication
technology. It is digital platform for conducting business. Various strategics and methods are
used to produce and make it appealing to customers. It is the virtual company where
communication between the enterprise and its clients are made (Veit and et.al., 2014). The
purpose of the report is guide about the virtual marketplace and successful internet business. Its
advantages, disadvantages, legislations are website needs are evaluated. Further, current
requirement and future scope are mentioned in the report. For better understanding ASOS.com
firm has taken. It is online fashion destination which was founded in 2000 is among the UK's
leading online website. There are more than 800 brands which are sold by the firm all over the
world.
TASK 1
1.1 Describe the environment in which E-Business is conducted and types of business
transaction.
E-business way of performing the business operation through internet which consist of
four different system. They are system of communication, information, human activity and
transaction. The main environment on which it is based are intranet, extranet and internet.
Intranet is used by the company, extranet is used by suppliers and buyers and at last internet is
used for virtual markets. Internet is the main source for doing the e-business (Yee-Loong Chong,
and et.al., 2014). It can be defined as global interconnected system of computers networks which
has various types of information and communication features and to connect the worldwide it
uses internet protocols. Worldwide web (www) helps the uniform resource locators to identify
documents and web resources. It is linked by hypertext links. Intranet is private, restricted
network which is created by using the www software. When intranet is accessed by outside
authority, facilitating information exchange in businesses via internet. People get confuse over e-
business and e-commerce which is explained below:
E-business E-commerce
Business process are conducted. Commercial transaction are involved.
It is super-set of e-commerce (IWiengarten,
Bhakoo, and Gimenez, 2015).
It is sub-set of e-business.
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Information are exchanged. Mainly contains
details of purchasing and selling.
Transaction of purchasing and selling is there.
It contains the internal process. Mostly outward facing process.
Mostly it is in context with Business-to-
business transaction. For example, Dell.
It is Business-to-customer context. For
example, Amazon.com.
There are mainly four types of business transaction which are done in e-business. They
are explained below:
Business-to-business (B2B): Transaction which took place between the businesses. They
can be manufacturers, retailers or wholesalers. It is mostly conducted online and the supply chain
may include different transactions (Fielt, 2014).
Business-to-consumer (B2C): In such transaction model the product and services are
sold directly to customer. Such activities includes selling over internet and intermediary are not
required.
Consumer-to-Business (C2B): Here product of customers are sold to the companies.
Illustration of such unique business is affiliate program.
Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C): Using third party, electronically transaction are
facilitated between consumers. For example, online auction where deal is made by third party
and sale is posted by individual customers. Then buyers bids for purchasing the product.
The company ASOS uses the B2B and B2C services and complete process is completed
online through internet. They purchase product from the manufacturers, retailers and wholesalers
and sell them to customers. They sell the products through their websites and applications.
1.2 Explain the benefits and barriers to businesses considering an online process.
In the digital scenario, business must have an online presence as the number of
consumers are increasing. Customers are mostly using the technology as it is beneficial and cost-
effective to them. ASOS is also having many benefits through the web-presence. It is one of the
important way of potential marketing. It provides the accessibility of using the services virtually
24/7. Customers can spend hours in researching their products and services at any place and can
order online whenever they are interested of purchasing it (Barnes and Hunt, 2013). This way it
is feasible to customers and owners. Along with this, it helps to expand the business and brand
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image worldwide. The enterprise is exposed to millions of people globally in very short period of
time. More than 140000 people are joining the organisation every month. Further, the company
uses the customer-information which helps them to provide the products that can be more
preferred by customers. This makes strong networks among them. Other than this, it is more
cost-effective in terms of operations and maintenance of physical stores. Through the online-
process, the firm sells over 800 branded products to millions of customer every month.
However, there are barriers to online system which affects the establishment of business
in the firm. The most which affects is the legal issues. The firm have to abide by the laws of
every country where they are providing their services. Among this, taxation is one of the
important factors which needs to be considered. Further, some people lacks in the doing the
online shopping due to internet fraud, lack of trust (Bung, 2014). For the firm, it was very
difficult to manage and get copyright for their website ideas worldwide. Moreover, now there are
many online stores so competition level has also grown.
1.3 Assess the security and legislative issues facing an online business organisation.
For abolishing the above barriers, security and legislation are used.
Security issues: For every e-business there must be security of data of their customer private
details. It plays major role in establishment of better business. So security is required to protect
the data from an unknown users or access and malicious virus or malware. For the e-business
there are 5 main security issues they are validation, authorization, secrecy, integrity and non-
repudiation. There are three types of security threats which can be faced by the firm. They are
Denial of services (DOS), theft and fraud and unauthorized access. DOS has two types of attacks
spanning which is commercial mails send to an individual by the hackers and viruses are
programs which cause unwanted programs to perform (Camarinha-Matos, Afsarmanesh and
Rabelo, 2013). Fraud is done when private data is stolen and theft of hardware, illegal copying
and software. There are many types of security such as digital signature, certificate, firewalls,
anti-virus software which can help to prevent the data and privacy of the customers. However,
this requires customer support also as they need to protect their data from being hacking.
Legislative issues: Legislation is an important issues which are faced by the e-business firms.
There are different laws and policies which are made by the countries for the operation of e-
business. Moreover, legal validity is required for doing the electronic transaction. However,
there is also problem in the distribution of the products for example, selling alcohol is legal in
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many countries but they are banned in the Islamic countries. So it is firms responsibility to
protect their data. Staff training is also another issues which are faced by the e-business.
1.4 State the modes of communication available to an E-Business and their applications.
As technologies are getting evolved there are many changes which can be seen in the
communication level. These may include the use of mobile phones, applications devices, social
media, mails and SMS. Other than these also there are various ways by which e-merchants can
connect with their customers (Cherif and Grant, 2014). This can be also done through the FAQ
which are asked by the e-business sites from their customers.
Mostly to promote and communicate with their potential customers they contact using the
social media. They try to make their site look more attractive and influential for them so that they
can make great conversation. Perspective buyers may use mobile phones and emails for the
communication. Some of the businesses have the their own personal network which is used by
the employees to make the communication more easy and fast. Messengers applications and
software also helps those firms to provide quick reply to their customers. Some of the advance
technological companies may also use the voice and video calls for communication. Such things
helps to maintain the privacy and avoids the third party interaction. For interaction of more than
one people teleconferencing can done. Customer-follow up and Shopping carts are another ways
by which communication can be established.
TASK 2
2.1 Internet technologies and its value in making an E-business successful.
Information technologies (IT) is way by which large database or information are
transferred/transmitted or passed through different host and systems by using internet protocol.
Almost all the people access it and millions of firms uses it for transmitting the data. It is the way
to establish the communication which are required by many e-businesses (Grant and et.al.,
2014). In the given firm, it is particularly used for buying and selling process. Many firms have
established this concept. It is one of the cheapest and most affordable way of transmitting data.
E-business uses e-mails and PC's as their IT for searching. More the bigger firm larger will be
storage and data transfer rate. The details are transmitted through multiplexing and segmentation
process. There are various components required for it such as hardware, software, network
service providers and many more. The message is send through the TCP/IP model by using
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hypertext transfer protocol to transport layer. The data is send in the from of bits using Ethernet
media through the server of network interface card.
There are many ways by which IT has contributed to the e-business which are mentioned
as follow:
1. Increasing productivity, profitability and communication level (Winkler and et.al., 2015).
2. Establishing better relationship with the customer and clients.
3. It has reduced the production cost and data storage is easy to maintain.
4. Providing more flexibility and boosting the brand image of the company.
5. Increasing and promoting the international and domestic market shares.
6. Customer services and satisfaction level has increased as speed of the process has
increased.
7. This has also helped in promoting the business and providing better competition.
8. It promotes the sustainable developments of the company as it is cheap and more reliable
(Loukis and Charalabidis, 2013).
9. Further, standards, legality and visible reputation can be maintained through this.
2.2 Explain the main features of HTML.
As the growth of the E-business has taken, now every firm wants to have their own
online store which are unique and have special appearance to their customers. However, to
overview their sites they need to focus on the website developments. Hypertext markup language
is the language used by web-pages as the structural area of all websites. Further, images and
objects can be used in it. It is the basic framework of any web-pages which can be modified
through Javascript and cascading-style-sheets (Yee-Loong Chong and et.al., 2014). It contains
the links and hyperlinks in it. Whenever, the user clicks the hyperlinks another page opens.
Below are the tags and description which are used for the development of webpage.
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It is the basic diagram of the webpage written in HTML codes. Doctypre in this shows
the HTML version. Here text can be understood by the browsers. Reading HTML code are
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shown to browser by the next opening tag. Then it contains title part shown by head section,
location, body and many more. In the above code the text are mentioned in body tags. Now there
are many software packages used without HTML to build pages such as XML and XTML.
Extensible markup Language (XML) is a case sensitive, structure used for defining the markup
languages. Here tag can be defined by the users at the time of development. It is dynamic in
nature. XTML is higher version of it.
2.3 Analyse the functions of client servers and browsers, and the role of the search engine.
Different computer programs or system are connected through the browser and servers.
Here request is fulfilled by the server which are asked by the client (Lucia-Palacios and et.al.,
2014). Through this, computer system from different location can be interconnected or linked-
up. Further, e-business uses the client/server model for performing the transactions. For
illustration, any person can access their bank details from their personal PC's. There are two
model Two-tier and Three-tier architecture in it. The former one is client-server application
having direct communication and no intermediators. It has database and client-application.
program are saved using SQL-servers. However, 3-tier has 3-layers which are client which
design the form, business as an intermediate and way of processing faster and at-last data which
has information/database. It is more faster and has good performance. As there are billions of
websites so search-engine is made for searching database in network system. It is mostly used in
web-search by using www. It requires search-request and provides the results page. Its
architecture consist of searching-bots, indexer and search-engine. Interpretation is going line-
wise which helps browser to interpret HTML. Its main function is to collect the data, web-pages
from he servers and finally show to the clients (Zhang and et.al., 2014). The common search-
engine are google and Yahoo.
2.4 Evaluate the use of intranets and extranets within business communication.
The use of internet, intranet and extranet is shown:
Features Internet Intranet Extranet
Network Global Private Private but used by
public network
Authorization No required Regulated Regulated by many
organization.
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Content Accessible to everyone single member Organizational and
external members.
Connected devices Unlimited Limited Limited
Owner No Single firm There can be multiple
owners.
Information sharing Worldwide Within organisation External and internal
members.
Security Dependent on user Use of firewall Use of firewall.
Use in business
communication
Communication,
information retrieval,
marketing, networking
and sales are major
opportunities provided
by it. They can gain
information and sale
their product. It is used
for internal-
communication.
It servers firms digital-
communication needs.
It helps for accessing,
developing and storing
the data. Provided
efficiency and reduced
errors. Instant e-mails
and messengers are
best example of it.
Used for multiple-
connection. Firms use
it for joint-projects,
initiatives and details
sharing. Through this
customer and externals
can connect to the
company.
TASK 3
3.1 Explain various E-Business models that can be used to generate revenue for a business.
There are various models through which more revenue can be generated in the business.
They are required for the correct design rational and type of business which is being conducted
through the e-business (Malhotra, 2014). The prospectiveness and vital information are provided
through these models. There are various types of business models, some of them are illustrated
below:
Storefront Model: One of the common type of e-business models which is integration of
e-commerce, data-storage, security and transaction. This is what most people think about e-
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business. Features of goods and models helps are explored so that merchants can show it to
customers. For example: www.asos.com. The company ASOS is based on this model.
Auction Model: Here consumers can post any commodity for sell and other customer can
bid on those commodities. These are handle by third party (McElheran, 2015). Pictures and price
plays major role here. For example: www.ebay.com
Portal Model: The model is best used for surfing. It provides the ability to search and
identify the relevant information. There are some links which directly relates to e-business, or
merchants. Example: www.yahoo.com.
3.2 Analyse each model in terms of its capacity to generate revenue.
All the above e-business are different in functioning but they are responsible for
generating higher revenues. They are mostly based on B2C business-models.
Storefront Model: These are majorly used for the revenue generation and hence the
designing and appearance are specified. As mentioned it is used for doing business which consist
of many stages. The transaction are made and processed online through internet. Many firms
similar to ASOS sell different products online and earn huge revenue. Some of this websites may
also have high inflow (Popa, Soto-Acosta and Loukis, 2016). Through this many other offline
firms get inspired to do e-business. Due to this model ASOS has earned 900M as their sales.
Auction Model: As bidding is there so the revenue depends on the expensiveness of the
product. Here the rate the more will be bid and higher will be the revenue collection. Revenue is
collected through the transaction fees from every successful transaction. Other than this, listing
fees and subscription also add revenue. Using online advertisement more revenue can be
generated.
Portal Model: Mostly the revenue is generated through online-advertisement. Also,
promoting other sites helps them to earn more money. Subscription fees from some sites are
another way getting money.
3.3 Report on future developments in E-Business models.
It will be on pinnacle and will provide huge transformation level for the company.
Further, digital technologies and internet will help to increase the business. Mostly as the
business is based on customer-perception and use of internet and its devices. People are largely
using the electronic devices which can help to promote the business (Rashidirad, Soltani and
Salimian, 2014). It is key aspect for commercial and economical growth of ASOS to widespread
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in other countries. It has been considered as competitive strategies by many firms. Further, it has
more revenue collection methods than physical stores as well as more feasible to the owners.
TASK 4
4.1 Explain the key elements of good web design structure.
There are various elements which are required for better web-design structure such as
ease of navigation, attractive visual design, confidentiality, ease in payment, target audience and
content, metatags and many more. They help to improve the visual appearance and create
attention to the customers. These are all important elements which are required for earning high
revenue and getting popular.
In them Keywords search is an important part. This are search request made by the clients
which they are searching for (Sinkovics, Penz and Molina-Castillo, 2014). It is very necessary to
identify and search the accurate or resembling data/ phrases which customer is looking for.
Word-tracker or algorithm can be used to research the data more precisely and accurately. It will
boost website quality and performance.
There must be focus on the content and structure of data. They must be more appealing
and easily used by the users. Other than this, navigation structure and payment methods must be
more reliable. It helps to provide easiness to customers and provide right information at accurate
time.
4.2 Describe the impact of a well designed website to an E-Business.
E-business is customer-driven marketplace on internet world. Impression and appearance
plays key importance for the website development. Content, design, functioning and
performance of the website is more important. Well-designed web-site creates positive effect on
the customers (Veit and et.al., 2014). There are various elements used by the web-developers to
promote and increase traffic on their webpage. Providing the effective and reliable information to
the customer will increase their trust. Moreover, it will provide transparency and confidentiality
to the customer. They will have more clear ideas of presentation and ways to target audience.
A good design website will have more joining and keeping visitors. At the starting
customers are attracted through various ways like search-engine. It must be logically maintained
so that user have interest on using that websites.
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