Metabox Laptops: E-Commerce and Marketing Strategy Evaluation

This report evaluates the e-commerce and marketing strategies of Metabox Laptops, a leading laptop seller in Australia. It begins with an overview of Metabox, highlighting its business model, which is a direct-to-consumer (B2C) approach. The report analyzes the Metabox website, including its content, hardware infrastructure, software, security issues, and transaction/payment processes. Recommendations are provided for improving the website's security, payment options, and overall customer experience. The analysis covers the website's functionality, security measures, and payment methods, including credit card, debit card, and direct bank transfer. The report concludes with suggestions for enhancing Metabox's online presence and ensuring continued success in the competitive laptop market. Desklib provides access to this document and numerous other solved assignments.

Running head: E-COMMERCE AND MARKETING
E-Commerce and Marketing
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1E-COMMERCE AND MARKETING
Executive Summary:
The main aim of this report is evaluating the current business of the Metabox laptops. Metabox
laptops is one of the largest laptop seller in Australia. Currently, Metabox is operational through
their website where consumers can make purchases directly from the website. Here, in this report
overview of the Metabox has been discussed. This report also comprises the business model used
by the Metabox. Evaluation of the website used by Metabox has been also done in this report. In
the recommendation section of this report important recommendation has been provided
regarding improvements in the website.

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Table of Contents
A. Introduction:................................................................................................................................3
B. Organisation Overview:..............................................................................................................3
C. Business Model of Metabox:......................................................................................................4
D. Website:......................................................................................................................................5
I. Website Content:......................................................................................................................5
II. Hardware Infrastructure:.........................................................................................................6
III. Software:................................................................................................................................6
IV. Security Issues:......................................................................................................................7
V. Transaction/Payment Process:................................................................................................8
E. Recommendations:......................................................................................................................8
F. Conclusion:..................................................................................................................................9
H. References:................................................................................................................................10

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A. Introduction:
The e-commerce or the electronic commerce is one of the important trend nowadays. The
e-commerce is actually purchase and sales of goods using an electronic type of medium which
includes the internet (Laudon and Traver 2016). This is the basic functionality of an e-commerce,
while the advanced e-commerce is a having more advanced functionalities. More advanced e-
commerce have various of more features which includes funds and data transfer among two or
more parties. In a simple way it can be considered as the online shopping. E-commerce can
provide numerous of options to the customers for shopping while it can also save the precious
time of them (Chaffey, Hemphill and Edmundson-Bird 2015). Due to this advantages the e-
commerce services is having a positive implications over the current market situation.
Regarding this e-commerce website, in this report a global case study will be selected and
the operations of this e-commerce site will be evaluated in this report. In the operational section
of the website the overview of the organization will be evaluated and with that business model of
the organization will be evaluated. In the following section of this report the selected website
will be analysed and various section of this website will be discussed thoroughly. Some
important recommendation will be also shared in this report.
B. Organisation Overview:
In this aspect the selected organization is the “Metabox Laptops” which is one of the
famous laptop manufacturer in Australia. Currently, Metabox produces some of the high-end
laptops in the market and all of their products are very much famous in the current market. At
that time when Metabox was formed, their main aim was changing the current landscape of the
mobile computing (Metabox.com.au 2019). At that time the Australian market was dominated by

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some of the big brand but their offerings was quite low compared with the price. Metabox aimed
to change this market scenario by providing high end mobile technology with a very competitive
price tag. Currently, the Metabox is operational in the Australian market for more than 17 years
and is the largest high end laptop producers of Australia (Metabox.com.au 2019). Each and every
products of them is consisting the important core principles of their organization. Currently,
there are various of reasons due to which Metabox is very much successful in Australia. Here,
the most important reasons behind the success of Metabox is their industry leading support,
remarkable quality of the product and the most advanced technology around the world which
they includes in their laptops (Metabox.com.au 2019). In Australia the current customer base of
the Metabox laptops is very much strong due to the services and the quality of the products that
is offered by them. The business procedure of Metabox is also quite different from the traditional
type of laptop manufacturing organization. Metabox provides customization for each of the
laptops of them which is quite unique and for that their customer base is very much strong.
C. Business Model of Metabox:
Here the business model that is operated by the Metabox is the business to consumer
business model. Metabox currently sells their products through their website directly to the
consumers. Through this website the consumers can also modify the laptop of them which
satisfies most important business requirement of Metabox (Metabox.com.au 2019). This business
model of Metabox is currentlt based on transaction among organizations which sells any type of
services and products (Kim and Peterson 2017). In this business model individual consumers are
the end user of the products and there is no third party among them. For a B2C business model
the business must be having an online interaction medium through which they can directly reach
to the customers and Metabox is able to do that through their own website (Ong and The 2016).

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The key partners for the Metabox are the Nvidia Corporation and the Intel Corporation who
supplies the main hardware for their laptop manufacturing processes. With that there are other 3rd
party partners who supplies the storage and ram related solution for their laptops. Making
innovative and more powerful laptops is the key activity for the Metabox (Metabox.com.au
2019). Customer relationship of the Metabox is also very good due to their proper after sales
service. For Metabox their main revenue stream is their customers.
D. Website:
I. Website Content:
Here the main business website and the overall content of the website is quite attractive
in nature. All the information regarding how they function within the market is described in the
website. For the ease of the customer they have already provided support section through which
the customers are able to contact the support directly (Metabox.com.au 2019). Thus this website
is very much focused into giving proper service to their customers. All the logos and the contents
regarding the products are shared in the website in a proper manner. The images used in the
website are very much clear which is making this website very much attractive. For the social
media engagement with the Metabox direct link of their Facebook and Twitter account is given
in their website so that the users are able to engage with the social media activity of the Metabox
(Metabox.com.au 2019). Metabox sells various of laptop products through their websites and
here they have actually described each of their products in proper manner. All the specification
of these laptops are mentioned in the website so that customers can easily choose their required
laptop from a vast category. The contact information to them is also mentioned properly in the
website content.

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II. Hardware Infrastructure:
In this case, proper hardware infrastructure is really very much important for ensuring
that the business website of the Metabox is always up and there is no problem in the normal
function of the website. For the appropriate operation of the Metabox website it is very much
important that web server hardware platform functions in a suitable way (Kuleshov et al. 2016).
Here, the web server hardware platform is one of the most important hardware component for
their website. So, proper functionality of the web server hardware platform is very much
important in this case (Ramírez et al. 2016). With that there are also several of other hardware
infrastructure that is related with the website of the Metabox. These includes the proxy server,
load balancers, firewalls and encryption devices (Goodyear 2017). Proxy server is important for
establishing the connection between website resources and outside world. Load balancers are
important to split the whole work equally within the infrastructure. Firewall is implemented for
protection of the inner infrastructure. Encryption devices are important so that important and
confidential information can be moved throughout the website with proper security.
III. Software:
Like the hardware infrastructure, appropriate software infrastructure is also very much
crucial for proper functionality and further development of the Metabox’s website. Metabox
currently uses various of software technologies for making their website user friendly and quite
attractive in nature (Metabox.com.au 2019). The important software programs that has been used
in this for the website of Metabox are the content management system, text analytics, database
server, web analytics and application programming interface. These are the main software
applications which are being used by the Metabox for their website so that their website remain
functional. With that there are others of important software applications also that is used by the

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Metabox for their website. With the normal functions this website is also capable of handling
various of other complex operations including payment and services. For this type of advanced
operations some advanced software are also used by the Metabox (Metabox.com.au 2019). These
software includes transaction processing system, object oriented, database system,
communication system and application middleware. Database plays an important role to store all
kind of data for the website so that it can function in a normal way. The API or the application
program interface is important for the overall design of the website.
IV. Security Issues:
While the website of the Metabox is functional in internet there can be various of security
related issues with the website. If the security of the website is not maintained in a proper way
then it is very much natural that this type of security issues is going to be occurred. Also, apart
from the internal security issues the external type of attacks can be also there on the Metabox
website (Metabox.com.au 2019). All of these security related issues includes malware attacks,
DDoS attack, password related attack, interception of the data, authorization related issues,
exposure of the sensitive data from the organizational server and any type of unfiltered redirects
(Feghhi and Leith 2016). These type of security issues are very much common and can occur
regarding the security related issues of the website. In the current context the internal security of
the Metabox website is very much high. Thus, chances of occurring this type of security related
issues is quite minimal for Metabox website. Though the internal security is very much high,
hackers will try to perform attacks on the website. In this case the website must be suffering
DDoS attack, malware attack and authentication related attack. Current security of the Metabox
website is quite capable of handling this type of attacks.

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V. Transaction/Payment Process:
In this website of Metabox the consumers can pay online directly to the Metabox for their
products. The processes for the payments are quite simple in the website. Currently, the website
supports four type of payment methods. These payment methods are the credit card payment,
debit card payment, credit card EMI transaction payment and direct bank transfer method
(Metabox.com.au 2019). All of the payment methods are quite simple to execute for the
consumers. Though this type of payments method are supported by the website, one of the
famous payment method which is the PayPal method (Douglas 2017), is not currently supported
by this website. A digital invoice is generated by the website system which sent to the consumers
at the time of delivery. For the products there is currently no transaction costs or any type of
merchant fees but the customers need to pay an extra charges for the delivery fee. This delivery
fee depends on the region where the laptop need to be delivered. For the direct card payments,
the payment is processed by some third party organizations (Metabox.com.au 2019). Refunds is
also done by Metabox but it must satisfy refund policy criteria. Refunds will be given by
Metabox if the product is damaged or it is significantly different from the actual demonstrated
product. If the product got damaged due to user’s fault then no refunds will be made.
E. Recommendations:
From the above discussion it has been assessed that Metabox is currently performing
good in the market and all of their organizational operations are executing in a proper way. Still
some important recommendations can be provided to the Metabox for improving more which
are:
 To ensure proper security of the website security audit must be performed in a periodic
manner.

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 To increase the overall performance of the website Metabox can move to some more
reliable and fast web server.
 Metabox can implement PayPal payment method in their payment sections.
 Metabox can also include a video demonstration section where all the available products
offered by them will be demonstrated through a video.
F. Conclusion:
From the above discussion it can be concluded that Metabox is one of the largest laptop
seller in Australia and they are currently performing very well with their online website. In this
report the case study of the Metabox business has been evaluated briefly. In this aspect, first a
brief overview of the Metabox laptops has been shared in this report. In the following section of
this report, business model of the Metabox has been demonstrated in this report. Following that
evaluation of the website has been done within this report where various aspects of the website
has been discussed including content of the website, hardware and software infrastructure,
security related issues and transaction related process of the website. Some recommendation has
been also shared for the future improvements of Metabox website. In future Metabox needs to
improve their service standards to a whole new level so that they can hold their current market
position in the future also. More of that, Metabox can also implement a customer feedback
system in their website through which they will be able to collect valuable information from the
users and can make improvements according to the feedback of the customers.

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H. References:
Chaffey, D., Hemphill, T. and Edmundson-Bird, D., 2015. Digital business and e-commerce
management. Pearson UK.
Douglas, E., 2017. PayPal is New Money: Extending Secondary Copyright Liability Safe
Harbors to Online Payment Processors. Mich. Telecomm. & Tech. L. Rev., 24, p.45.
Feghhi, S. and Leith, D.J., 2016. A web traffic analysis attack using only timing
information. IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security, 11(8), pp.1747-1759.
Goodyear, M., 2017. Enterprise System Architectures: Building Client Server and Web Based
Systems. CRC press.
Kim, Y. and Peterson, R.A., 2017. A Meta-analysis of Online Trust Relationships in E-
commerce. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 38, pp.44-54.
Kuleshov, M.V., Jones, M.R., Rouillard, A.D., Fernandez, N.F., Duan, Q., Wang, Z., Koplev, S.,
Jenkins, S.L., Jagodnik, K.M., Lachmann, A. and McDermott, M.G., 2016. Enrichr: a
comprehensive gene set enrichment analysis web server 2016 update. Nucleic acids
research, 44(W1), pp.W90-W97.
Laudon, K.C. and Traver, C.G., 2016. E-commerce: business, technology, society.
Metabox.com.au., 2019. Metabox Laptops - Official Metabox Site Australia. [online] Available
at: https://www.metabox.com.au/
Ong, C.E. and Teh, D., 2016. Redress procedures expected by consumers during a business-to-
consumer e-commerce dispute. Electronic Commerce Research and Applications, 17, pp.150-
160.

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Ramírez, F., Ryan, D.P., Grüning, B., Bhardwaj, V., Kilpert, F., Richter, A.S., Heyne, S.,
Dündar, F. and Manke, T., 2016. deepTools2: a next generation web server for deep-sequencing
data analysis. Nucleic acids research, 44(W1), pp.W160-W165.