Basic Guide to E-Commerce (Doing Business Over the Internet/Web)
Written by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD, Authenticity Consulting,
LLC. Copyright 1997-2008.
Table of Contents
Basics of E-Commerce (including assessments to see if your business is ready)
One Basic Overview of E-Commerce
Overviews About Getting Started
Getting a Computer, Connecting to the Internet, and Developing a Web Page
Getting a Computer for Your Business
(learning about them, buying one, maintaining it, etc.)
Getting Connected to the Internet and
Web (learning about them, get an ISP, etc.)
Building, Promoting and Managing Your
Website
Computer and Network Security for Your Computer (including usage
policies, etc.)
Etiquette of Communicating Online
Understanding Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
Understanding Electronic Data Interchange
(EDI)
Buiding and Managing a Virtual Team
Product Development
What's Involved in Designing and Managing
a Product?
Product Creation and Development (ideas,
market research, competitive analysis, etc.)
Developing Your Online Store, Online Transactions, etc.
Store Basics
Processing Online Credit Card Transactions
With Customers
Whether
You Need a Shopping Cart Program (Outgrowing a Simple Order Form?)
Online Marketing, Advertising and Promotions, and Sales and Service
Online Marketing, Advertising and
Promotions, and Sales and Service
General Resources With More Help for You
Telecommunications
Laws
General Resources
Introduction and Basic Overview of E-Commerce
The Free Management Library will help you address the major considerations in setting up an e-commerce business. The considerations are as follows.
E-Commerce is Like Any Other Business, Except ...
Developing a business over the Internet requires many of the same major activities as starting any other business. You should do some basic business planning. After all, you need a product. You may need funding to get your business going. You need customers. You need to market products to your customers. You need strong customer service. You need to manage purchases by customers, finances, staff and other resources.
Not All Products Are Very Compatible to Sales Over the Internet
But there are some features unique to e-commerce. Not all products are real compatible to be sold over the Internet. For example, they may require a lot of face-to-face selling. They may cost a lot to ship (a primary practice in e-commerce is that customers buy products, and you ship the products to them). You need to make sure that, because your product may be advertised to the world, that you remain in control of your ideas, or "intellectual property".
You Need an Online "Store"
Basically, you need an "online store" to be an "e-tailer". (Don't fret. You may be able to outsource, or hire, a current store to work with you.) Your store will need a "merchant" account, or the ability to process your customers' credit card transactions over the Internet. This includes needing a "secure server", or that your online store be on a computer system that ensures that customers' credit card numbers cannot readily be read by people who are not supposed to read these numbers. You'll probably need some kind of online order form that customers can complete, in order to purchase your products. You may even want your the processing of customers' order to include processing the customers' credit card numbers right away while they're still online and connected to your Website.
Let's read on to understand the very basics of e-commerce.
Obviously, You Need a Website
You need to design and promote a Website. You'll need access to expertise that can regularly design and maintain this Website for you -- and it will require ongoing attention. Fortunately, there is a great deal of free information available to help you with this design and promotion.
Overviews About Getting Started (including assessments for your business)
Basics
7 Steps to E-Business Launch
CEO's
E-Biz Survival Kit (how CEO's can quickly come up to speed about
e-commerce)
Business
on the Net
Business
Growing on the Net
Growing
Your Business on the Net
Beginner's Guide to E-Commerce
Is E-Commerce Really Such a Breakthrough?
Myths
And Realities (suggests that starting e-commerce is not as easy
as it sounds)
Assessing if Your Business is Ready for E-Commerce
E-Commerce Readiness Assessment Tool
Getting Started
About.com "One-Stop Workbench"
Starting Out in E-Commerce (extensive, well organized set of useful
links)
Ecommerce
Guidebook
Some "Advanced" Topics
Legal Issues (mostly about trademark and copyright
issues, protecting yourself)
Getting A Computer System for Your Business
You'll need a computer system to manage information for your
business. The size of the system depends on how much you want
to do with it. However, today's desktop personal computers (especially
if they're configured as part of a client-server system) can handle
many of the demands of e-commerce. (Note that you may need a different
computer system to actually host your Website, conduct financial
transactions with customers, etc.)
Planning
and Buying a Small Computer System (including information for
nonprofits)
Software
for Small Computer Systems (including general and nonprofit-specific
information)
Learning
About Small Computer Systems
Basic,
Technical Support and Maintenance of Small Computer Systems
Computer
and Network Security
Getting Connected to the Internet
Internet
(including information for nonprofits)
Intranets
(Computer Networks Internal to the Organization)
Getting
Connected to the Internet
Building, Promoting and Managing Your Website
Building, Managing and Promoting Your Website (including for disabilities & various browsers)
Computer and Network Security
Computer
and Network Security (including worms, viruses, hoaxes and spam)
Polices
about Using Computers and Networks
Etiquette in Online Communications
Netiquette - Techniques and styles of writing e-mail messages
Understanding Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
EDI appears to be the current standard format used by businesses
to exchange documents between computers. The following links will
give you a basic understanding of EDI.
What
is EDI?
Developing and Managing a Virtual Team
If you are conducting business over the Internet, it's not
unlikely that you'll use the Internet for most, if not all, of
your communications with employees. You are also likely to use
the Internet to communicate with collaborating organizations,
suppliers, etc. You'll benefit from reading about virtual teams,
or groups of people working together primarily by using the Internet
for means of communications.
Virtual
Teams
What's Involved in Designing and Managing a Product?
It will benefit the reader to have some basic sense of what's
involved in developing and managing a product or service. Read
the section
Basic
Introduction to Product Management (read this section, not the
entire topic)
(Optional Reading)
It's common for businesses to develop a business plan whenever
they start a major new venture, for example, a new organization,
product line, etc. You might review the basics of business planning.
These basics will include information needed in the following
sections, including product creation, marketing, advertising and
promoting, and sales and service, as well. See
Business
Planning
Product Creation and Development
The Library topic Product
and Service Management provides a complete overview of how
to develop an idea into a product, how to build and regularly
produce that product and how to advertise, promote and sell the
product. See the following sections in that topic:
Product
Idea
(Are
You Planning a New Business Around Your New Idea?)
Product
Evaluation -- Can Your Idea Become a Viable Product or Service?
Product
Development -- Building Your Product or Service
Product
Production -- Ongoing Building of Products or Services
Online Stores -- Basics
Now you're read to begin selling your product over the Internet.
The following links will help you set up your "virtual store"
to begin transactions with customers.
How Does Store-Building Software Work? (very good
overview)
Creating
the Virtual Store: Taking your Website from Browsing to Buying
Making
People Want to Buy in Your Retail Webstore
(There will be more about online marketing, advertising and sales, later on below.)
Online Credit Card Processing
The ability to process credit card orders over the Internet
is a major convenience to customers -- if they believe their credit
card numbers will remain private to the transaction.
Why
You Need to Take Credit Cards on Your Website
Unraveling
the Mysteries of Merchant Credit Card Accounts for Web Commerce
How
to Decide Whether You Need Real-Time Credit Card Authorization
for Your Site
You can learn about these services just by looking at some
of the ads from businesses that offer merchant accounts.
Internet
Media Solutions
1-888-MerchantAccounts.com
Online Marketing, Advertising and Promotion, Sales and Service
There is a great deal of information in the library about marketing,
advertising and promoting, and sales and service. However, when
these activities are carried out over the Internet, they have
unique features.
Marketing
Advertising
and Promotion
Selling
Online
Customer
Service
Customer
Satisfaction
General Resources With More Information for You
There are an increasing number of online resources about e-commerce.
The following links will help to get you started in finding more
resources.
About.com's Electric Commerce Workbench (many,
well-organized links)
About.com "One-Stop Workbench"
IS
World Net's Electric Commerce Course Page (massive collection
of useful resources!)
Introductory and General E-Commerce Articles -
Electronic Commerce Research Room
Electronic Commerce
Resource Center
E-Commerce Dictionary
Capterra's
listing of ecommerce software
For the Category of E-commerce:
Related Library Topics
Recommended Books
General Information
The following books are recommended because of their highly practical nature and often because they include a wide range of information about this Library topic. To get more information about each book, just hover your cursor over the image of the book. A "bubble" of information will be displayed. You can click on the title of the book in that bubble to get more information, too.
Also See
Information Technology -- Recommended Books
