E-BUSINESS MARKETING CONCEPTS:

Ecommerce is one of the most competitive industries on the Internet. No matter what
you’re selling, there’s bound to be at least one other company selling the same products
— or at least products that do the same thing.

That means it comes down to marketing to see if you can get more customers than your
competitors.

But how do you market an ecommerce company? What specific strategies can help you
achieve success?

1. Personalization

Personalization is the process of tracking what your site visitors look at on (and off) your
site, so you can get a better understanding of their preferences.

Then, once you know their preferences, you can use cookies to each customer an
experience on your site that was designed specifically for them.

Personalized website content helps you build relationships with your site’s repeat visitors
by showing them the perfect message at the perfect time.

2. Product recommendations

Product recommendations show your potential customers that you pay attention to their
wants and needs. It also allows them to get a bigger picture of your inventory and — as
we mentioned above — move more products.

You can use product recommendations in a number of ways.

First, you can add your own company recommendations. These would most often be
products that are similar to something a customer has already bought.
Second, you can highlight user recommendations. These can be items like wish-lists that
your customers share with one another. This also requires your site to have the
functionality to allow users to share items internally, but it can pay dividends.

After all, word of mouth is the most trusted form of advertising.

Third, you can use recommended products to show customers products that
complement what they’re currently buying. So if someone’s buying a garden hose from
your housewares store, you should also show them different hose heads or wall spigots,
so they’re buying a group of products that work together.

3. Cart reminders

One of the most frustrating parts of running an ecommerce store is customers who leave
your website when they have products in their carts.

That’s why you need to use cart reminders.

Cart reminders are emails that automatically generate and send whenever someone has
a cart of products and leaves your site. The emails can send out a day after the
customer leaves, or sometimes as long as a week or month later.

Regardless, the point is always the same — to get that customer back to your site and
have them finish their transaction.

4. Product social sharing

Social media marketing is a critical part of any Internet marketing plan.

But it’s exceptionally important for ecommerce companies.

For every product on your site, you have an opportunity to cause an impact on social
media. Someone shopping for your items might find something their friend would like, so
it’s important that you let them tweet, post, or share about what you have.
Then, the friends of the person who shared your product will see what they posted. That
lets them click to your site — at their friend’s recommendation — and possibly become a
new customer.

5. Product reviews

Did you know that up to 70% of customers check out ratings and reviews before making
a purchase? And 63% of customers are more likely to purchase if a site displays product
ratings and reviews.

Adding reviews to your ecommerce website provides value to customers and

encourages them to buy from your site. Online reviews provide the social proof shoppers
are looking for, and they can help your ecommerce store establish trust and credibility
with customers.

6. Email campaigns

Email marketing accounts for over 7% of all ecommerce transactions, so incorporating a

strong email strategy can help your ecommerce store attract more customers and earn
more revenue.

In addition to sending abandoned cart emails, you can use email marketing to send
personalized updates to customers and potential customers. For example, you can send
personalized emails on customers’ birthdays or other important milestones. Studies
show that personalized birthday emails have almost five-times the transaction rate of
standard emails.

7. Responsive design

Responsive design automatically adjusts your website to fit the device that a person is
using. So if someone’s on your site with their phone and their laptop at the same time,
they can still see and read your site perfectly.
That’s essential to ecommerce because if your site isn’t responsive, you’ll lose mobile
customers left and right. Mobile customers are becoming more and more common as
well — they make up nearly half the market of ecommerce shoppers.

What is Online Retailing

1.A process that allows the customers to search, select and purchase the products,
services and information remotely over the Internet. Learn more in: The Functionality of
Online Shopping Site within the Customer Service Life Cycle: A Literature Review

2.Retailers sell goods online. Learn more in: Price Dispersion on the Internet: A Further
Review and Discussion

3.The sale of goods and services over the internet is known as online retailing.
Business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) sales of items and
services are examples of e-tailing. Learn more in: Determinants of Women's Online
Buying Behavior: An Extension of the TAM Model

4.A type of electronic commerce whereby consumers buy goods or services directly
from a seller through the Internet using a web browser. Learn more in: Modelling
Website Stickiness at Initial Encounters
What is Marketing Concept?
Marketing concept is a set of strategies that the firms adopt where they analyse the
needs of their customers and implement strategies to fulfil those needs which will result
in an increase in sales, profit maximisation and also beat the existing competition.
The marketing concept has been widely used by companies all over the world in the
present age, but the situation was not the same earlier. As per this concept, it is said
that for an organisation to satisfy the objectives of the organisation, the needs and
wants of the customer should be satisfied. This theory was first mentioned in Adam
Smith’s book “The Wealth of Nations” in 1776 but came into widespread use only 200
years later.
Therefore, marketing can be said as a process of acquiring customers and maintaining
relations with them and at the same time matching needs and wants with the services or
product offered by the organisation, which ensures that the organisation will become
profitable.

Types of Marketing Concept

Five types of marketing concepts are as follows:
1. Production Concept
2. Product Concept
3. Selling concept
4. Marketing concept
5. Societal marketing concept

Production Concept
This concept was based on the assumption that customers are primarily interested in
products which are accessible and affordable. This concept was introduced at a time
when business was focused mainly on production. It says that a business will be able to
lower costs by producing more quantity or mass production of goods.
Solely focusing on producing goods may lead to the firm deviating from its objective.

Product Concept
The product concept is based on the assumption that customers will be more inclined
towards products that are offering more quality, innovative features and top-level
performance.
In this type of marketing concept, a business focuses on creating high-quality products
and refining it every time in order to develop a better and improved product.

Selling Concept
While the previous two concepts focused on production, the selling concept is focused
on selling. It believes that customers will be buying products only when the product is
aggressively marketed by the company. It does not focus on building relationships with
customers, and ensuring customer satisfaction is also not deemed necessary.

Marketing Concept
A marketing concept places the centre of focus on the customer. All the activities that
are undertaken by an organisation are done keeping the customer in mind. The
organisations are more concerned about creating value propositions for the customers,
which will differentiate them from the competition.

Societal Marketing Concept

This is the fifth and most advanced form of the marketing concept. Here the focus is on
needs and wants of the customer as well as ensuring the safety of the customer and
society first. It believes in giving back to society and making the world a better place for
all human beings.

What is Internet marketing?

Internet marketing, also called digital marketing or online marketing,
involves promoting a brand and its products or services to online
audiences using the Internet and digital media.

With Internet marketing, you use a combination of online strategies to

help you build better relationships with your audience and attract more
interested leads.

7 Internet marketing examples

Internet marketing uses several techniques and strategies to drive online
traffic, leads, and sales. Online marketing involves using these major
strategies:

1. Search engine optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing your

website to rank higher in search results. This strategy helps you appear
in more relevant search results, so you can drive more qualified traffic to
your site.
 Much of SEO involves increasing your rank in search by using
techniques to:

 Research and incorporate search terms (keywords) that your

target audience uses into your content
 Generate high-quality content that provides your audience with
relevant answers to the questions they make
 Improve user experience by improving web design
 Earn backlinks from authoritative sources in your industry to
gain online reputation
2. Content marketing

Content marketing strategy focuses on sharing valuable, industry-

relevant information with your audience. With quality, relevant content,
you can build up an attentive audience and get them to check out your
business.

Content comes in numerous forms including:

 Blog posts
 Infographics
 Videos
 Ebooks
 Podcasts
 And more
The important thing to remember with your content marketing strategy is
to create content often. Content marketing is all about consistency. The
more that you post online, the more people that your content marketing
will reach.

For your content marketing to produce the best results, your content
needs to be high-quality, which means your content:

3. Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising

 Online paid advertising generally involves paid search ads and display
ads. Most online paid advertising functions on a pay-per-click basis,
where businesses pay for the ad only when users click.

Much of the benefit of online ads comes from the fact that most online
ads are less intrusive than their traditional ad counterparts like billboards
or cold calling.

Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is one of the best Internet marketing

strategies to drive traffic to your site quickly at a low cost. With PPC
advertising, you can easily appear high in search results, and the return
is high since you only pay when someone clicks on your ad.

4. Social media advertising

Social media advertising is also another cost-effective Internet marketing

strategy to start generating an online presence.

If you want to use social media advertising, you’ll need to choose which
platforms you want to use to reach your audience. Popular social media
advertising platforms include:

 Facebook
 Instagram
 Twitter
 Pinterest
 LinkedIn
 YouTube
Social media platforms gather a plethora of information on users that you
can use to target your ideal audiences — the ones that are most
interested in what you have to offer.
 Pulling in these audiences with a wide variety of engaging social media
ad types will boost your traffic and engagement, as well as your sales
and conversions.

5. Social media marketing

Social media networks provide a great opportunity to market online

because of how easy it is to use the networks to share information. That’s
why social media marketing is a great option for your business.

With social media, you can:

 Increase brand awareness: Social media lets you have a

larger online presence. You can build up your brand identity and
show up as a relevant interest for your audiences. When your
audience sees your presence on social media, they’ll get more
familiar with your brand.
 Interact with audience members: Social media provides
useful platforms for interacting with your audience one-on-one.
Whenever your audience has questions, concerns, or thoughts
they want to share, you can be there to provide quality
interaction right when they do. Your engagement with your
audience on social media can help set you apart from your
competition and show that you care for your audience.
 Build your brand voice: Social media is one of the best places
to show off what makes you unique. You can showcase how
your quality products and services improve your audience’s life.
You can also show off the relevant content that you produce.
Social media provides an essential means of engaging with your
customers, building your brand voice and identity, and providing people
with great customer service.

6. Email marketing

Email marketing enables you to connect one-on-one with leads

interested in your products or services.

There are several different types of emails you can send, but some of the
most popular ones are:

 Newsletters
 Customer service
 Follow up
 Loyalty/rewards
 Recommendations
 Promotions
You can also take advantage of the advanced targeting and
personalization options that come with email Internet marketing
strategies. With emails, you want to hit users with reminders and deals
when they’re most likely ready to convert.

Use email personalization to send emails to your audience when:

 You publish new content they might like: You can show off
your new content and get your audience to interact with your
brand. Show that you have something in common with them.
 They look at your products and services: You can send
promotions on those products or services, or recommend similar
ones they might be interested in.
 They abandon a cart of products: You can remind them of
items in their cart to increase the chance that they’ll make a
purchase.
 It’s their birthday or another special event: Discounts and
coupons sent on these days work great for getting your
audience to convert.

With Internet marketing, you can connect with customers using their
preferred communication channels. The Internet also allows you to build
strong and long-lasting relationships with your customer base.

Internet marketing is important because:

 It drives a better return on investment (ROI): Internet

marketing strategies are more cost-effective than traditional
marketing strategies. These strategies have a better ROI
because you target more interested leads, making them more
likely to convert.
 It allows you to reach more interested audiences: Online
marketing enables you to reach audiences interested in your
products or services. Using Internet marketing, you can reach
 these audiences interested in your business, whether they’re
local or international.
 It allows you to interact with audiences regardless of the
time: With automation and other techniques available with
Internet marketing, you can stay in contact with your audience
24/7, so you can be there right when they’re ready to convert,
no matter the time, no matter the time zone.
 It can be tailored to any industry and any size
business: No matter what industry or size your business is,
Internet marketing can adjust perfectly to provide the results
you want because your audience is guaranteed to be online.
 It provides easy and convenient ways for audiences to
convert: The Internet makes it easy for your audience to
convert. All it takes is the push of a button to buy, sign-up,
download, or contact.


4 steps to developing an Internet

marketing strategy
Internet marketing allows you to communicate your brand’s message to
your audience, so when building your Internet marketing strategy, it’s
essential to keep your audience and brand in mind.

Use these four steps to help you build your Internet marketing strategy:

1. Identify your Internet marketing goals

The best Internet marketing plan is built around and continuously works
towards a set goal. Without something to work towards, your Internet
marketing strategies will fail to produce the results you want.

When building an Internet marketing strategy, identify what you want to

achieve with your online marketing. Possible goals you could choose
from are:
 2. Define your audience
To create a proper Internet marketing strategy, you need to identify your
audience first. You want to identify who is interested in your products or
services.

Take a look at your typical customer. What attributes define them?

3. Identify the strategies you want to use in your

Internet marketing campaign
After you have identified your Internet marketing goal as well as your
audience, the next step is to determine which Internet marketing
strategies would work best for your business.

You’ll want to use strategies that enable you to reach your target
audience. Where is your audience likely to engage with your business?
You’ll want to consider what keywords they’re searching or what social
platforms they use.

It’s also important to consider your budget, too. You want to ensure
you’re investing in strategies that fit within your budget, so you don’t
overspend.

4. Monitor your strategies

For Internet marketing strategies to drive the best results, you need to
analyze the data from your campaigns.

Online data tracking tools such as Google Analytics can help you keep
track of data from your Internet marketing strategy in real-time. This
platform is great for SEO and PPC strategies. You can track:

 How many people visit your site

 How long they stay on your pages
 How many people click your ad
 How many conversions you receive
 And more
The metrics these tools pull in will help you determine how well your
Internet marketing strategy performs.

This data will help you optimize your Internet marketing strategy. By
monitoring your campaigns’ performance, you can see what’s working
and not working for your business. As a result, you can optimize your
tactics to drive better results for your business.

The Retail Sector

Retail refers to the activity of selling goods or services directly to consumers or end-
users.Some retailers may sell to business customers, and such sales are termed non-
retail activity. In some jurisdictions or regions, legal definitions of retail specify that at
least 80 percent of sales activity must be to end-users.
Retailing often occurs in retail stores or service establishments, but may also occur
through direct selling such as through vending machines, door-to-door sales or
electronic channels.
Although the idea of retail is often associated with the purchase of goods, the term may
be applied to service providers that sell to consumers.
Retail service providers include retail banking, tourism, insurance, private healthcare,
private education, private security firms, legal firms, publishers, public transport, and
others.
For example, a tourism provider might have a retail division that books travel and
accommodation for consumers plus a wholesale division that purchases blocks of
accommodation, hospitality, transport, and sightseeing which are subsequently
packaged into a holiday tour for sale to retail travel agents.
Some retailers badge their stores as "wholesale outlets" offering "wholesale prices."
While this practice may encourage consumers to imagine that they have access to
lower prices, while being prepared to trade-off reduced prices for cramped in-store
environments, in a strictly legal sense, a store that sells the majority of its merchandise
direct to consumers, is defined as a retailer rather than a wholesaler.

Analyzing the viability of online firms:

Explain the key strategic factors to analyze the economic viability of an online
firm.
A strategic analysis of the economic viability of an online firm focuses on the industry and the
company as a whole.
Key industry strategic factors:
• Barriers to entry – Can you prevent new investors from entering an industry with a high cost
of capital?
• Power of suppliers – Can suppliers charge higher prices for the industry or can they
effectively negotiate lower prices? Do companies get enough coverage to negotiate lower prices
with suppliers?
• Power of customers – Can consumers choose from many competing suppliers and challenge
higher prices and higher margins?
• Existence of substitute products – Can the goods or service role be attained during substitute
guides or opposing products in diverse industries?
• Industry value chain – Does the industry's production and distribution chain change the
company's profit or loss?
• Nature of intra-industry competition – Is the source of competition in the industry stands on
diverse goods and services, cost, range of offers, or concentration of offers? How is the
personality of competition varying?
The key strategic factors to analyze the economic viability of an online firm include:
1. Firm’s Value Chain. It should be evaluated to determine if the company has adopted business
systems that allow it to operate with maximum efficiency and if there are technical changes that
force the company to change its operations or methods.
2. Core Competencies. These refer to unique skills that a firm has that cannot be easily
duplicated. When analyzing a firm's financial viability, it is important to consider whether
technological changes can invalidate these institutions.
3. Synergies. Refers to the availability of the assets and capabilities of the relevant company or
its strategic partnership.
4. Firm’s current technology. It has proprietary strategies that balance on demand and must be
estimated to decide if customer relationships, sourcing, supply chain management, and human
resource systems are growing.
5. The social and legal challenges. The business must consider consumer trust issues, such as
privacy and protection of personal information, and determine whether the business is subject to
legal challenges.
What Is Electronic Retailing (E-tailing)?
Electronic retailing (E-tailing) is the sale of goods and services through the internet.
E-tailing can include business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C)
sales of products and services.

E-tailing requires companies to tailor their business models to capture internet

sales, which can include building out distribution channels such as warehouses,
internet webpages, and product shipping centers.

Notably, strong distribution channels are critical to electronic retailing as these are
the avenues that move the product to the customer.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

 Electronic retailing is the sale of goods and services through the internet.
 E-tailing can include business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer
(B2C) sales of products and services.
 Amazon.com (AMZN) is by far the largest online retailer providing consumer
products and subscriptions through its website.
 Many traditional brick-and-mortar stores are investing in e-tailing through
their websites.