Strategic & Tactical Tools for Ebusiness

1. Employee empowerment and Engagement

• Mobile point of sale (POS) transactions – Salespeople -> problem solvers

• These technological improvements causes a paradigm shift, salespeople with a POS transaction device can be kept accessible to become part of the problem solving human resources. The store is not only a marketing channel, but also a point to solve problems

2. Omni channel marketing

Deliver seamless shopping experience to customers across all channels by synchronizing technologies, services and processes in a centralized and interoperable way

Solutions:

• Marketing can happen with seamlessly integrated channels
• Cross-channel inventory visibility
• In-store pickup 

Challenges:

• Siloed technology
• Inventory intelligence
• Fragmented fulfillment
• Customer identification
• lot of organisational work to achieve omni-channel strategy

3. Customer analytics

• Consumer in-store location through beacons that direct customers to aisle

Location-based marketing targets marketing messages to users based on their location.

Two general techniques to local marketing

• Geo-aware techniques identify the location of a user’s device and then target marketing to the device, recommending actions within reach
  • may target smartphones within several square city blocks to alert them to available offers from participating merchants
• Proximity marketing identifies a perimeter around a physical location, and then target ads to users within that perimeter, recommending actions possible within the fenced-in area.
  • For instance if users walk into perimeter of a store, they receive ads

Tools

• iBeacons - are in-store devices that send messages to customers nearby
  • Uses Bluetooth Low Energy to connect to devices
  • Special offers can be sent, general areas can be marked with different areas, and get help if stuck in a section too long
  • Beacons can stimulate loyalty programs by being noticed when walking into stores
  • Beacons can give sudden sales or discounts
  • Can also silently gather data on points in store where people buy most or get stuck
  • Downside: only 20% of users have bluetooth on
    • Privacy concerns
    • Pushing notices in store ca make people stop using app
      • If more than 1 message sent in store, 300% less usage noticed

• Facebook PlaceTips - Facebook messaging to news feed about offers nearby
• NFC technology - Scanning of location based bar codes to get more info on products

1. the client side, within the customers hardware and software
2. at the server side, within the merchants information systems
3. within the communications pipeline, that is the various internet communications channels enabling the transaction to take place and be fulfilled

For example at the client side web beacons or malicious spyware might be installed on the consumer's computer and this might be used to obtain credit card information through recording the user's keystrokes.

On the merchant server side the database of customer details (including credit cards) might be hacked - this is known as a customer list hack this might be done through an SQL injection where SQL database statements are inserted into a database entry field for execution resulting in the contents of the database being dumped to the attacker.

Throughout the communications process the internet communications channels might be monitored

Major technical security attacks:

• Malware: code that has gotten into our device without our knowledge that is hurting it
• Unauthorized access: someone taking the customer data, for example
• Denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks: hurtful events that can stop the service
  • Involves the hijacking fo several computers in a botnet and sending Get requests to a server repeatedly, overloading its CPU
• Spam and spyware
• Trojans
• Hijacking
• Botnets

From the social side:

• Social engineering
  • psychological manipulation of people
    into performing actions or divulging confidential information
• Social phishing attacks
  • most common type of attacks leveraging social engineering techniques. Attackers use emails, social media, instant messaging and SMS to trick victims into providing sensitive information or visiting malicious URLs in the attempt to compromise their systems
• Fraud and scams on the Internet
• Data breach (leak)

1. Integrity

• It refers to the ability to ensure that information being displayed on a website or transmitted or received over the internet has not been altered in any way by an unauthorized party. 

2. Nonrepudiation

• the ability to ensure that e-commerce participants do not deny or repudiate their online actions

3. Authenticity

• the ability to identify a person or entity with who one is transacting with on the internet

4. Confidentiality

• the ability to ensure that messages and data are only available to those who are authorised to view them

5. Privacy

• the ability to control the use of information about oneself

6. Availability

• the ability to ensure that an e-commerce site continues to function as intended and is available to provide service

• Malware
• Malvertising
• Drive-by download
• virus
• worm
• ransomware
• trojan
• backdoor
• Dos
• DDos
• Identity fraud
• SQL injection attack
• etc.
• Credit card fraud / theft

• Social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Tumblr provide a rich and rewarding environment for hackers
• Viruses, site takeovers, identity fraud, malware-loaded apps, click hijacking, phishing, and spam are all found on social networks
• Common types of scam on social networks include manual sharing scams, where victims unwittingly share videos, stories and pictures that include links to malicious sites, with “free” gift cards, for example
• Another technique is a fake reaction button: when clicked, it installs malware and post updates to the user’s newsfeed, further spreading the attack
• SN firms have by far been relatively poor policeman because they have failed to aggressively weed out accounts that send visitors to malware sites (unlike Google, that maintains a list of known malware sites).

• The existence of mobile devices has broadened opportunities for hackers
• Mobile users are filling their devices with personal and financial information and using them to conduct transactions, from retail purchases to mobile banking
• Mobile devices face the same risk as any other Internet device, as well as some risks associated with wireless network security
• Public Wi-fi networks that are not secured are very susceptible to hacking
• Malicious mobile apps (MMAs, malware for cell phones) was developed early 2004
• The majority of mobile malware still targets the Android platform

• The move of so many Internet services into the cloud also raises security risks
• DDoS attacks threaten the availability of cloud services, on which more and more companies are relying
• Companies with hybrid networks, with their applications scattered among public clouds, private clouds, and on-premises systems, are more at risk

• Encryption
• Symmetric key cryptography
• Advanced encryption standard
• Public key cryptography
• Digital envelops
• VPN
• Firewalls
• Proxy servers

customer relationship management, demand management, order fulfillment, manufacturing management, procurement, product development, returns, logistics/transportation, and inventory management

E-Commerce: describes specifically that portion of B2B commerce that is enabled by the Internet (including mobile apps). It is the sale of goods or services between businesses via an online sales portal. In general, it is used to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of a company's sales efforts. Instead of receiving orders using human assets (sales reps) manually – by telephone or e-mail – orders are received digitally, reducing overhead costs

• Lower administrative costs
• Lower search costs for buyers
• Reduce inventory costs by increasing competition among suppliers (increasing price transparency) and reducing inventory to the bare minimum
• Lower transaction costs by eliminating paperwork and automating parts of the procurement process
• Increase production flexibility by ensuring delivery of parts just at the right time (known as just-in-time production)
• Improve quality of products by increasing cooperation among buyers and sellers and reducing quality issues
• Decrease product cycle time by sharing designs and production schedules with suppliers
• Increase opportunities for collaborating with suppliers and distributors
• Create greater price transparency—the ability to see the actual buy and sell prices in a market
• Increase the visibility and real-time information sharing among all participants in the supply chain network.

• Often Lack of real-time demand, production and logistic data.
  • Result of this is unexpected supplier failure
• Environmental impacts
• Natural disasters
• Labor concerns (strikes etc.)
• Impacts of economic, financial and political instability

The sensitivity in the supply is a difficult challenge to manage (Bullwhip effect)

The bullwhip effect is, how a change in the user demand can echo all the way down in the supply chain with an increasing effect between each link in the supply chain and is commonly visualized with the waves a bullwhip makes, and thus the name.

Information systems can help avoid this bullwhip effect, as they make companies able to be more transparent about their expected demand, and thus the following links in the supply chain have better odds of matching the precise demand. However, this require companies to share information with each other, which is not always wanted.

Examples:

• Blockchain
• EDI (Electronic data interchange)
• Cloud

A coordination of various organisations that are related in the process of producing value

Ad:

• Transparency
• Real-time information
• Security
• Immutability

Dis:

• Hard to build network
• Information loss (e.g. blackouts)
• Loss of sovereignty 
• Carbon footprint / Energy consumption

Reusable

Non-rival use

Versionable

• can be subject to different modifications (upgrades). Such as video games