Benefits of electronic/web commerce

Explain in detail about Benefits of electronic/web commerce.

v  Reduced costs to buyers from increased competition in procurement, as more suppliers are able to complete in an electronically open marketplace.

v  Reduced costs to suppliers by electronically accessing on-line databases of bid opportunities, by one-line abilities to submit bids, and by one-line review of awards.

v  Reduced errors, time, and overhead costs in information processing by elimination requirements for reentering data.

v  Reduced inventories, as the demand for goods and services are electronically linked through just-in-time-inventory and integrated manufacturing techniques.

v  Increased access to real-time inventory information, faster fulfillment of orders, and lower costs due to the elimination of paperwork.

v  Reduced time to complete business transaction, specifically reduced time from delivery to payment.

v  Reduced overhead costs through uniformity, automation, and integration of management processes while enable flatter, wider, and more efficient processes.

v  Better quality of goods as specifications are standardized and competition increases; also, better variety through expanded markets and the ability to produced customized goods.

v  Creation of new markets, especially geographically remote markets, as the playing field becomes more even between companies of different sizes and locations.

v  Faster time to market as business processes are linked, elimination time delays between steps and the engineering of each sub process within the whole process.

v  New business opportunities, Businesses and entrepreneurs are continuously on the look-out for new and innovative ideas as viable commercial ventures; electronic commerce provides such opportunities.

v  Optimization of resource selection as businesses build cooperative teams to better tailor capabilities, to work opportunities to increase chances of success more broadly, and to give the customer a mix of capabilities more precisely meeting the customer’s requirements.

v  Increased access to a client base, Identifying and location new clients and new markets is not a trivial task since it involves analysis, product marketing, and consumer-based testing.

v  Improved product analysis as businesses are able to perform product analyses and comparisons and report their findings on the Internet and on-line.

v  Improved market analysis.  The large and increasing base of Internet users can be targeted for the distribution of surveys for an analysis of the marketability of a new product or service idea.  Surveys can reach many people with minimal effort on the part of the surveyors.  Once a product is already marketed, businesses can examine the level of customer’s satisfaction.

v  Wider access to assistance and to advice from experts and peers.  Users can utilize the Internet to obtain expert adv ice and get help.

v  Rapid information access.  Accessing information on-line and over the Internet is faster (on most occasions) than transmissions via fax or transfers via courier services.  Businesses can access information from countries around the world and make interactive connections to remote computer systems.

v  Rapid interpersonal communications.  Contacting other individuals through e-mail provides a new method of business communication.  E-mail has both the speed of telephone conversations and the semi=permanence of regular mail.  E-mail can be sent form nearly anywhere there is an Internet service or (dial-up) access.  Businesspersons or travelers on the go can keep in touch with the office or site.

v  Wide-scale information dissemination.  One can place documents on servers on the Internet and make them accessible to millions of users.  Creating Web documents and Web sites improves the availability of the documents to a client base larger than the circulation of many major newspapers.

v  Cost-effective document transfer, transferring on-line documents over the Internet takes a short period of time, particularly if they are text-based (rather than multimedia-based); this can save money on regular mail or courier services.  Most, if not all, Internet access providers do not charge by the raw number of bytes transferred across their links, unlike other commercial information services.