The Problems with Current Online Business - Case Study Example

A proposal to the leadership of the Bumble Corporation explaining the issues, and recommending a strategy to address each issue Table of Contents Background 4 The Problems with Current Online Business 4 Objectives 6 Developmental Objective 6 Immediate Objective 7 The Proposed E-Commerce Model 7 Planning & Implementation 7 Expected Results 9 Benefits for Bumble Corp 10 Benefits for Old Customer & New Customer 10 Limitations 10 MEMO 11 Introduction 11 Definition of M-Commerce 11 M-Commerce Companies 12 Benefits from Integration of M-Commerce with E-Commerce 12 Summary 12 Work Cited 13 Background Bumble Corp is a department store that offers home, fashion, and electronics goods. The company prides itself on its very personalized services in the brick and mortar stores where their customers and employees interact with each other face to face. This direct interaction between the employees of Bumble Corp and their customers is highly appreciated by the customers. This was one of the main reasons for the success of Bumble Corp’s traditional stores. The company has recently launched an electronic commerce website to reach the potential customers more easily and quickly. Bumble Corp believes that their online success is directly tied to recreating their brick and mortar customer experience in E-Commerce space. After the launch of their new E-Commerce website, the existing Bumble Corp customers were excited about the new online shopping opportunity form the company they already trust and love. Bumble Corp has three centrally located warehouses in Unites States. One is located in West coast, and the other two are located in the East coast and Texas respectively. Their current E-Commerce business model accepts orders from the customers through the internet and after that these online orders are processed and shipped to the local stores, closest to the customers shipping address. The Problems with Current Online Business Bumble Corp decided to offer their products to their existing as well as future potential customers through their recently launched E-Commerce website. Their existing customers were excited about their new online shopping experience with their trusted company. However, these loyal customers soon became disillusioned by the impersonalized shopping experience as their real life experience was contrary to their existing belief. When the online model was implemented, it was found that the company’s existing customer information and profile was not accessible online even though they were members in the company’s reward program for many years. Some of the customers even had Bumble branded credit card for buying Bumble Corp’s goods. The new online shopping experience was quickly becoming disappointing without the face to face interaction between the customer and employee of Bumble Corp. Their potential new customers were initially interested on the word of mouth recommendation from their family and friends who had already shopped at the company’s traditional stores before. But after the launch of E-Commerce website, customers have often complained that the shipping and handling times are very inconsistent. The store managers have also complained that the store employees do not have the required time to serve both the in-store and online customers simultaneously. These new potential customers tried out the online E-Commerce offering only because they did not have a local store at their place, but, the great experience described by their friends and family created a negative sentiment in them. Hence the company failed to attract new customers and was also on the verge of losing their loyal customers because of limited resources and lack of proper planning before implementing the online model. Objectives Developmental Objective Bumble Corp needs to give the same experience to new customers that it gave to its customers at the traditional brick and mortar stores in order to maintain their goodwill to their loyal customers. The success of E-Commerce platform lies with the fact that as to what extent the company is able to successfully recreate the face to face communication and shopping experience with their new potential customers, without losing focus from existing customers. Considering the company’s long term strategy and not to mention the growth in E-Commerce business in the last few years, a compact and simple online shopping platform holds huge potential for the company to attract new customers. As the company still runs the brick and mortar stores along with the new online E-Commerce website, its actual potential to reach new customer has actually increased since it can leverage the existing brand. The company needs an E-Commerce business model that requires least maintenance and that automatically updates new customers whenever they visit the company’s website. At the same time, their loyal customers from brick and mortar stores also need to be given the same attention that they used to have in the traditional stores. Thus, the long term goal of Bumble Corp is to retain the loyalty of their existing customers as well as target new customers who could be reached anywhere in the world with the help of online E-Commerce website. An automated online shopping platform will reduce the number of employees to manage online customers. These employees in the mean time would be able to focus on to their in-store customers. This strategy will help the company to retain its goodwill to customers as well as help the concentrate to their new customers. Immediate Objective The immediate objective of Bumble Corp is to turn its online business into a successful E-Commerce experience for their customers. The company also plans to implement a social commerce to recreate their famous customer and employee interaction. It also wants to reach new customers and referrals from friends and family into loyal customers. The current online business model is inefficient. It should be replaced with an efficient order fulfillment system which is automated. Keeping in mind that the company used to pride itself on its very personalized services in traditional brick and mortar stores that made the company famous, the new model should ensure it. The Proposed E-Commerce Model Planning & Implementation E-Commerce platforms are created by combining a set of technologies and business processes that brings together the business and the customers anywhere in the world. It provides a space for the customer to buy products from home without worrying about deliver. The business model most suitable in this scenario is the B2C model of E-Commerce, where the sales of goods take place between the business and customers similar to a retail store (Andam, p.25). The customer selects the goods available online and then places order. Upon successful completion of receiving order from customer, the database is automatically updated and the customer is asked to provide his/her address and contact number. The customer is given the option to either pay online or make payment on delivery. It is the responsibility of the company to ensure that the goods transferred reaches customer’s address on time. When the customer enters the address, the database tries to locate the nearest store from that address. The delivery would take place from that store to customer’s given address. An expected date of delivery is given to customer based on the current inventory level. It should be maintained strictly if the company wants to keep its goodwill. The transaction processing system at the client-end automatically takes the order if the item is available in store and provides the customer a unique order number and details of processed order about the quantity, size, price of item, etc. The status of order is communicated to the customer through e-mail or text message. Thus, the customer has the advantage of buying products from anywhere in the world without personalized interaction as in brick-and-mortar stores (Rajaraman, pp.13-15). (Source: Word Press, 2010) The new E-Commerce business model will focus on three aspects as follows: 1. Data manipulation – Processing transaction data about the orders should be easy and should provide the customer flexibility, like online payment or the payment at delivery option. 2. Data Storage – Altering and updating databases to reflect transactional changes in the centralized database. This will ensure the consistency principal. The availability of products at the local stores must be checked before taking orders. This will ensure timely delivery and limit customer dissatisfaction. 3. Data output and presentation – Process documents properly and display the correct information if the customer is an existing customer. All details of such customers should be available at wish of customer or company whenever a query is sent to central database. It asks for customer ID and then shows required information. 4. The system is to be automated with least human interaction so that the employees of Bumble Corp can focus on their in-store customers without worrying about online customers. Expected Results After the implementation of new E-Commerce model, the in-store customers of Bumble Corp will experience personalized communication that will motivates them to keep their loyalty with the company. The pleasant interaction on which the company once kept pride will help it to reach new customers. These existing customer referrals will soon turn into new customers as the company can focus on them without worrying about the new online leads. The company will be able to successfully implement social commerce by recreating the customer and employee interaction. An automated E-Commerce model gives the company the space to find new potential customers across anywhere in the world and at the same time their limited resources like availability of employee to attend in-store customers will be intact. Thus, the new E-commerce platform is expected to increase the company’s existing market share (Kuzic, Fisher, & Scollary, pp.1608-1610). Benefits for Bumble Corp Since the company maintains its existing B&M retails as well as E-Commerce website, it has the opportunity to leverage existing brand as referrals from existing satisfied customers. Benefits for Old Customer & New Customer Old customers can still experience personalized interaction with the employees of Bumble Corp. New customers will get the goods and services at lower cost along with a feeling of social commerce interaction if they prefer shopping online (Wen, Chen, and Hwang, p.6). Limitations The cost of acquisition of new customer is huge because significant amount of advertising will be required if Bumble wants to penetrate new market. But considering the good will of the company and satisfactory personalized experience of the customers at Bumble Corp’s brick and mortar stores, it can leverage existing brand to attract new customers (Liliana, pp.297-298). MEMO Date: February 18, 2013 To: Bumble Corporation executive team From: Strategic Consultant Subject: Potential Role of M-Commerce in Achieving Company’s Strategic Vision Introduction For quiet sometimes now the Bumble executives were curious to know about how the mobile commerce could potentially play an important role in achieving the company’s strategic vision by integrating with e-commerce and further enhance Bumble Corp shopping experience. The following discussion highlights the potential benefits the company can experience from such integration. Definition of M-Commerce Mobile commerce is a type of e-commerce which takes place over wireless devices such as hand held cell phones. The customer using m-commerce can open an account and access it in a secured network for performing transactions which are equivalent to e-commerce transactions done through a desktop computer. M-Commerce uses Wireless Application Protocol technology to bring the customers and company together over a network. M-Commerce Companies Few companies which provide their customers with m-commerce service platform are 3dcart.com, demandware.com, fireflymobile.com, hyperwallet.com, globalbay.com, madmobile.com, mobi-cart.com, mobius-ecommerce.com, obopay.com, and shoptext.com. Benefits from Integration of M-Commerce with E-Commerce If the existing E-Commerce model of Bumble Corp is integrated with m-commerce, then the customers will feel more attached with the company. Not the mention how the cell phones are becoming popular among the young generations, perhaps it is one of the best way to reach the young bloods. The customers will be regularly updated about the delivery in progress and also they will get to know about new offers on their handsets without having to visit the stores. Thus, it provides the customer the convenience to check the availability of product, price, and location of store without a desktop computer. Summary If m-commerce is integrated with e-commerce, customers will be able to make payments from their cell phones. A customer can first check about the current offers and then visit the stores directly or otherwise he/she can directly order from cell phone. It also overcomes the limitations of desktop computer as in traditional e-commerce model the customer must have a computer and access to internet. In the m-commerce model all a customer needs is a cell phone hand set and a service provider, which is much cheaply available. The m-commerce model is expected to change the concept of retailer as well as e-tailing. It is easy to use, secure, and cost effective. It will help the company to implement social commerce. Work Cited Andam, Z. R. e-commerce and e-business. 2003. Web. February 18, 2013. . Rajaraman, V. Electronic Commerce. 2000. Web. February 18, 2013. < http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/Oct2000/pdf/Oct2000p13-23.pdf>. Kuzic, J., Fisher, J., & Scollary, A. ELECTRONIC COMMERCE BENEFITS, CHALLENGES AND SUCCESS FACTORS IN THE AUSTRALIAN BANKING AND FINANCE INDUSTRY. 2002. Web. February 18, 2013. < http://is2.lse.ac.uk/asp/aspecis/20020067.pdf>. Wen, H. J., Chen, H., & Hwang, H. E-Commerce Web Site Design: Strategies and Models. 2001. Web. February 18, 2013. < http://www.nyu.edu/clubs/web.design/education/ecommerce/e-commerce%20Website%20Design.pdf>. Liliana, N. Advantages and Disadvantages of the Electronic Commerce. 2006. Web. February 18, 2013. < http://steconomice.uoradea.ro/anale/volume/2006/economie-si-administrarea-afacerilor/42.pdf>. Read More