Introduction to E-business

and the module

(Lecture 1)
Module code: BUSI4458

Module convenor: Dr Ashutosh Sharma

Email: ashutosh.sharma2@nottingham.ac.uk

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This lecture should enable you to understand:

• An overview of the module

• The assessments

• What an E-business is

• What we will cover each week

• Interpersonal Computing and Software-as-a-Service (Saas)

• Some uses of Social media in digital business

• Some examples of the Big Data Revolution

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 Dr Ashutosh Sharma

• More than 20 years of work experience spanning Government and Industry

and Academia

• Sectors: technology, telecommunications, engineering, nuclear, energy,

education

• Functions: international business development, engineering design,

production, marketing, sales and quality

• Now: lecture, research, publish, and consult on business & information

systems

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 Your introduction

Think about the below points and we talk about them after the
session to network and make study groups

• Which other courses are you taking?

• Why this module?

• What do you want to get from it?

• Where next? - internships ideas?

• Industry, research, public sector, other?

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 About this module: basic rules

• Make yourself comfortable

• Don’t panic about the assessment, I will do my best to help you

• You can always talk to me about this module:

– in class
– after class
– before class
– appointment by email

• Attendance will be taken via QR codes. If it doesn’t work for you then please
inform the Module Convenor.

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 About this module: Special Needs ??

• If you have any special needs for Accessibility or Disability then please
inform the University via student services. And if you wish then please let me
know in-person and/or via email.
• Check this link for details about special needs
• https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/studentservices/servicedetails/disability-
support-services/disability-support-services.aspx

• Extenuating Circumstances (EC)

• The form for extenuating circumstances is available at:
https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/studentservices/servicedetails/extenuating-
circumstances/extenuating-circumstances.aspx

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 About this module: key Aims
• Help future managers and business people.

• To familiarise participants with the strategic management issues and

technology developments associated with e-business.

• To provide participants with a solid strategic business view of the uses of

web technologies and Information Systems.

• To help participants understand how and why e-businesses are successful

or not, i.e. what makes them 'tick’.

• (See Module Outline document on Moodle for details about Aims and
Objectives).

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 About this module: key points
• This module is more about businesses than technology

• Theory vs practice

• Using models & theories to get good marks

• Using models and theories in business

• Course assessments:

- Individual Report (100%)

-Group Presentation (0%)

• After the course: getting a good job

• Moodle

• Library: e-journals, books, articles.. NUSearch…

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 About this module: theory vs practice

what Linking theory and data to get different

data perspectives and generate ideas
?

discussion
(synthesis)

different
perspectives
(analysis) conclusions recommendations

#? which theories? 9
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 Handouts

All materials (e.g. outline and handouts) are available on Moodle to

reduce the amount of wasted paper.

Please refer to the Module Outline which is available in a pdf document on

the Moodle page for this module.

If you have trouble in accessing Moodle then please contact IT services or

the Student Services Centre to help immediately as this is really
important.

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 About this module: what will be covered?
1: Introduction to e-business and the module

• What is an e-business?
• Examples
• Some underlying ideas & explanations for how they work
• Web 2.0
How to think up innovative ideas for Web 2.0 and e-businesses

2: The Internet of Things (IoT) and Business Ecosystems

• What is the Internet of Things (IoT).

• IoT includes phones, cars and consumer electronics – anything connected
to the Internet.
• We use the Resource System model to start to analyse the Digital
Ecosystem of businesses.
• We think about how devices and the firms that make them can work together

How to share data and capabilities between devices and firms?

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 About this module: what will be covered?
3: Business models for e-commerce firms

• Value propositions
• “Marketspace” offering
• Resource system
• Business model
• How well does the value flow?

How to check or develop a business model for your firm

4: Customer interface

• Content, context, communication, community, commerce, connection and

customisation
• Strategic implications
• Operational implications
• Different channels & how to get the mix right – mobile, web, social …
How to check your firm’s customer interface

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 About this module: what will be covered?
5: Market communication, branding and Customer Relationship
Management (CRM)
• Online communication
• Brand equity and building a brand
• Strategic CRM, not just call centres
How to manage your customers more profitably
Plus: How to get high marks in this module

6: Artificial Intelligence (AI) services

• The difference between products and services
• How products are turning into services
• How Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing the world
• Fintech and its development

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 About this module: what will be covered?
7: Digital Innovation and Transformation
• Digital Technology and its distinctive characteristics
• The underlying principle behind digital transformation
• The transformative potential and challenges of digital technology
• Digital innovation’s implications for a firm’s growth

8: Consulting Skills
Introduction to consulting
• Consulting life cycle
• Stakeholder engagement
• Case study and workshop

9: Guest Speaker (Keith Burgess, IBM, Topic: Consulting))

• Consulting from an IBM/Professor of Practice perspective
• Understanding consulting as a science

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 About this module: what will be covered?
10 & 11 :Group presentations + Assessment Q&A
• Time to present and discuss group presentations.
• Feedback on group presentations.
• How to use the feedback in the main individual Assessment.
• Assessment Q & A.

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 Group presentations

• Form study groups

- 6-7 people

• Email me early and definitely by the start of lecture 3

- group name, member names & group communications person

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 What is an e-business?

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 Older e-business examples
• Amazon

• Google

• Alibaba.com

• eBay

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 Older e-business examples
• Amazon

• Google

• Alibaba.com.cn

• eBay

• BBC

• NHS Direct Are these really e-businesses?

• nottingham.ac.uk

• Manchester United

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 Newer e-business examples
• YouTube, Flickr, Instagram, Tinder

• Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, Ren Ren (Xiaonei), LinkedIn, Google+, Weibo

• Wikipedia, Tencent, Airbnb, Uber, Tesla cars

• Habbo, WoW, Taobao, Tmall, others?

• http://www.slideshare.net/tkawaja/commerce-lumascape-8223012

What have they got in common?

What’s different to the older e-businesses?

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 No real dividing line
• All businesses use digital technology

Businesses Businesses Old “e” Newer “e”

with no “e” + “e” Businesses Businesses

Painter Painter Amazon Facebook

selling on
eBay

Or their suppliers and customers do

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 Interpersonal Computing
www.explainingcomputers.com
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 Interpersonal Computing (IPC)
• Person-to-person interactions enable collaborative content addition,
augmentation and association
• wikis, blogs or social networking sites collect and concentrate customers
rather than requiring firms to gather customers themselves

• Eye balls are assets

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 Software as a Service (SaaS)
www.explainingcomputers.com
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 Software as a Service (SaaS)
Software consumed over the web

Office SaaS
Google Docs, MS Office Web Apps, Zoho, Acrobat.com, SlideRocket
https://www.google.com/docs/about/
www.zoho.com

Business SaaS
HR, CRM and project management tools, e.g. Employease, Salesforce,
Clarizen, Netsuite & Zoho

Creative SaaS
Aviary, Pixlr, Pixorial, FotoFlexer and Photoshop Express
www.aviary.com

See the Cloud Computing Directory on www.ExplainingComputers.com

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 Why SaaS are commonly cheap or free
SaaS offerings are very low marginal cost

Marginal Cost is the change in the Total Cost that arises when the Quantity
produced changes by One Unit
experience complexity

Total Cost

Volume

Implications
• Commonly free for basic use
• Charged by volume (‘freemium’) – or number of users
• Charged by functionality (‘freemium’) – upgrades
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 SaaS benefits and drawbacks
• Accessible from any device

• Collaborative

• No fixed costs and sometimes free

• Continually updated (incrementally)

• Less sophisticated (task centric standardisation – ‘one size fits all’)

• Needs a fast, reliable Internet connection

• Applications run and data stored in the Cloud

• Limited to vendor-determined applications

• Security issues – runs on someone else’s Cloud

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 Social media in digital
business

What social media do you use?

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Social Media – what’s it for?
• Listening platform: understand relevant conversations – where and who

• Interact with existing and potential customers around activities that interest them

• Sales channel: enable and accelerate purchase through complimentary channels

(Customer Buying Process)

Group of social media logs

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Targeted marketing responses at touch points on the ‘consumer decision journey’

COMPANY

individual

social
CUSTOMER

Divol R, Edelman D and Sarrazin H (2012) Demystifying social media, Mckinsey Quarterly, April.
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Mobile devices – 4 revolutionary characteristics

Location – ‘the thing you want is

around the corner from you?’

Personal – ‘what you want, not what

people like you want?’ – brand
engagement – segment-of-one

Real-time – ‘what you want now?’

Two-way – ‘what exactly do you

want?’

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Summary of e-business developments

chat bots,
interfaces

AI
apps

Before Web 2.0 Web 2.0 Mobile

‘everything is
social’ happened
about here
Internet of
Things

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 But what is a “business”?

Is it just commercial?

Is it public sector?

Is it not-for-profit?

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 An “e-business”

A business is any organisation of one or more people that makes

products or services

An e-business uses digital technology in some way

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 The Big Data Revolution
examples

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 Analytical Strategy: Structuring Unstructured Data
• E.g. 1: Segmentation based on serial basket journey analysis

– how did a VIP customer become a VIP customer?

– who can be nudged into becoming a VIP?
– segmentation based on serial behaviour & predictive models
File:SurvivorFlipCupChamp.jpg

File:MissExoticWorld2006JulieAtlasMuz.jpg

File:Elton John à Malte - 26 sept 2010.jpg

Potential big spender?

37 Images: wikimedia commons

 Analytical Strategy: Structuring Unstructured Data

• E.g. 2: Product-led analyses – how to structure bundles of products based

on customer’s interests and your different commercial objectives.

• E.g. 3: Context Aware applications – how external context affects

purchasing behaviour and supports real-time personalisation
– weather, time, day, season, mode of interaction (mobile etc.), location,
sentiment on social networks and demographics.

http://blog.beatthebrochure.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/a-z-umbrella.jpg

http://www.purplewifi.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Facebook-Like.jpg

38 Images: blog.beatthebrochure.com, www.purplewifi.net

 Analytical Strategy: Visualisation
Structuring requires new visualisation techniques
• Putting the data into human and business context.
• Making the ‘best’ options and best choices stick out – 3D, colour, video, sim
http://content.stamen.com/files/fb/marvin.gif

Image http://content.stamen.com/facebook_mapping_how_viral_photos_spread00
Try doing this with
just a pie chart
39 Mapping how viral photos spread on Facebook
 Data Visualizations
Engaging data: categories of visualizations
https://engaging-data.com/

Data visualization: 15 wondourous examples

https://econsultancy.com/15-wondrous-examples-of-data-visualization/

17 visualisation tools to make your data beautiful

https://econsultancy.com/blog/66131-17-visualisation-tools-to-make-your-data-beautiful

10 Fascinating Data Visualization Projects

http://mashable.com/2013/03/05/data-visualization-projects

Flowing data site on Data visualisation

http://flowingdata.com

Information is beautiful awards

http://www.informationisbeautifulawards.com/news/116-2015-the-winners
http://www.informationisbeautifulawards.com/showcase/710-a-world-of-languages

Gun Deaths Since Sandy Hook (The Huffington Post)

http://data.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/gun-deaths

Visualization tools
https://d3js.org/
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 Personalisation requires new data sources
•services
Personalise premiums: based on individual behaviour rather than higher level
(one size fits all) proxies and groups like gender
• Real-time changeable and pay-as-you-go
• Demand personalised (drive less-pay less, drive at night or in less busy traffic-
pay less)

Key point: Fitting the personal context of the customer also helps to fit
the business needs of the service provider

Corner the market for young but safe male drivers? Then keep them and
cross-sell forever!
http://resources0.news.com.au/images/2010/02/09/1225828/467816-jeremy-clarkson.jpg
http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRPtquh7i5lD238eG5ALMLkQrwbA0CQTu9iRD2wFgQLGNrtFvFIbw

www.dailytelegraph.com.au himalmag.com
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 Another data source – Intent HQ’s Social Data APIs
services

[social login]

[interested friends]

(1) ‘virality’: from friends &

similar people
(2) interests: from profile &
posts
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 Another data source – Global Dawn’s Social Data APIs

services

Source: Intent HQ /GlobalDawn

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 Money Dashboard – ‘sat nav’ for your financial life
services

(1) spending: with

competitors or unused
cash
(2) time: real-time feedback
& historical record
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 Is this a ‘sat nav’ for your health life?
services

A health-life
personal ‘sat nav’?
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 Another data capture device - Nike+ FuelBand
http://mocoloco.com/mr/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/nike_plus_fuelband_2b.jpg

services

46 mocoloco.com
The financial services data problem
services
Great opportunity for banks and payment systems providers
• Insurance relationships - a limited key hole on a customer’s life.
• Loyalty cards just have data on part of your shopping life (many cards).
• But mobile wallets - a huge window on all that you earn and spend.

• Smartphone data – location, segment-of-one, real-time, 2-way.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8xahlow_iPY/TimT0hrkB7I/AAAAAAAAAro/sycl8EeXhyA/s1600/Window.jpg

47 nicole-forrester.blogspot.com
 Big Data can support the whole business
Not just Marketing – cross-selling and innovation/product development
Big data is the personal minute to minute diary of everyone and
everything – B2C, B2B and your machines.
http://lancasterdiary.net/images/assets/diary_3.jpg

Image: lancasterdiary.net
48 If I know what’s in your diary then I can help you in your life.
 Available ‘Now’
Google Search
• Tell then what you are interested in - get an advert

Google Assistant
• Google’s intelligent
personal assistant
for Android

.google.co.uk
Key point its not the service it's the access to your personal context in real-time.
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Summary

• An overview of the module

• The assessments

• What an E-business is

• What we will cover each week

• Interpersonal Computing and Software-as-a-Service (Saas)

• Some uses of Social media in digital business

• Some examples of the Big Data Revolution

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 Questions?
Remember:

- If you get stuck and want to talk these ideas over then see me
after class, in a break or email to make an appointment

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