Encyclop_dia Britannica - Case Study Example

& Britannica.com Case study Was the free of charge strategy congruent with other offers? Britannica’s online strategy was congruent with the offer because the company was also getting some revenue from the sale of CD-ROM. This also improved usability as well as the improving the availability of updated content from the website. The strategy for making text available free of charge was also congruent because more people were attracted to the website as a result of the products offerings and the subscriptions for the academic and research institutions.

Consumer perceptions One consumer perceptions that may not be advantageous for turning Britannica.com into a leading Web portal include the poor company’s infrastructure which is overwhelmed by traffic. This therefore discourages customers from using the web portal as less than one percent get to reach the homepage during the initial period. The other disadvantage is the offering of a subscription online version of Britannica online. This therefore discourages consumers since they will have to consider other web portals offering the same kind of information but one with no subscriptions.

Direct and indirect competitors Britannica’s direct competitors include Yahoo, Lycos and Excite since they offer the same kind of information to the internet users. The indirect competitors include Microsoft, Compton’s Encyclopedia, World Book and Glolier Inc. these include the major selling reference software products. The customers’ needs offered by these competitors are adequate for example Microsoft’s Encarta has many customers due to its Reference suite, offering of deluxe products and encyclopedia.

The customer’s needs that are fulfilled by Britannica differ from those fulfilled by competitors as Britannica focus on traditional strengths in reference, learning and educational materials. This has enabled the company to gain popularity and growing audience numbers due to its productive and helpful information therefore brought up major implications on their business models. Ways of segmenting Britannica.com market Some of the actionable and meaningful ways of segmenting Britannica.com market would be through targeting consumers who mostly need education materials such as students.

The segment should therefore be well dominated by sophisticated research tools and contents. The company should also aim at developing the Centre for Educational Technology Holdings and should use it in acquiring more customers in need of technological research tools. The major target should therefore be focused on library products and resources used in academic institutions. The searching capabilities should also be improved as students are the major target. The quality offered, breadth and the depth of information should be in a way that it satisfies the needs of the students searching for research materials.

Charging fees to improve profitability The move by Britannica to charge for its services will not help the company in gaining any profitability as it will be impossible for students to pay for services that are being offered for free in other libraries. However, once Britannica.com major in producing quality and in-depth information as well as unique combination of reference and interactive learning resources, the students will be more than willing to pay for the extra benefit they get from the source.

Therefore for this strategy to bring in profits, additional features and new services should be introduced and maintained as this will help students in need of different features from those offered for free. Would you invest in Britannica.com Company? If I was an investor, I would invest in Britannica.com Company. The reason for this is because the company has promising benefits but is lacking good management. I would therefore invest under the condition that I will be in a position of changing the business models.

First I would set new strategies that will specifically focus students’ needs. Their need for quality information and searching tools will be effectively met and the company will also be offering quality materials and provide unique combination on online services as compared to other competitors. How information technology transformed the company Information technology was in a position of transforming Encyclopedia Britannica Inc. into Britannica.com as a result of the improvement of more sophisticated searching capabilities.

This was also due to the in-depth introduction of features that targeted on the needs of students. Information technology also contributed as the company changed to offering premium and high-quality content. Infrastructure was also improved by the help of information technology and this brought about increase of internet users after the re-launch (Hafner 1998). Business challenges Some of the business challenges faced by Britannica.com include the need to pursue an electronic format that would deliver wealth of information.

Despite the company being the strongest brand recognition and being the first encyclopedia to be posted in full online, Britannica.com faced various challenges. These include not being in a position of making profits over some years of operation. This had mostly been caused by lack of a specific business target as the company was trying various methods of improving profitability. There was also competitor challenge where its competitors offered the same kind of information better and for free.

Use of identity provider I would consider the use of identity provider in accessing contents from Britannica.com. This is important as it will be easy to help the company in the identification of people who have paid the subscription fee to view the site. In order to access the contents, Brittanica.com should introduce a place for entering personal information such as password and username as this will help the company in identifying its users and it will also encourage more people to pay the fee therefore improving company’s revenue.

8-second rule The 8-second rule applied on the internet is an internet standard and is also a way of measuring the adequate response time taken for a web server to download resources from the internet. Hafner (1998) describes that this is used through various bandwidths, as it states that if the load-time is more than 8 seconds, the users may not wait for the completion of the download. This rule might be important to a company like Britannica.com as once it is effected more people will be willing to pay for the contents which are faster to download rather than using other sites that are congested.

Once put in place, the company will increase users thus more revenue. Works cited  Hafner, Katie. Where wizards stay up late: The origins of the internet. Simon & Schuster, 1998.