Howards Cameras E-Commerce - Report Example

Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Executive Summary 3 2- Business overview 3 3- Comparison of Vendors 3 3.2- PinnacleCart 4 3.2 Strengths 4 3.2.2-Weaknesses 5 3.2.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost 5 3.3- Goecart 5 3.3.1- Strengths 6 3.3.2-Weaknesses 6 3.3.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost 6 3.4- Volusion 7 3.4.1- Strength 7 3.4.2-Weakness 7 3.4.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost 7 Vendor Selection 8 4- Web-Hosting 8 5- Industry Analysis 9 6- Market and Competitive Analysis 10 7- Marketing Plan 10 8- Management and Operation Plan 12 9- Financial Plan 12 10- Additional Information 13 11- Conclusion and Recommendation 13 12- Work Cite 14 1- Executive Summary This report presents a detailed analysis of the Howard’s Cameras E-Commerce Website Plan. This research based report is aimed at providing a deep analysis and assessment of the different choices for the business web-hosting solution providers. Here I will assess the different options and budgetary constraints for the effective implementation of the business solution for the Howard’s Cameras E-Commerce Website project. 2- Business overview The business of Howard’s Cameras is a privately owned retailer of digital cameras with 5 stores in central Ohio. Currently the business of the Howard’s Cameras is operating through traditional business approach. By seeing the potential enhancements in the global business areas, Howard’s Cameras has decided to develop and implement an online web based system for the enhanced business scope and potential enhancement in the business operations. The new technology implementations at Howard’s Cameras will be potential enhancement in the business cycle and enlargement in the business target market. 3- Comparison of Vendors This section will present the detailed analysis and comparison of the different business vendors for the deployment of the web hosting facility for the Howard’s Cameras. 3.2- PinnacleCart In this section I will discuss about the Pinnacle-Cart web hosting services for the handling of the business web site at Howard’s Cameras. Pinnacle Cart software was built by a group of Internet organization with over 20 year’s joint practice in the Internet business. The partners carried their knowledge in promotion as well as company development jointly to offer the online business holder an admission to Internet sales that offers them the probability to attain the online marketplace efficiently without becoming specialists in the field of Internet website online marketing, development, and well-organized web delivery (pinnaclecart). The Pinnacle-Cart specializes in web hosting and E-marketing solutions to facilitate businesses to arrive into the worldwide Internet viewers to efficiently plus professionally reach new clients. 3.2.1- Strengths PinnacleCart is a tremendously influential PHP shopping cart as well as website developer. PinnacleCart is designed for marketing viewpoint, its E-Commerce facilities and services are robust, feature packed, scalable as well as simple to utilize. PinnacleCart is the apparent selection intended for serious merchants spotlighted on fast plus cost effectively managing, deploying and growing a flourishing web-based business. PinnacleCart Ecommerce facilities aids us compel traffic to our business store, merchandise our products, handle our clients plus orders and consequently a great deal extra. This entire solutions offer us everything we require to productively produce and direct online storefront. PinnacleCart organization team has over 30 years of joint sales as well as marketing experience. The main advantages we can have form the taken form the PinnacleCart web hosting solution (pinnaclecart). Capability to manage administrative access as well as set access levels Locks account following set number of failed credit card efforts Password protection facility at administrative area Complete support of HTTPS/Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocols Tier-1 ecommerce hosting in the course of Rack-Space, the worlds principal data center by means of 100 percent assurance for redundant OC-3 connections, network connectivity, daily backups, power backups as well as spam free email accounts. Website support and hosted on complete PCI Compliant atmosphere 3.2.2-Weaknesses More costly and have no facility for monitoring the business traffic 3.2.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost The main professional solution offered by the PinnacleCart for the Howard’s Cameras business charges $ 95.97 for each month. The total cost of $ 1151.64 will be charged for the professional package of web hosting offered by the PinnacleCart business. 3.3- Goecart Goecart was established in 2000. GoECart is a global leader in developing and managing on-demand ecommerce applications. Hundreds of web based business depend on the GoECart structure each day to put up for sale goods as well as services online additional effectively. GoECarts support team of passionate web based business operations tirelessly to give the most excellent all-around client experience for deals as well as consumers alike. GoECart ecommerce solutions are second to none (GoECart). 3.3.1- Strengths Making sure the entire processes directed easily by means of a high-tech, fault-tolerant IDC or Internet Data Center hosting environment. Manage, Host, and uphold the entire software, websites, as well as databases by means of our forceful enterprise-grade software and hardware structure. Making sure for performance never obtained slow by means of redundant OC3 link, burst able online bandwidth (it wills approximately 100 mpbs), intrusion detection, availability monitoring, and 99.9 percent uptime. Hold serious points in web traffic yet in the busiest times of year. Make sure sales and data integrity by means of generator power backup, UPS (uninterruptible power supply) backup, as well as daily tape backup (GoECart). 3.3.2-Weaknesses Too much costly that does not fit to our business established budget 3.3.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost Goecart offer monthly web hosting services with “Professional package” at $499.95 per month. This totals to $4999 for each year (goecart-Pricing). 3.4- Volusion Volusion offers services for the availability of the online E-commerce Solution. Volusion offers online services like that web hosting, security, development and online consultation. The specialists at Volusion online have made the effort through compiling the entire of the tools we require to put up for sale online into one search engine responsive web based shopping cart-software-solution (volusion). 3.4.1- Strength There are following advantages of the selecting the Volusion web hosting solution for the business: (volusion) Incorporated, regular web based software updates 100% redundancy of every hardware for the successful upholding of the online business Dedicated network operations center Incorporated Hosted Email by means of Multiple Email Accounts SSL established Security by means of full HTTPS Support 32-GB RAM Assurance of 99.99 percent Up-time SLA 3.4.2-Weakness The Volusion offers greater services, although its services are limited for some medium size business, but are not a great difficulty for our business. 3.4.3-Startup cost vs. Ongoing Cost Charges $60-70 each month that cost $720-840 per year Vendor Selection I have decided to go with Volusion web hosting services. The main reason behind the selection of this web hosting business is its less cost and availability of approximately all the services for a better online web site management and handling. This web hosting company offers web hosting charges $60-70 each month that cost $720-840 per year. Therefore by comparing these charges with other companies we can have the better facilities and fewer charges only this web hosting company, so it will be really effective and advantageous to move with this business structure. This company also ensures the quality of services and enhanced management of the web based operational structure. Howard’s camera business will pay to this web hosting business each year or monthly basis regarding the hosting of the web domain. In this way the online business website will be operational through in an enhanced way on the web. 4- Web-Hosting This section is about the implementation of the website of the Howard’s camera business by Howard business. I have researched lots of hosting techniques and finally selected the Dedicated Web Hosting technique for this camera business website implementation project. Why I have selected this technique? The answer of this question is comprehensively given in the discussion below. We all know that business websites are straight away as available as with the strength of web hosting technology. A website will by no means accomplish magnitude and public presence devoid of the support offered by the web hosting corporations. Consequently, if we want to gave more popularity and ease to our website visitors then we have to have to keep in mind these entire thing. We have implemented a Howard business website and are it really necessary to provide our visitors and Howard business staff an easy and quick access to website resources. Dedicated Web Hosting is the most excellent solution in this scenario (Wagner). I have selected the Volusion web hosting services for the online website of Howard. 5- Industry Analysis Nowadays we are facing great competition from the overall world regarding the camera sector. Due to extensive transformations in the information technology and minimization of the technology products cost we have achieved the greater availably to the digital products like Cameras. In this market Howard’s business needs to take a competitive edge. The present structure is confined to imperfect physical areas, although the implementation of the web based system will offer enhanced business management and handling at all levels of the market place. The new web based system will offer approach to more customers and additional facility for the products marketing. The implementation of the new web based system for the Howard’s camera business is having following scope; Enhancement of the Howard’s camera business working Incorporating new technology options Facilitating for capturing new marketplaces Enhancing new working power Safer business transactions Ease for customer handling Management for customer complaints New markets discover Increased market share Better platform for marketing and advertisement New website implementation will minimize the transitions time Additional cost for the manual working and handling will be minimized Extensive and enhanced order processing system Multiple payment options 6- Market and Competitive Analysis Nowadays web based business has evolving more readily so it is really important to have an online business system so that our business can flourish. E-commerce is most likely one of the majority popular subjects between sorts of studies on the effects of the Internet. A Lot of studies regarding business to customer Internet shopping have been done to distinguish main factors influencing buying decisions on the Internet, which encompass, in common, the psychographic and demographic characteristics of customers and the excellence of products or services (Kotler). The new web based system for the Howard’s online business will provide a wide market share and enhance the power of the Howard’s online business to reach and attract more customers. Howard’s online website is mainly targeted to the new and younger generation. This web site will present and market the product especially to younger generation. This web site is mainly aimed at targeting the nature, photography, and landscape lovers. This website will greatly facilitate the customers who want to shop online products. Howard’s company will manually ship the cameras to the purchase’s home through the local courier services. 7- Marketing Plan For the Howard’s online website we will establish a web based policy for enhanced business management and handling. In this policy for the online products and services we will establish greater customer satisfaction and comfort regarding online business. The main facilities we will provide to online customers are the more flexible transaction process, easy to handle website structure, on time delivery, and some of the value added services for the enhanced security of user information on the web. The marketing policy will involve the advertisement of new products and promotions on the web. These will be made available on the Howard’s online website, local newspaper, and through search engine optimization. An effectual marketing attempt is foundational upon data and information that would be utilized in conditions of emergent sound commerce policy that augment our return-on-investment, permit for additional flourishing modernism, and guide to enhanced branding efforts, augment the usefulness of our marketing and promotional attempts as well as reinforce our interne / web marketing efforts (E-CRM). For the Howard’s online website business an accurate competitive benefit would be understood if there is an assurance to hold in the subsequent proceedings (Doraemon): Spotlight our consumer – In the new system implementation for the Howard’s online business we need to be familiar with how we will attain target, recognize our clients requirements as well as offer the essential services/ products to develop the significance that we be able to carry to our client; Identify our competition – In the Howard’s online business we have to recognize who our main competitors are, on the other hand, as well recognize what their weaknesses and strengths are, as well as their promotion strategies and potentials. Organize every promotion efforts by means of other functions inside the association– Howard’s online business will incorporate the marketing that is not intended to be secluded function, however rather should disseminate / share information by means of manufacturing, finance, client service, etc.; Market direction – Howard’s online business will establish a policy that would be tending to augment general performance as well as augment the corporations value to its clients (Doraemon). 8- Management and Operation Plan The structure of the Howard’s Cameras website will be similar to any online e-commerce website. This will start when the customer visits to the website. Customer will search and select from the different categories of web based available products. Customer will search form these categories and select any one. He will select the payment options and entries the personal details. The transactions held and customer product will be delivered to home through local courier services. 9- Financial Plan For the development of Howard’s Cameras website we need to allocate financial resource to each aspect of the business and website development project. In this scenario system development we will allocate financial resource to all phases of the development. The main online web based system development financial plan is given below: No. Project Tasks Allocated cost for development ($) 1 System requirement 500 2 System design 500 3 Website development 2000 4 Testing 1000 5 Online system Implementation 200 6 Web hosting charges 1000 / year 7 Hardware for new implementation 2000 8 Software 1000 9 Employees Training 500 10 Support expenses 1300 10- Additional Information The management of the online web site involves the enhanced security management of the system. Some time business competitors establish a website attack that damages the online business structure and smash down the overall operations of the website. For handling such issues we need to incorporate a tight security and business privacy environment (Laudon and Laudon). 11- Conclusion and Recommendation In this report I have presented the detailed analysis of the online web based system implementation for the Howard’s Cameras Company. This new structure is aimed to offer a better competitive edge for the enhanced business and transactions handling. In this report, I have provided the overall areas those are necessary for the development and implementation of online web based system. The main thing we need to concentrate in this business system implementation is the satisfaction of the customer and fulfillment of the overall customer requirements. Through concentrating on the customer needs and spotlighting the customer interest we can deploy an extremely useful system that offers enhanced services to business and customer also. 12- Work Cite 1. Carter, Brian. "The 5 Best Revenue Models in E-Commerce History." 2009. 23 08 2009 . 2. Doraemon. Customer Retention Strategies and CRM on the Internet. 8 1 2008. 13 06 2009 . 3. E-CRM. E-CRM. 2008. 25 06 2009 . 4. Feinberg, R. and R. Kadam. "E-CRM Web service attributes as determinants of customer satisfaction with retail Web sites." (2002). 5. GoECart. "About GoECart." 2009. 03 10 2009 . 6. goecart-Pricing. "Small Business Ecommerce Solution Editions & Pricing." 2009. 03 10 2009 . 7. Kotler, P, Armstrong, G. Marketing: An Introduction. NJ: Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1997. 8. Laudon, Kenneth. C. and Jane. P. Laudon. Management Information Systems, Sixth Edition. New Jersey: Prentice Hall , 1999. 9. pinnaclecart. "About US." 2009. 03 10 2009 . 10. Touchbriefings. "E-Commerce." 2009. 01 09 2009 . 11. volusion. "Hosting." 2009. 03 10 2009 . 12. Wagner, David. "Web Hosting new challenges. ." In Proceedings of the 9th ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (2002). Read More