6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
How to swim with the tide of history, January 26, 2001
This review is from: E-Volve-or-Die.com: Thriving in the Internet Age Through E-Commerce Management (Paperback)
Without a doubt, the first stage of the advent of electronic commerce is now over. Unfortunately, it lasted about two months longer than it should have. In the initial stage, the all to common and inaccurate perception was that it was different from "traditional" business. The emphasis was on building brand recognition and establishing large numbers of visitors, relying on the "inevitable" time when commerce largely moved to the Internet. Pure Internet companies seemed to be the future and many of the stodgy old bricks and mortar stalwarts seemed to be in serious trouble. It is clear now that that appearance was little more than a Potemkin village of false fronts.
Like the sound business entities they are, Wal-Mart and K-Mart spent the time to get their online structures right and are now pushing aside those whose only presence is online. There is now a two track movement. Those pure Internet companies that still exist are building physical structures or partnering with others with physical structures. Many traditional physical retailers are partnering with or acquiring Internet companies. In either case, the end result is a traditional company with an Internet presence. In other words, business as it has always been done as the core with the added step of doing it through a new medium.
The two paragraphs above summarize the theme that courses throughout this book. Two types of companies are headed for extinction, the pure Internet and those with no Internet presence. As the quote goes, "There is no such thing as e-business, it is just business." However, the consequences of the move to the Internet are not to be underestimated. Messages can now travel through the Internet almost as fast as a virus can propagate. Therefore, a dissatisfied customer now has a great deal of potential power, simply by publicly voicing their displeasure. While this power is of course to be feared, it can also be used to your advantage if the planning is done correctly. By understanding that the spending to maintain customer satisfaction is now more significant than ever, it is cost effective to keep every avenue of customer touch points operating at peak efficiency. To succeed in business, the motto must be exemplary service all day every day. This point is explained in detail, with many different ways of coping with this new power structure put forward as solutions.
With the majority of Web users now outside the United States, the emphasis is now shifting to the World part of the WWW. Furthermore, as the purchasing power of this majority rises, it becomes even more imperative for any company with a web presence to understand that the interaction is now multinational whether you intend it to be or not. This is a very complex endeavor, and many of the problems and possible solutions are put forward.
Most of us say good riddance to the high-flying glory rush days of the Internet. Many fortunes were made and lost, although most were probably not really made to begin with. The good news is that it is now possible to use the Internet to build stable long-term business value, based not on hype and fluff, and this book will show you how to do that.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sound Advice, January 16, 2001
This review is from: E-Volve-or-Die.com: Thriving in the Internet Age Through E-Commerce Management (Paperback)
Too bad that many of the CEOs of now defunct dotcoms didn't have this as required reading in their business school classes. What I like best about this work is the roundtable feel of the discussion. Mr. Levy acts much like a moderator as well as an analyst in this edition. With so much changing so fast in the B2B industry, the true lasting power of this book will be determined by its relevance five years from now. I'm going to bet it's still around and useful at that time.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Consitency during the hype, December 28, 2000
This review is from: E-Volve-or-Die.com: Thriving in the Internet Age Through E-Commerce Management (Paperback)
Mithchell is one of the leaders in the emergence of the Fortune 1000 using the Internet to improve business.
As I walked through a book store yesterday, I saw a title "Dow 35,000" another was named "The Top 100 Internet Stocks" (many now at 5% of the price quoted in the book). I almost bought them for history sake and then realized that I could probably pick them up in the near future for 1/10 of their price (still better than the performance of many of the stocks!).
This book stands in contrast. It contains some of the hype that evereyone was imersed in. However, it mostly describes how to use the Internet and network computing to improve your business. Hype will come and go. The Internet and e-commerce is here to stay.
This book will help IT executives make very valuable strides in the essential process of turning their business into a business web.
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