Social media is a very important marketing channel for marketers. Marketing through social media can easily enhance the effects of viral marketing or accelerate the word-of-mouth effect. How small e-stores and startups that lack marketing resources conduct their online marketing strategies and overcome their marketing weaknesses are the points of interest in this research. This research examines how new online shops implement marketing strategies using social media. Our samples come from the E-commerce Idea Competition of 2009 and 2010. The students who participate in this competition only have two months to operate their online stores so that they can be taken as typical samples of new online shops. We encode 141 online shops¡¦ contents, including their final reports and website contents of blogs, Facebook, micro-blogs and YouTube. We use the content analysis method to analyze the dimensions of product information, trust messages, promotions, interactivities, multimedia contents and brand stories. This research is to answer two research questions. The first research question asked is how small e-stores implement their marketing strategies using social media. The findings show that information is exposed more completely in blogs because of the students¡¦ familiarity with blog platforms and the variety of information that it can handle. Promotions information such as special offers is the most commonly used information pattern on social media. The second research question is how the e-stores enhance and overcome marketing weaknesses in using social media. We found out that trust messages are seldom used in social media and only a few promotions skills were used. These are caused by the time constraints and the unfamiliarity with social media. From the results, it was shown that these students used very limited resources in implementing their marketing strategies. Analyzing the contents of the social media can give us a better understanding of the behavior and strategies of small e-stores and startups. To overcome these weaknesses, it is suggested that the features of the social media they want to use be studied first and to reduce the numbers of social media usage to become more familiar with the social media platform. The current study found what the operating characteristics of small e-stores and startups are and some suggestions are given to strengthen their weaknesses and establish long-term businesses. We hope that these suggestions can be applied to the e-commerce environment so that future startups can have a better working understanding of marketing using the social media.

The current study extends the exploration of online relationship building by examining how Business Next top 100 online sellers use the popular social network site Facebook to assist dialogic communication with their fans. A content analysis of Facebook fan pages maintained by Business Next top 100 online sellers (n=100) and individual posts which posted on those pages (n=2804) examined the use of dialogic features within the Facebook fan pages as well as the individual. The contraction process of social networking sites effectiveness indexes used literature review and content analysis. Those indexes were revised by reexamining the circumstances of Facebook. Four dimensions of indexes were ¡§Usefulness of information¡¨, ¡§Generation of return visits¡¨, ¡§Conservation of return visits¡¨, and ¡§Dialogic loop¡¨. 25 indexes were developed. Results indicated that online sellers which manage Facebook fan pages (76%) employed the dialogic strategies of dialogic loop mostly (M=16.76). It presents the highly interactive of Facebook fan pages. Interact games on Facebook fan pages which combine asking interesting questions and special discounts are significantly related with user responses.

With the rapidly development of electronic commerce, the competitions between enterprises have been getting more and more turbulent. In order to win business in such a highly competitive environment, it has to not only implement customized marketing strategy but also have a timely response whenever there is any change in the business environment. Currently, in most companies, whenever the marketing people wants to implement a new sales promotion program, he has to communicate it with the MIS department and ask it to rewrite the Web system and pages. It is quite often a very time-consuming as well as strenuous process. In this research, we have explored all popular and important sales promotion models. Based on these models, an object-oriented Web system has been designed and developed. There is an interface by which the marketing people can set the new sales promotion program and then, the Web system can execute it immediately afterwards. The interface, allows the marketing people easily to select target customers, conditions for getting bonus and contents of bonus to set a new sales promotion program. That is, the marketing people can let the Web system execute a new sales promotion program whenever he wants without the help of system programmers. In addition, the whole design is object-oriented. It lets the system have very high portability.

Electronic Software Distribution(ESD) sprung up in the U.S.A. from 1994. The business volume of global ESD market was 2.5 hundred million in 1996 and the growing rate was over 100% every year. ESD attains to maturity in the U.S.A. and Europe, but the concept of ESD is still in the initial stage in Taiwan. There are a few firms offering services in this scope. However, consumers do not understand ESD clearly. Furthermore, there are very few researches about ESD in Taiwan. All the circumstances are unfavorable for popularizing and promoting ESD in Taiwan. For the above mentioned reasons, this study will seek to further our understanding of consumers¡¦ purchasing behavior and purchasing factors through ESD and how important the purchasing factors affect consumers¡¦ behavior. This study got the purchasing factors of ESD by analyzing and generalizing the functions of distribution in the Web, the characteristics of Internet marketing and digital product, and the Internet consumers¡¦ purchasing factors. After that, this study analyzed the importance of these ESD consumers, purchasing factors. A web survey was conducted on one ESD web site, called SoSoft.net. The total valid sample is 95 consisting of 37 ESD patrons and 58 ESD non-patrons. And the main findings of this research are as the following: 1.The purchasing frequency of the ESD patrons is unfixed, the rate of repurchase is high and the average amount of purchasing is medium. 2.The characteristics of the responded majority are young, highly educated, and are students or employees of the IT industries. 3.The ESD consumers had long histories of using Internet. They tend to be frequent and long hour Web surfers. About half of them have Broadband (ADSL) access to the Internet. 4.For the ESD patrons, six factors are extracted from the questions on ESD purchasing factors. The factors are ¡§purchasing process¡¨, ¡§characters of Internet marketing¡¨, ¡§variety of service¡¨, ¡§option of products¡¨ and ¡§transaction costs¡¨. As for the ESD non-patrons, six factors are extracted from the questions on ESD purchasing factors as well. The factors are ¡§design of the website content¡¨, ¡§characters of Internet marketing¡¨, ¡§distinctive products and service¡¨, ¡§efficiency of purchasing process¡¨ ¡§Web security¡¨ and ¡§availability of try-before-you-buy service¡¨. 5.The ESD non-patrons are much more concerned with the security of payment and the privacy of personal data. 6.With ESD purchasing experience or not, the Consumers value all the purchasing factors with the same importance. 7.The ESD patrons¡¦ concerns of ¡§purchasing process¡¨, ¡§variety of service¡¨ and ¡§option of products¡¨ are influenced by their different age. And their occupations influence their concerns about ¡§variety of service¡¨. As for ESD non-patrons, their gender and education influence their concerns about ¡§distinctive products and service¡¨. ¡§efficiency of purchasing process¡¨ is influenced by the difference in monthly income. 8.The area of residence, Internet connection speed, and the period in history of contacting Internet do not influence the ESD consumers¡¦ concerns of purchasing factors.

<p>Relationship marketing represents a trend in marketing to focus on mutual value creation and consumer retention by strengthening the connection between an organization and its customers. With the growing popularity of online social networks such as Facebook and Twitter as communication platforms, the networks have gained attention as tools that organizations can use to address current and potential consumers. To utilitize these networks, it is crucial for organizations to understand how consumers use the net-works, what attracts them towards communicating with organiza-tions on online social networks and what drives them to maintain these relationships in the long run.</p><p>This study examines the willingness of students, the dominant user base of online social networks, towards the  initiation of relation-ships with organizations on the networks Facebook and Twitter, and the drivers behind the relationship.</p><p>The  study was performed through a mixed method approach consisting of a quantitative survey study and a qualitative focus group discussion conducted at Jönköping University. The survey addressed the topics of usage patterns and adopter motivations, while the focus group attempted to explain and motivate the data gathered during the survey study. Both studies targeted Swedish and international students.</p><p>The students tended to be long-term users of the networks, and were positive towards communicating with organizations through the networks. However, the majority of respondents had not adopted relationship marketing through online social networks at this point in time. The respondents favored access to information and communication channels with peers as value offerings that would attract them to form relationships with organizations. Ulti-mately, relationship marketing on online social networks is com-pletely dependent on the consumer’s consent and wishes, and marketers must focus entirely on satisfying the concerns and re-quirements of its targeted users.</p><p> </p>

Dissertation--Universität St. Gallen, 2008. / Bibliogr. p. 201-230.

This paper examines the effects of serial position, price promotion, user experience and brand familiarity on search advertising in China. Past research on traditional media has hypothesized that TV ads in prime time and print ads in cover pages received more audience's attention than other ads placed in nonprime time spots on TV or other ads placed in inside pages in print media. Recent study finds the "banner blindness" phenomenon in interactive advertising due to user expertness. Past research also indicates that price promotion and brand familiarity have positive effects on consumer behavior. Will these theories also apply to the new media search engine? This study investigates whether higher ranked ads will result in higher click-through rates, whether "banner blindness" phenomenon also exists in search advertising and whether price promotion and brand familiarity lead to higher level of user attention and thus higher click-through rate. First, this paper analyzes advertisements in varied positions within the same context to better understand the effect of advertisement position ranking on consumer behavior, its role in advertising effectiveness, and the implications for interactive advertising and marketing communication. Second, it compares advertisement with price promotion message in ad copy with advertisement without price promotion message at the same ranking position within the same context. Finally, this study explores the relationship between user experience, brand familiarity and click-through rate. Major findings of this study include the following: first, primacy effect, price promotion and brand familiarity can lead to higher level of user attention to search advertisements and thus result in higher click-through rates. Second, user experience has a negative effect on search advertising effectiveness. The more experienced the users are, the less likely they click on search advertisements. Lastly, recency effect is not obtained in search advertising in this study. This study helps us better understand the effects of ad serial position, price promotion, user experience & brand familiarity on search advertising. It adds to our knowledge in search advertising and provides theoretical & practical implications for future research. / text

Traditional redress mechanisms such as litigation and traditional alternative dispute resolution generally fail to strengthen consumer confidence in e-commerce. Rather they may represent an additional source of uncertainty. In particular litigation fails to offer the certainty the consumer seeks. To date, neither European nor American courts have found reliable criteria for determining Internet jurisdiction and have failed to provide consistency in their decisions. In addition, uncertainty arising from unclear concepts on the enforcement level and the high volume of disputes with low monetary value have led to the development of online ADR providers that allow individuals from across the world to settle disputes. Both online mediation and online arbitration serve consumers as appropriate instruments to enforce their rights arising out of online disputes. They are designed for disputes with small monetary value and are capable of overcoming jurisdictional obstacles. On the enforcement level, online arbitration based on the New York Convention provides the consumer with a powerful tool on global level. Online consumer arbitration can ensure a maximum of enforceability if the consumer arbitration rules of online ADR providers incorporate the requirements of the New York Convention. In addition or instead of online ADR, businesses increasingly rely on other dispute avoidance and dispute settlement instruments in order to promote consumer confidence. Some of those models employed by e-commerce companies succeed in promoting trust, while others do so only to a limited extent. In particular, mandatory credit card chargeback regimes give consumers an effective and quick means of disputing a transaction with a merchant at almost no cost. On the other hand, escrow services seem to be less appropriate for the typical small amount e-commerce transaction mainly since consumers are generally not willing to pay the added costs for the use of the escrow service for the average small amount transaction. Trustmark and seal programs provide the potential to give guidance to the consumer about consumer protection standards of the online seller before any damage is done and offer effective and inexpensive certification, monitoring and enforcement procedures. However, to date trustmark and seal systems have applied these powerful tools only to a limited extent. A proliferation of trustmark and seal programs make it hard for consumers to distinguish between differences in the programs and to assess their quality. Rating and feedback systems provide an immediate and inexpensive source of information to buyers about sellers and a strong incentive for good performance to repeat sellers. These systems are prone to abuse and information gathered through these systems is often unreliable. In my thesis I argue that traditional litigation no longer provides the most appropriate means of dispute settlement in the case of small amount crossborder consumer transactions. Neither do traditional ADR mechanisms provide the most convenient and efficient method of settling online consumer disputes. Online ADR and several other models of redress successfully replace traditional mechanisms since they better meet the challenges of online disputes and live up to recognised consumer protection principles. I argue that online arbitration based on international arbitration law such as the New York Convention presents a particularly viable instrument for the settlement of the average smallamount online consumer disputes. After having sketched the jurisdictional hurdles for the resolution of online disputes I analyse whether both online ADR and other trust-creating models are capable of providing an efficient and fair redress instrument for the consumer. For this purpose, the practises and policies of online dispute resolution providers are mirrored in recognised consumer protection principles and the international legal framework. Likewise the potential and limits of other trust-creating models are explored under the question of to what extent they serve the consumer as a viable instrument to impose her rights. The guiding questions of this evaluation will be if and to what extent these recently evolved institutions meet - according to their policies and practises - the challenges set up by the particularities of online consumer transactions.

Shifting demographics and economic factors have recently necessitated the export of prefabricated homes. With respect to trade in the global market, home manufacturers can greatly benefit by using E-commerce and digital networks to communicate with their foreign clients. / The author proposes a software application to assist Canadian home prefabricators and manufacturers of building components to display their services and products in an interactive and electronic format. This tool would help these companies by increasing the size of their potential client base and the speed of their business interactions. / The study concludes that specialised software to facilitate the export of prefabricated homes can easily take advantage of the Internet's speed and accessibility as a download or Website as well as be available on CD-ROM.

<p>Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) plays an important role in improving organizational competitiveness. Information technology has been instrumental in integrating functional areas within and outside firms. This research used empirical evidence to evaluate the state of EDI in the in the willingness of SME's to connect electronically to a large distribution centre in South Africa. Furthermore, it investigated the EDI adoption rate from the viewpoint of a small business. Many such businesses feel coerced by larger trade partners to adopt EDI or lose the customer.</p>