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University of Paisley Department of Computing and Information Systems MSc in Management of e-Business Stream: e-Commerce Project Title: ¨The ¨Info-Quest SA¨ case study :Integrating on line sales with electronic customer services¨ By Name: GIANEDAKIS GEORGE Date: July 2003

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University of Paisley

Department of Computing and Information Systems

MSc in Management of e-Business

Stream: e-Commerce

Project Title: ¨The ¨Info-Quest SA¨ case study :Integrating on line sales with electronic customer services¨

By

Name: GIANEDAKIS GEORGE

Date: July 2003

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Info-Quest SA

Deligiannis Konstantinos - Managing Director Psichogios Vassilis - Sales Manager Avgerinos Chris – Product Manager University of Strathclyde in Glasgow

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ABSTRACT

For the last 20 years the exchange of information is the big issue, which not only completely changed the business world but it affected seriously our lives too. Internet was the killer application that accelerated exponentially the changes in the information distribution systems.

The introduction of the new medium gave the customer, the power to know more about products, services, price offers, businesses, substitute-products, in very short time from anywhere. As the new medium matured the customers had the ability to conduct electronic transactions and to enjoy sophisticated services in near real time. But several important issues rose against its rapid expansion, security, intellectual property and personal data concerns.

This project is focusing on the Greek ITC sector and specifically on Info-Quest SA, which is one of the biggest hardware and software distributors in Greece. It is examining and analysing the current on line ordering system of the company. Primary data is collected through a customer survey, to examine how effectively serves the most important customer needs. The evaluation of the system, leads the discussion for possible improvements.

Electronic customer relationship management practices are forming the academic basis. Customer loyalty, customer value, customisation, intelligent interfaces are some of the aspects of the E-CRM and E-Marketing that are being investigated. The latest trends and state of the art technologies are presented to form the ICT business applications of the future.

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University of Paisley

Department of Computing and Information Systems

MSc in Management of e-Business

Surname: GIANEDAKIS Name: GEORGE Matriculation No: 00/5412/GRF Course Title: MSc in Management of e-Business Project Supervisor: Yannis Psaromilingos Project Title: ¨An Info-Quest case study :Integrating on line sales with electronic customer services¨ Session: 2002-2003 Date of Submission: 25 July 2003

"The copyright of this dissertation rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without his prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged

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Table of contents

Acknowledgments 2

Abstract 3

Declaration 4

Chapter 1 ¨Introduction¨ 7

1.1 Problem specification 7

1.2 Research objectives 8

1.3 Thesis outline 8 Chapter 2 ¨The arrival of the digital age¨ 10 2.1 Disruptive Internet-based technologies 10 Chapter 3 ¨Marketing in the digital age¨ 15 3.1 Information technologies pitfalls 15 Chapter 4 ¨Customer relationships – The key to success¨ 19 4.1 Why is customer service important? 19

4.2 The excellent service characteristics 20 4.3 Customer relationships beyond products and services 20 4.4 Customer loyalty 21 4.5 Customer lifecycle value 22 Chapter 5 ¨Customer relationship management – The latest trends¨ 23 5.1 What is CRM and e-CRM? 23

5.2 CRM basic tools 24 5.3 Why humans are not enough 25 5.4 How technology can help 26 5.5 Building intelligent customer interfaces 27 5.6 CRM and E-CRM - Strategic choice-implementation 29 Chapter 6 ¨Generic web design principals¨ 31

6.1 User identification 31

6.2 Content 32

6.3 Graphical user interface 34

6.4 Navigation 36

6.5 Interpreting research findings 38 Chapter 7 ¨Economic environment analysis ¨ 39

7.1 The global ICT environment 39

7.2 The Greek ICT environment 40

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Chapter 8 ¨Methodology of research¨ 45 8.1 Research basis 45 8.2 Questionnaire design 47 8.3 Sampling 50 8.4 Results 52 8.5 A brief competition overview 69 Chapter 9 ¨ Info-Quest SA¨ 72 9.1 The company 72 Chapter 10 ¨ Quest-Online - The online ordering system ¨ 77

10.1 Technology 77

10.2 Available services 79

10.3 User interface 83

10.4 Customer loyalty practices 84

10.5 Security-privacy 85 Chapter 11 ¨ Evaluation criteria -Customer Perspective¨ 86

11.1 The true customer needs 86

11.2 Basic evaluation criteria 89

Chapter 12 ¨ Conclusions and improvement proposals ¨ 91

12.1 Navigation 91

12.2 Information 94

12.3 Usability 95

12.4 Innovative online services- proposals 97

Chapter 13 ¨ Critical appraisal ¨ 99

13.1 Critical self evaluation 99

13.2 Suggestions for future research 100

References 101

Bibliography 105

Appendixes 106

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CHAPTER 1

¨Introduction¨

The 90s was the golden decade for the IT related industry in Greece.

Almost all the companies, enjoyed respectable growth in sales and some medium sized companies transformed to huge organizations in short time. During the last 3 years the IT sector in Greece is confronting market difficulties, negative sales growth and lower profit margins influenced from the decrementing global economy.

¨Info-Quest SA¨ introduced first, a Web based online ordering system, in the IT hardware distribution sector. At first the development of such a system offered the customers new services and the company built a new competitive advantage. The customers had an additional near real time, information medium available, where they could search for product info, put an order online at anytime, check the progress of products that was in service department and get accounting reports for their purchases.

Until then, all IT hardware distribution companies used the Web, as a ¨brochure ware¨. They had developed static product catalogues and pricelists which where rarely updated.

1.1 Problem specification ¨Info-Quest¨ introduced first its online ordering system, ¨Quest-Online¨

in 2000. Many Greek companies had already implemented such systems successfully but ¨Info-Quest¨ pioneered in the computer peripheral distribution sector.

As the IT related sales started to decline in Greece, distributors, wholesalers, retailers were forced to cut back investment programs and to focus more on their traditional sectors of expertise. Reducing operational cost was the key element to maintain their profitability. The development of an online ordering system would benefit ¨Info-Quest¨ as a distributor and benefit its customers in the same time, wholesalers or retailers. The system reduced human interference for routine procedures; each customer didn’t have to contact a sales representative to give his order. The distributor will be able to use his sales representatives more creatively, contacting potential new customers rather than keying sales orders into the system. Wholesalers and retailers could save much time delivering easier and more accurate offers to the end customer. Undoubtedly the online ordering system, added value through the supply chain by reducing cost and by freeing resources for more effective use.

Each sales representative can handle successfully a limited number of transactions. An online system is more flexible to changes such as managing more requests in rush hours or deliver the information instantly in any communication channel in the company.

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Communication and information quality is always higher in human interactions and an experienced sales representative is far more effective compared to the most advanced ordering system. In other words sales representatives cost more for a company but they deliver higher quality customer services than the ordering systems.

Consequently the company strategy should employ both human and computer based communication channels for better performance. Building a system that emulates successfully sales representative interactions is a rather difficult task. The system should be cost effective, tailored to the company structure, presented in an attractive and functional interface, providing logical applications while stimulating the customers’ emotions.

The problem, this Thesis will try to examine, is how to optimize the current system to meet the rising customer requirements with the use of minimum company resources.

1.2 Research objectives

This project is going to investigate the level of customer satisfaction

delivered from ¨Quest-Online¨ through a primary research. The customers will be asked to express their opinion through a questionnaire for first time.

The research objectives are to discriminate the strong and the weak assets of the system. A future project team could use those results to develop a more customer oriented and functional version of the system.

1.3 Thesis outline This study is examining the integration of online sales with electronic

customer services in ¨Info-Quest SA¨ case. It will be structured in the following sections:

• Introduction • Background / Literature review • Research methodology • Primary research • Discussion of findings / Implications • Recomendations / Conclusions

The introduction section contains a general overview of the project, the problem specification, the research objectives and a Thesis outline.

Chapters one to five are forming the literature review. In the first chapter are indicated the latest and most promising IT

technologies that will change the IT environment in the future: Digital Home, Interactive TV, Expert Systems, Neural Networks, Artificial Intelligence, Bots.

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In the second the most important information technology pitfalls are recognized as: Internet bandwidth limitations, varied penetration of computer technology, privacy and security. As this project will try to evaluate a Web based online ordering system it considers first the opportunities derived from most promising technologies and the threats derived from information technology pitfalls.

The third chapter is illustrating the importance of customer relationships in the synchronous business environment. It is explaining how excellent service can build loyal customers and is determining the customer lifecycle value parameter. The online ordering system, this project is investigating, should be harmonized with the company strategy and built to enhance customer relationships.

The fourth chapter is apposing the latest trends in Customer Relationship Management. It defines the CRM basic tools, explains why humans sometimes are not enough and how technology can help. Finally it defines the term intelligent customer interface and explains why CRM and E-CRM should be thought as important part of the corporate strategy. As the customer-centric model is the most successful in the synchronous business environment, any online ordering system should be harmonized to this model and contribute building long lasting, profitable customer relationships.

Chapter five is indexing the principles and guidelines commonly accepted by Web designers and Information Architects that should be considered before any Web site creation or redesign.

Chapter six to eight are forming the background for the case study. The sixth chapter the latest global Information Technology trends are examined .The Greek IT environment although is seriously effected by the global trends it has some distinctive characteristics that are considered in this chapter.

Chapter eight consists of a brief overview of the company: products, services, customers, people, culture and IT system. In chapter nine an analysis of the online ordering system is focusing in: software technology, available services, user interface, customer loyalty practices, and security privacy concerns. The basic evaluation criteria are presented in chapter ten after ranking the customer needs. Navigation, information and usability are forming the basic axons for the primary research. Those are the most important and determine customer satisfaction received from online transactions.

Chapter seven presents the methodology of research that is going to be followed. Primary research is based upon a questionnaire distributed to selected company customers. Finally the results are being presented and discussed along with a brief competition overview. Strong and weak points of the system are to be stated for first time.

Conclusions and improvement proposals are suggested in chapter eleven concerning presentation, information and structure aspects of the system. Finally there are proposed new innovative services that could be easily integrated to the system.

The last chapter contains critical self-evaluation comments on this Thesis and states future research proposals.

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CHAPTER 2

¨The arrival of the digital age¨

Summary

The Web vast growth favoured the development of innovative Web- based technologies. The most promising technologies are: • Digital Home • Interactive TV • Expert Systems • Neural Networks • Artificial Intelligence • Bots Those will most probably affect indirectly any Web ordering system, in the near future. As this Thesis is examining an online system it should consider first any possible evolution of current technologies and techniques that might transform current e-commerce standards. If the company is aware of the potential of the new technologies, it could react more quickly in a technological change and benefit from the first mover’s advantage.

2.1 Disruptive Internet-based technologies

New Internet-based products or technologies are being developed, by leading corporations. The discussion of disruptive technologies is especially relevant to e-Commerce, because it highlights how seemingly inconsequential technologies such as the Web and the user interface, can have a tremendous impact in business. The most promising are: the Digital Home, Interactive TV, Expert Systems, Neural Networks, Artificial Intelligence, Bots.

The Digital Home. On June1998 took place the first annual Digital

Living Room (1) conference, which tried to specify the technologies that would lead the Digital Home vision. Executives from diverse companies-including Intel, Columbia Pictures, Kodak and Lego Toys- spent three days learning each other’s ideas. Microsoft has invested a lot on that new life style and he is moving towards this new market, strategically (2). Microsoft Chair and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates in Consumer Electronics Show –Las Vegas-, previewed new technologies for Windows XP that transform the humble PC into a kind of digital control centre, allowing users to access their applications and digital content wirelessly from computer screens and other devices anywhere around the home or office. Digital Home will have smart electronic devices that will be linked with each other to provide advanced services- for example you could remotely check the content of your refrigerator, as you go shopping-.

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Digital Home is a concept that it might influence indirectly the business world and more specifically the Web based online ordering systems. Any new software development or higher bandwidth technology will be transferred to business applications inevitably.

Interactive TV. The most basic and perhaps widely recognized

example of iTV(3) is the interactive program guide. An IPG, like that available in many digital satellite/cable boxes, allows the viewer to easily navigate a list of current and future programs using their remote control. And not only does the IPG give access to program listings, but some program guides even offer extended program descriptions, reminders when your favorite programs are about to start, and the ability to search listings based on keywords, actors, or related programs. The IPG is a basic form of television enhancement, but one that illustrates many of the core components of iTV. In today's world of 250+ channels, it plays a critical role in helping people decide what to watch and how to plan their future watching/recording.

Large corporations-telephone and cable companies, publishers, broadcasters, film makers and software developers – expressed the financial interest to support the Interactive TV platform but the have not yet presented a commonly accepted application. The iTV platform will provide new Internet based business applications. An application of ITv in a Web based ordering system could be a special section where the user could see product advertisements and interact with their content.

Expert systems. Expert system is the rule-based system, which can

modify its own behavior according to stored data. The trajectory in expert systems development, or, more correctly, machine learning development, is toward hybrid systems. There are machine-learning systems that incorporate the best aspects of rule-based expert systems, neural networks and statistical methods in their design. The idea behind the hybrid approach is to use the strengths of each technology to nullify the inherent weaknesses of the others.

For example, neural networks cannot explain their reasoning, whereas the rule base of an expert system is can be examined and modified if necessary.

An expert system could modify an online ordering system into a learning system offering easier access to most recently used information and offering a customized interface with the favorite tasks of each user.

Neural networks. The artificial networks, that try to imitate the human

neural activity, are called neural networks. In the beginning, medicine was mostly interested in neural networks as it tried to resolve physical neural abnormalities. In the mean time some application proved useful to some products. There are camera systems with predictive focusing, that predict where the subject will be by the time the shutter opens. Also they can adjust the focus of the camera lens depending on what the photographer΄s eye is focused on. This technology will have many promising implementations if it could be embodied in the Internet interface. It could enhance the interactive communication between the user and the system.

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Specifically a Web based ordering system could be linked to exterior sensors that detect and comprehend human interactions. If the system could identify frustration in the user behavior he could offer him special help options automatically.

Artificial Intelligence. AI is the knowledge system, which may analyze

past data to predict future situations, may adjust its behavior according to environmental stimulants. Nowadays it is probably the most popular discussion in the academic society. Enormous budgets are spent each year on pioneering research programs from leading industries as well as from top universities.

¨There will be billion of agents performing automated interactions between software systems¨, said Benjamin Grosof, a speaker at the 17th International Joint Conference on artificial intelligence (4). Grosof studies AI at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan Management. As a part of his research, he helped develop an AI agent to negotiate contracts for business suppliers in manufacturing. The $29 million (U.S.) project, conducted over three years, was funded by such high-tech firms as: International Business Machines Corp., Lucent Technologies Inc., as well as by the National Institute of Science and Technology, a U.S. government agency. An AI application could allow the system to search the Web for the best price for a specific product, verify its availability and negotiate for a discount and make a purchase automatically.

Bots. Zabaware’s Bots are human like images that focus on carrying a

rational conversation with the customer (fig 2.1) (5). In commercial bot development, related to customer support, activity is focused on three areas. The first approach is to provide text-only chatter bots, without any emotive graphics. The second hybrid, integrated approach, involving a mix of text-only chatter bots and live support. Brightware Inc. utilizes an Emotionally Intelligent Interface in its site to converse with the customers in real time and over mail. For example, Web-based customers can interact with Brightware’s Web assistance bot. The responses created by the bot are realistic and personalized, in part because the system incorporates customer data in the message. Complex inquiries or those acquiring immediate live interaction can be transferred to Brightware’s Live Assistance. The third major area of bot development activity is in creating chatter bots accompanied by images that convey appropriate emotional cues. Big Science Company Inc. offers virtual representatives called Klones (6). Bots could be used in online ordering systems as supplemental to human representatives and offer most frequent asked information through an attractive, human like medium. The maintenance cost benefits and their expansion flexibility are indicating that this technology will probably be established in the near future.

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Fig 2.1 Zabawares’ Ultra Hal assistant (www.zabaware .com)

WEB bots could be deployed against online scammers following news the securities regulator and academic researchers have combined in a $1 million online anti-fraud project (7). The joint research project between the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, the Capital Markets Cooperative Research Centre, the University of Sydney and Macquarie University would see automated search engines crawling the web for scam sites.

Today, computer researchers are striving to be in the Web's next bobsled, the Semantic Web (8). This phase could truly enable robots to do our bidding, leaps and bounds beyond the bots and agents of today - and not just on the Web either. But the prediction has also ignited a new debate within the scientific community. Berners-Lee, the director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and other researchers proclaim that this new form of Web content "will unleash a revolution of new possibilities." In an article published in the May issue of Scientific American magazine entitled "The Semantic Web", Berners-Lee, James Hendler and Ora Lassila write: "The Semantic Web will enable machines to comprehend semantic documents and data, not human speech and writings." A truly amazing era of software agents, greatly facilitated by semantic content and the use of artificial intelligence could be about to dawn, they argue. The authors lay out some of the underpinnings of organizing the language of this next Web revolution.

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The article has also renewed a debate among scientists over the use of the term itself, as well as the promise of robotics on the Web. Is the Semantic Web that close to breakthrough, similar to where the original Web was in 1991? Or is it closer to where detractors say it is: like early forms of hypertext in 1965 - a long way off from actual widespread adoption.

"AI technology has also been around since the 1960s, and it feels to some of us that new approaches are beginning to address the needs of the Web," says Hendler, a professor and head of the Autonomous Mobile Robotics Laboratory and the Advanced Information Technology Laboratory at the University of Maryland. "And just as hypertext needed a new model to make it to the Web, a combination of AI researchers and Web developers are beginning to converge on new models of how AI ideas can come to the Web," he told at NewYork in an interview. Prof. Hendler, one of the authors of the article, is also the chief scientist at the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and is a leading authority on robotics research and the uses of artificial intelligence. In a paper that appeared in IEEE Intelligent Systems Journal, Hendler wrote of the Semantic Web: "I predict that in the next few years virtually every company, university, government agency or ad hoc interest group will want their Web resources linked to (Semantic Web) content - because of the many powerful tools that will be available for using it." But Noah Wardrip-Fruin, a research scientist with New York University's Center for Advanced Technology, says the promise of the Semantic Web is too much of a leap for where much of the research is, not to mention the question of standards in coding data to speak to other data. "I don't think the idea is ill-advised. I just think that maybe they've gone a little overboard in getting people excited (and have) over sold it as something it can't be," says Wardrip-Fruin.

He argues that the term is a more attractive way for selling a scaled-up database. "People want to know what's the next Web, and what's the next thing for my database. But you're not going to get a cover article in Scientific American by saying 'I've got this cool way of making databases talk to each other,'" he says. "What they're arguing for is a scaling up of databases by having this distinct ability (among Web pages) to agree on what the database fields mean. But let's not call that the Semantic Web.

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CHAPTER 3

¨ Information Technology pitfalls¨ Summary

The main information technology pitfalls are: • Internet Bandwidth limitations • Varied Penetration of Computer Technology • Privacy • Security Any Web ordering system should consider those constraints before implementing an online presence. These IT constraints are referred in this chapter as they directly affect any Web application and consequently the online ordering system that is investigated. Security is important as the system includes financial transactions. Internet bandwidth becomes most critical in reducing time per transaction-an important element in business applications. 3.1 Information technology pitfalls

Organizations strive to predict which is the most promising technology

today and which will prevail in the future. They spent much on special research programs and usually they collaborate to reduce R n’ D costs.

Technology and operational excellence are two interdependent variables towards the company success. Technology offers the opportunity but it has to be well fitted with the company strategy, culture, and processes. The most important information technology pitfalls are:

Internet Bandwidth limitations. Restricted bandwidth at the

customer’s site, whether due to customer’s Internet service provider or computer hardware, can limit a business ability to provide interactive, multimedia-rich experiences through its Web site (1)(2).

Depending on demographics some businesses may be forced to create equivalent of two Web sites, one for fast connections (DSL) and one for home users (28.8K). Fortunately, even customers with low speed dial-up connections aren’t limited to one-way interactions with Web portals. Because of demand for two-way, interactive communications, there is an extensive software industry based on serving customers with limited bandwidth access to the Net. There are numerous utilities for Web-based video, animation and audio compression, streaming, transport and decompression.

Even with the utilities described above the bandwidth remains the key issue for advanced web-based applications.

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The broadband discussion has been active for several years, and can be seen as a natural next step in the telecom reform process according to William H. Melody,¨Economics of Infrastructures¨, Delft University of Technology(3). With deregulation, competition, and technological improvements, the market should drive investment in alternative ways for customers to achieve broadband access. Investments in network capacity are growing at a frantic rate, as fibre cable is being laid in many developed countries as fast as the manufacturers can make it.

Preparations for next-generation mobile and satellite systems are moving ahead as fast as possible. The bit carrying capacity of many transmission networks is increasing several times each year.

Varied Penetration of Computer Technology. Worldwide the

availability of PC at home is not equally spread. This fact is keeping down further expansion of PC-based technologies (4).

More wealthy countries have better penetration of PCs (fig3.1). Higher education and higher income individuals log on more frequent on the Internet. Computer ownership demographics vary even inside a nation or even a national region. This fact limits the potential development of information technology applications in a broader audience. Also if a business needs to reach a broader population segment it may have to rely on telephone, television and direct mail as well as its Web touch point.

Today it is said that limited access to information can intensify the gap between the wealthy societies and the poor ones. Hopefully, over the next years computer prices will continue to drop and any person could log on easily and cheap on the Web.

Privacy. To create a personal and personalized Web experience for its

customers, a business needs access to customer information, from general preferences to demographic data. By creating an extensive tracking file for each of its customers, the business will eventually own a database of customer profiles. The value of this profile library is very useful to those companies that want to interpret the behavior of their clients, visitors to successful products-services. Additionally a business may discover that selling customer information could be more profitable than its main business. On 2000 an Internet Provider, Extreme, entered in the Greek market, offering free Internet access. Its only income came from some advertisements-banners-in its home page. After 2 year it disappeared and it is thought that its main business was selling customer information to several Greek companies.

The United Nations guidelines concerning computerized personal data

files (5), are left to the initiative of each State subject to the following orientations:

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1. Principle of lawfulness and fairness 2. Principle of accuracy 3. Principle of the purpose-specification 4. Principle of interested-person access 5. Principle of non-discrimination 6. Power to make exceptions 7. Principle of security 8. Supervision and sanctions 9. Trans-border data flows 10. Field of applications

The Greek Parliament has voted for a body of law in 2000, - the Law for

Protection of Personal Data – that reserves the private rights of Greek citizens. To address customer privacy concerns, a number of companies have

established themselves as clearinghouses for users who want either to surf the Web anonymously or only to visit sites that abide by certain privacy rules. Zero-Knowledge Systems Inc(6). After its customers sign in, their privacy system allows customers to surf the Web, send e-mail or chat in total privacy. Customer messages are then encrypted and routed, somewhat randomly, through a globally distributed network of servers. It would be impossible to build up a customer profile on a customer using the Freedom system because his identity would be different every time he visited the site.

Enonymous Corporation Inc. (7) takes the approach of warning customers about the privacy policy of the Web site they are entering. PrivaSeek Inc. (8)

allows customers to create their own Persona, an encrypted, password-protected online identity. The advantage of their system is that, for sites that support this standard, registration forms are automatically filled in, allowing customers transact faster.

A new standard, P3P-Platform for Privacy Preferences Project-, which is being adopted by Microsoft, enables a business to encode its Web site privacy practices in a standard, machine-readable format. The encoded message can be retrieved automatically and interpreted by software agents. This automated approach to privacy notification saves customers time because they don’t have to read the privacy policy of every site they visit. The ideal private data controlling mechanism should be established from a non-profit organization commonly accepted throughout the world such us the Electronic Privacy Information Center (9) and Privacy International (10). The problem of melding old but still valid concepts of constitutional rights, with new and rapidly evolving technologies, is perhaps best summed up by the following observation (11). Twenty-five years ago there was not much question but that the Constitution of most countries prohibited the government from seizing a newspaper's printing press, or a writer's typewriter, in order to prevent the publication of protected speech.

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Similarly, the government would not have been allowed to search

through, and seize, one's private papers stored in a filing cabinet, without first convincing a judge that probable cause existed to believe that evidence of crime would be found. Today, most of the international companies are moving towards personalization, which means companies find ways to acquire more and more information about their customers. This trend violates privacy rights, shaped from basic Constitutional rights. The problem for each government is to institute new body of laws harmonized with new technologies, without constraining their development.

Security. Security is concerned with the malicious or illegal destruction

off, access to, or removal of information. It is a major issue for the Web and for electronic transactions. Customers do not feel comfortable disclosing their credit card number as the credit card fraud is high. As security becomes critical for electronic transactions, companies shape their security policy, selecting the right tools and knowing their limitations.

There are three major challenges the need to address: protecting data inside the business, handling the transmission of data to others and deciding how much to trust third parties. Despite the high media profile on hackers and viruses, careless employers and disgruntled former employees threaten security more than outside factors.

Each organization should examine the degree of security it needs to establish, correlated with the return on investment and the potential economic loss involved in a breach of security. Today the SSL(12), SET (13) and Secure Server Protocols have been developed and adopted by most online retailers. Another approach to providing Web security is to use public, private keys and digital certificates. According to CERT Coordination Center (14) as the hosts of the Web is increasing, the security incidents are increasing too.

Figure 3.1. Italian Treasury, reported in the Financial Times (20 July 1999)

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CHAPTER 4

¨ Customer relationships – The key to success¨ Summary Customer service is becoming more and more important in the new information era because of the advanced production techniques, globalization and little product differentiation. As this project is investigating the optimisation of an online ordering system it introduces the characteristics of excellent service that should be met in a business-to-business application. Excellent service includes: customer oriented communication channels, appropriate level of service, seeing problems from customer’s perspective, continuous learning organisations. Web based ordering systems should follow this principal and built upon customer relationships. Good customer relationships are delivering profit in the long term as they form loyal customers. This chapter is highlighting the importance of building long term, profitable customer relationships in any online business application.

4.1 Why is customer service important? ¨It used to be, back in the good old days, selling a product to a customer

was enough to ensure success – if it was a good product¨, declares Paul Greenberg (1). Now good product is still necessary but it isn’t enough to guarantee the sale. There are dozens of similar good products competing for markets that have worldwide scope and localized distribution needs. Advanced production techniques enhanced product quality while reducing its cost. With the accession of the Internet to the mainstream, there are more small and large companies competing in a rather declining economic environment. Time to market for new products has been accelerated with simulated test marketing and advanced manufacturing techniques. Click and mortar companies entered rather easily in the marketplaces as the investment in buildings, retail stores, distribution and logistics networks are much lower. Consequently there are more companies offering little differentiated products in a declining global market.

It is not coincidence that customer retention has become one of the primary objectives of contemporary marketing and sales techniques. ''The businesses that are going to succeed are those that, when I call, can access my e-mail history, my account history, my preferences,'' says Forrester analyst Bob Chatham (2).

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4.2 The excellent service characteristics Customer retention is closely linked with excellent service provision.

The online ordering system this project is investigating should be examined from this perspective too. If it could provide excellent service it could create loyal customer relationships. Excellent service includes the following according to Bryan Bergeron (3) and

Frederick Reichheld (4): Customer oriented communication channels. Using shared

metaphors, contextual clues, experiences and mental models to aid in communications. Service is about communicating and relating to the customer. The best-service business gets into customers head by using words and scenarios that he or she understands.

Providing the appropriate level of service. Expected level of service is

the level of service the customer expects from a transaction. Success is on meeting or exceeding the expected level of service in a competitive price.

Seeing problems from customer perspective. When you understand

the reason of a possible problem you can track the deeper roots of any transaction anomaly. Management should solve immediately customer problems but saying yes to anything is not a panacea. It may not be possible or appropriate always to see things from the customer’s perspective. It is not affordable for any organization and ultimately for the other, reasonable customers who will have to bear the economic burden of the problem customers.

Continuous-learning organizations. Organizations that deliver high

quality services to their customers have such feedback mechanisms that provide the improvement suggestions to the system. Additionally such organizations are more willing and capable to change to meet the customer needs.

4.3 Customer relationships beyond products and services Companies are beginning to understand the value that customer, rather

than products and services, generate for them. To promote customer relationships the company should reflect this intention to every interaction with the customer. This means any online ordering system should be customer oriented too. Each organizational transaction creates an experience to the customer’s mind, which constructs an image of the products and services offered. Human interaction is very important for the company image and company people are the face of the company. Many times customers are willing paying a premium price if they have good relationship with the business. Frederick Reichheld, author of "The Loyalty Effect," estimates that companies can boost profits by almost 50% by retaining just 5% more of their customers (4).

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Companies need to integrate marketing, quality and service, rather than treating them as separate elements of strategy, in order to strengthen customer relationships. Also they need to design and manage carefully the ¨service encounter¨ the period of time in which the consumer directly interacts with a service.

4.4 Customer loyalty Customer loyalty implies with the felling or the emotional bond of the

customer that affects his/her buying behavior. Customers will often place a higher value on products with which they

have a personal, sentimental connection. If a business sells a product that reminds customers of their youth for example, they may place a higher value on the product. Also if the company had helped him/her in a technical problem he/she will remember that for a long time and will come back. Consequently a customer’s experience with company’s products and services impact on perceived value and define customer loyalty.

The loyalty effect, form the customer’s perspective can be divided into internal and external factors that act upon his relationship with a business. Internal factors include the customer’s perceived value, the amount of time and energy invested and the emotional bond with the company. External factors include the number of affordable alternatives and the difficulty of allocating those alternatives. Loyalty should be correlated with profit and the challenge is to attract disloyal and profitable customers or make loyal customers more profitable (5). In our case study if the online ordering system provides good service to the users it will create loyal customers that will use it often. Also if the system has a customized interface it would add to customer loyalty. For example when the user enters the system he could find a welcome message with his first name and then presented automatically with the current offers of products he buys more often.

The loyalty can be expressed with a mathematic equation (6) (figure 4.1).

Loyalty effect = (Value + Investment) x Emotional Bond – Affordable alternatives x Frustration) + Difficulty Locating Alternatives Figure 4.1 ¨The Loyalty effect equation¨ according to Bryan Bergeron

(2001) ¨The eternal e-customer¨ McGraw-Hill pp(61-68).

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4.5 Customer lifecycle value The lifecycle of the customer is the interaction of the customer with the

company for a period of time. This includes the customers purchase history, how often did he/she respond to special offers. Companies should calculate how much revenue and profit each customer generates now and how much will he generate in the future. Customer lifecycle value defines if it is profitable to focus to some customers. Past experience suggests that it is far cheaper to retain an existing customer than acquire new ones. In this project, the company should probably decide to offer good service only to customers that are loyal and profitable. Through the online ordering system there could be special discounts only to customers with higher lifecycle value.

One of the most CLV methodologies belongs to Mei Lin Fung (7), a managing director at Wainscott Capital, an early stage VC fund with offices in the Silicon Valley, New York, Washington DC. In a paper that she wrote in 1998 identifies how you can determine which leads become the most profitable customers.

Turnbull and Zolkiewski (8) proposed a three-dimensional basis for customer portfolio analysis, as illustrated in (Figure 4.2). These four segments provide a mechanism for combining hard data (profitability of customers) with more judgemental data (relationship value). Managers can then assess customers in light of these findings and determine which relationships need developing and/or maintaining and which, if any, need to be broken. Initial analysis would suggest that customers/relationships which have a high value and net price combined with a low cost to serve are the most attractive and, those with low relationship values and net prices combined with a high cost to serve are least attractive. It is imperative, however, that such analyses of relationships are not a one-off process.

Relationship Value Net Price Cost to Serve Low High High Low Low High Low Low Low High High Low

Figure 4.2 Segments of the Turnbull and Zolkiewski Matrix, Turnbull and Zolkiewski, 1997, (p 320)

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CHAPTER 5

¨ Customer Relationship Management – The latest trends¨

Summary CRM is the set of processes that try to enhance customer relationships. E-CRM is a Web based communication channel and is integrated with CRM to benefit from the advantages Internet provides. CRM basic tools are: Sales Force Automation (SFA), Enterprise Marketing Automation (EMA) and analytics. Although human representatives are the optimum medium to deliver customer satisfaction, information technology can deliver structured information to more contacts in a less time. Technology can help by: reducing cost per contact, decreasing development time, creating emotional bonds, reducing human error, improving interactivity and return on investment. Data warehousing, data analysis and emotionally intelligent interfaces, are the basic tools for intelligent customer relationship management. CRM and E-CRM initiatives should be strategy driven and well fitted with the corporate culture. By introducing the basic CRM and E-CRM functions, this chapter, is highlighting how the company of the case study can manage successfully customer relationships. The problem this Thesis trying to investigate is how to integrate successfully those tools into the online system to enhance customer service and customer relationships.

5.1 What is CRM and e-CRM?

According to Brent Frei (1), president and CEO, Onyx software, CRM is a comprehensive set of processes and technologies for managing the relationships with potential and current customers and business partners across marketing, sales, and service regardless of the communication channel.

There are many contradictory opinions about the differences of e-CRM and CRM. The opinion of some consulting companies that e-CRM is a different technology is fading. As the recognition of the real value of the Internet as a communication channel became mainstream knowledge, e-CRM is emerging as a necessary Web based channel integrated in traditional CRM. Paul Sweeny declares that e-CRM is the inevitable evolution of CRM (2).

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5.2 CRM basic tools

The general customer intelligence process includes: a. Gathering customer data b. Analyzing data c. Formulating a strategy based on the analysis to recognize

customer value d. Taking action based on strategy

The basic CRM tools are: Sales-Force Automation(SFA). Sales Force Automation (SFA)

according to Kevin Myers (3), vice president of product marketing and business development, for SalesLogix argues that SFA is emerged to allow individuals to not only manage their contacts, but also to allow businesses to manage their accounts. SFA is candidate for father of CRM. SFA is designed to help salespeople acquire and retain customers, reduce administrative time, provide robust account management, and basically, make salesperson activities efficient. It΄s applications could provide mobile access (with PDA terminals) to customer information such as contact management information, product characteristics, sales incentives, order creation and information, automated billing, e-briefings, account management data and opportunity management data.

Organizations can choose three different options to maximize their investment in both SFA and the enterprise applications market: stand-alone SFA systems; ERP solutions with home-built proprietary SFA capabilities blended into one tightly-integrated enterprise system; and the newer balanced strategy of integrating best-of-breed sales and customer automation systems into a flexible, open ERP architecture. (4)

Enterprise Marketing Automation (EMA). EMA is the technology of

end-to-end marketing (5). Its core component is campaign management-the-end-to end administration and execution of marketing thrust. The ¨e¨ component of campaign management is the provision of a single view of a customer to the entire enterprise and those with responsibility for that customer, which are all available with a browser. Most e-marketing toolsets, like those of Siebel (6) and Unica (7), are focused on a suite of products that provide the following:

• Customer intelligence • Extraction and analysis of the intelligence • Campaign definition and planning based on that data analysis • Campaign launch • Campaign monitoring tools that handle lead generations • Response management • Workflow so that there is a uniform customer view across the

enterprise

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Analytics. Analytics are the collection, extraction, modification, measurement, identification, and reporting of information designed to be useful to the party using the analytics. Data is gathered from multiple sources: customer databases, prospect lists, call center records, sales notations and any other customer activity histories. Web based technologies enhance data management techniques.

Analytics are special techniques, based on that data and they may:

1. Describe the profitability of different customer profiles 2. Segment customer groups depending on demographic,

geographic and psychological factors 3. Predict the optimum budget and market segment for

advertisement 4. Measure risk for loosing an opportunity

Newer systems that offer real time interactive personalization products

are beginning to appear with the accession of the Internet as a critical communications channel, according to IDC research group (8). Data warehouses can track the shopping behavior of the customer and propose for him personalized product on the right time.

5.3 Why humans are not enough

Good customer service representatives can provide personal, empathetic,

quality, reassuring service, especially when they interact with the customer in person. An attentive, knowledgeable sales or support person bonds customers to a company. Great sales and service representatives create a loyal effect that’s often independent of the company they represent.

Although there are situations when only a live customer service representative will do, this is not always possible. Increasingly, sales and support interactions occur with the assistance of communications and computer technology. For example when time is of the essence, and an unstructured conversation can resolve things in a few seconds, the telephone is a great technology especially since it’s universally available.

Personal sales, service representatives are expensive from a practical perspective, especially in a 24-7 support model. In addition, there is the variability in service, due to dozens of possible issues, such as a representative’s disinterest in a particular product because there are many other products he/she needs to know about. Representatives usually work with customers one on one. Scalability, the ability to work with multiple customers at once, is possible only in group-presentation situations. There are also errors, of both omission and commission, which can appear in any human-mediated transaction, regardless the touch point. This is especially true when the transaction involves the manual entry of data.

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5.4 How technology can help

Interactive computer and communications technology can assist in the sales and support process in several ways. Telephone, live chat and email can enhance the effectiveness of overworked or outnumbered customer service representatives. Computer-mediated email, chat and animated chat can take over when a human representative is over-whelmed. Technology introduced many advantages in customer service (9):

Reducing cost-per-contact. One to one contact is being replaced by

multitask contact. Computer-mediated email, in which email is generated by a bot, can respond to hundreds of emails in the time it would take a human to answer one or two.

Decreasing development time. Training a sales representative for a new product or service may take a few days or up to several weeks, depending on the complexity and the variety of products and services. With computer-enabled tools, such as library of canned phrases, customer service representatives the development time of products and services is decreased.

Creating emotional bonds. Computer aided chat and animated chat, using emotionally intelligent interfaces provide a personal, reliable, responsive and reassuring interface. The golden rule though suggests that the most loyal relationships are element of human face-to-face interaction.

Reducing human error. Humans are more error-prone than computers when it comes to manipulating symbols and vales.

Improving interactivity. Interactivity, the ability of representatives to respond to customer queries in near-real time, has been improved through new communication channels (email, chat, portals).

Improving return-on-investment. Because of the variable nature of the labor supply and the low cost per contact for computer-mediated dialogue, the ROI for computer-mediated support of all types is potentially greater than for human mediated support. It is rather difficult for IT managers to calculate ROI in IT investments proposals because it is difficult to link the true impact of the invested money on sales and on customer satisfaction.

But technology is not a panacea for solving one of the major enduring problems in the global marketplace according to Champy (2002): cultural arrogance and insensitivity (10).

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HUMAN CUSTOMER SERVICE COMP. CUSTOMER SERVICE CHARACTERISTIC Personal Phone Live Chat Email Email Chat Anim. Chat Cost Per Contact

Development Time

Emotional Bond

Empathetic

Error Prone

Flexibility

Interactivity

Personal

Personality

Quality

Reassuring

Reliability

Responsive

ROI

Scalability

Transference

Variability

High Medium Low Figure 5.1 Characteristics of human-versus computer mediated customer

service representatives over a variety of touch points. Bryan Bergeron (2001)¨The eternal e-customer¨ McGraw-Hill.

5.5 Building intelligent customer interfaces

To succeed in the digitally aware economy, Internet is an essential

communication channel that enhances direct sales, information and customer support initiatives. To succeed in the -so called- new economy, a business has to do more than just erect a pretty Web site. Every customer contact is an opportunity to build a customer relationship and to learn more about customer needs.

Data warehouses. Every business transaction generates data that are

stored in a data warehouse, where they serve as the basis for business decisions and customer support. Customer data may also be acquired form the government, banks, credit card companies, research companies and other third parties. Once data to be included in a data warehouse have been identified, the next step is to create a process in which the data are checked for errors, transformed if necessary, merged and then stored in the warehouse. Regardless of which department initially owns the data (IT, Marketing), they must be readily and seamlessly accessible to anyone in the organization involved in business decisions.

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A properly constructed warehouse takes care of timing issues, automatically performs any conversion in data representation and populates a customer oriented central database.

Data analysis. Given a data warehouse, creating an optimum Web site

still requires an element of logic; that is an ability to reduce the complexity of data enough to recognize patterns in customer behavior and predict future behavior. For someone running a tape rental business, for example, it may be important to know which customers like science fiction movies and which comedy. This intelligence can range from elementary cluster analysis to sophisticated artificial intelligence techniques, such as various forms of machine learning.

a) Cluster analysis: Cluster analysis is one of several

computationally efficient techniques that can be used to identify patterns and relationships in large amounts of customer data. It correlates customer data, such as age, sex, past purchases, number of visits to a site and seasonality of purchases.

b) Expert systems: Expert systems (see page 11) and particularly

rule-based expert systems use a set of IF-THEN rules, to make decisions. An example of a rule is the following: -If the weather forecast is for rain then you should wear a raincoat. -If the weather forecast is clear and sunny then you should wear a hat.

c) Neural networks: Neural networks (see page 11) are ¨black

box¨ pattern matchers that learn by associating an input pattern with an output pattern. Since there are no IF-THEN clauses, it is simply fed with huge amounts of input- output data and it will learn to associate patterns without human intervention.

d) Genetic algorithm programming: Genetic algorithm

programming is another approach to reducing the complexity in customer data because it can identify patterns in what otherwise may appear to be unrelated information. Genetic algorithms are so named because they are modeled after the process of evolution, mutation and crossover that occur in genetics. They can be used to identify patterns or solutions through a mechanism that allows only the fittest solutions to survive and have offspring. This survival of the ¨fittest approach¨ uses a random selection of solutions and determines, within each generation, which solutions should survive into the next generation.

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Emotionally Intelligent Interfaces. An emotionally intelligent interface can be thought of as a life form with memory and logic- perhaps even a semblance of intellect-.

Bots, software versions of mechanical robots (see page 12), are one approach to creating emotionally intelligent interfaces for Web sites. Bots, which predate the Web, are autonomous programs that project intelligence and a personality and usually perform a service. They don’t really have any innate intelligence but they form the impression to the user that they operate under some sort of intelligence control. There are several kinds of bots that can be developed to interact with customers: game bots, mail bots, news bots, stock bots, search bots and chatter bots. Mail bots automatically filter email and perform other routine email functions. News bots can be used to create a custom newspaper from newspapers around the world. Chatter bots generate text-based dialogues and they can be used in customer support. In addition bots can exhibit appropriate facial expressions and can be configured to carry on a relatively decent conversation, with or without voice recognition or synthetic speech.

Virtual Personalities Inc (11), markets verbally interactive characters called Verbots. These bots combine plain English understanding and real-time facial animation. However even chatter bots without anthropomorphic graphics can be used as a customer friendly alternative to excessively long lists of FAQs posted on a Web site.

Creating an Emotionally Intelligent Interface (EII) for a Web site involves much more than simply acquiring a data warehouse full of customer information, expert systems and other artificial intelligence techniques to analyze the data, and an army of bots to converse with the customers. There are still soft issues, such as managing customer expectations and how to communicate with the customer, thereby planting the seeds of an emotional bond.

Anthropomorphized figures are not necessarily emotionally intelligent. Although the latest generations of chatter bots can seem surprisingly intelligent, most are actually sophisticated parrot programs, echoing information back to the user, modified by predetermined content from the chatter bot developers. They simply are not as adaptable or as trained as human customer service representatives. The trouble with using almost lifelike, anthropomorphic figures in EII designs is that customers may assume a higher level of intelligence, interactivity and service potential than a Web site can actually provide.

However, they can act much more rapidly, shifting through large amounts of data, in an instant.

5.6 CRM and E-CRM - Strategic choice-implementation CRM is an important part of the company’s strategy. Any investment on

CRM solution will probably cost several million Euros to acquire and maintain. The management team should justify this amount of investment with short return on investment plans.

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Acquiring the latest version of a well-known CRM software publisher and fitting it in the legacy systems is not easy and not enough for success. Most of the times the company should reengineer some of its basic procedures towards the system new capabilities.

Company culture and especially people are very important at any change, with their behaviour they will enhance or they will hinder any new system implementation. Along with the employees’ dedication, CRM initiatives, should be supported, by the management team.

According to IBM global services (12), the CRM engagement would step the client through the following steps:

1. Management consulting to identify CRM challenges 2. Business process examination and possibly some re-engineering,

if necessary 3. CRM strategy based on specific customer touch points 4. Implementation strategy 5. ROI business case analysis to justify the CRM strategy

CRM implementations are not always successful. According to Gartner

research company (13), attributes failure to poor or ignored data, excessive politics, lack of planning, automating flawed processes and ignoring needed skill sets. In a survey of 219 information technology experts (14), the CRM Consulting Group found that 62% of companies that implement CRM products aren’t customer-focused and only 22% have CRM metrics deployed across sales, marketing and customer service.

Reports from field surveys and case studies draw a troubling picture. Companies fail to implement CRM appropriately. While experts consistently remind businesses that measurement and knowledge are important components to success, few insights on how to manage CRM successfully are given. Kellen and Stefanzyk in their report ¨Complexity, Fragmentation and Emergence in Customer Relationship Management¨ (15) argue that in order for business to be successful in capturing this latest form of pure competitive advantage – understanding customers better and responding faster and more appropriately – additional conceptual models and skills are needed. These models and skills are synthetic and holistic not isolated and analytic.

There are three factors according Kellen and Stefanzyk that threatening CRM implementations: dynamic complexity, fragmentation and uncertainty. These factors must be fought with adoptive iteration, fluidity in anecdotal, correlated and casual measurement and coherency through emergent yet directed corporate self-consciousness. By leveraging our learning capabilities as teams or individuals, mastering new forms of measuring and actively encouraging collaboration and communication that can transcend old boundaries.

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CHAPTER 6

¨ Generic Web design principals¨ Summary Quest-Online is a Web based ordering application. Apparently it should follow the basic principles of Web design, oriented from its business purpose. This chapter is presenting those guidelines and some of them will form the evaluation criteria of the project survey. Some principles and guidelines are commonly accepted by Web designers or Information Architects and should be considered before any Web site creation or redesign. The user identification is the first thing, the development team, should study. Any Web application should have specific objectives and consequently addressed to specific user groups. Thereafter the site content is to be determined. Content should be organized on people’s perceptions about this content: language, acronyms and terminology. Christina Wodtke as Information Architect suggests eight principals for content orientation. Graphical User Interface is the medium that allows human and computer to interact. Jacob Nielsen suggests ten principals for effective graphical user interface. Navigation between the content entities is formed from links, tabs, labels and icons and can be categorized into: global, local, contextual and pagination navigation.

It was some years before that suddenly any company hurried up to build

an online presence. They all wanted to benefit from the first movers advantage. Today many Web experts and gurus argue that any Internet site should

be designed to meet specific objectives contributing to the company business strategy. Furthermore, companies can shape the new medium to their needs to offer improved customer services.

Unfortunately this Thesis couldn’t determine an optimum design methodology that could apply to any business. It will appose some commonly accepted generic design principals, instead.

6.1 User identification Before building or redesigning a Web site the first thing the development

team should consider is the user identification procedure. A site designed to meet the specific demographic and psycho graphic characteristics of a user group is more likely to succeed. The objectives that should be met are more comprehensive and a user centric design can be applied successfully.

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The basic steps before building a user centric site are the following according to Christina Wodtke (1a) who works for Carbon IQ and expertises in user experience:

1. Figure out whom the site is for. 2. Talk to those people. 3. Design the site for them. 4. Test a prototype of the site with them. 5. Change the design based on what you learned. 6. Test the final site with them.

Personas are a tool that Alan Cooper (2) developed based on an old

market research technique. To be better to sell to people, advertisers would take their demographics and try to invent an archetypal human from it. In other words the design expert is experiencing the Web from the users eyes and could see the opportunities to make the design simpler, cleaner and more valuable. The best way to create personas is to start with user research focusing in demographics of the audience, psychographics, gender location, surfing habits and technical savvy. Finally the designer should rank the personas focusing in the most important user profile.

The most useful application of personas is to create short stories of possible user interactions in different situations, some sort of scenario. Scenarios can be used in three ways: as a design tool, as an evaluation tool and as a communication tool. User should be involved in every stage of the design.

6.2 Content

After the user identification the designer will have to determine the content of the site.

Firstly the language and a controlled vocabulary should be selected. Each site subject has a specific terminology, abbreviations, acronyms and alternative spellings. User preferred terms should be defined and brought down to the core collection of unique concepts. Preferred terms are now to be grouped by subject. In this stage a common technique is to prepare a card sort and invite the user to participate. The subjects should be linked associative in such way that only obvious, commonly accepted relationships exist. The final choices and the rationale behind them should be better documented for later improvement versions.

Content should be organized on people’s perceptions about this content. The labels should reflect the words people use most. There are several sources to learn how people think about any subject of interest: observation, competition, search logs and organizing a card sort with potential users.

Christina Wodtke (1b) suggests eight principals in Information Architecture:

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1) Design for Way-finding. To assure that people can return to items of interest, and also to assume that they can find new ones, Information Architects can borrow from an architecture discipline called Way-finding. It is typically employed in disorienting places such as malls, airports and subways to help people get from one point to another. So people know where they are, where the things they are looking for are located and how to get to information they seek. Way-finding does this not only with signs, but also architectural cues and interior design choices. Logos remind people whose site they are on, headers, a navigation bar that shows where you are, and colour-coded sections are all proven ways to orient a user within the site. Clear labels set expectations of what lies beneath, and they are grouped with similar options so that they gain meaning through context.

2) Set expectations and provide feedback. On the Web any user doesn’t know what to expect when he clicks a link, submit a form, or push a button. It is the designer’s job to set expectations for every action and clearly present results of those actions. 3) Ergonomic design. When designing for hands scrolling distances and scrolling frequency should be considered. When designing for eyes colour blindness, nearsightedness, and farsightedness should be considered. 4) Be consistent and consider standards. Some patterns are commonly accepted from visitors and should be followed. For example, its common web convention that a link to the jobs available area is on the bottom of the site. On the other hand a web site cannot stand out without innovative schemes and ideas. 5) Provide error support-Prevent, Protect and Inform. The use of clear, brief, conventional language in instructions and dialog is preventing possible mistakes. Today there are very few ways to protect information entered into forms. Yahoo! Mail’s ¨Save Draft¨ lets savvy users to protect themselves. In the meantime if an error occurs the users should be informed and helped to recover. 6) Rely on Recognition Rather on Recall. Familiar items are easier to remember than unfamiliar, short words easier than long and it’s easier to remember in no particular order than in a particular order. Recognition means that the information should be located before the visitor’s ¨eyes¨ using labels that really work.

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7) Provide for People of Varying Skill Levels. A Web site user might be a beginner, an intermediate or less common an expert. User is a person in motion, in time, changing and learning all the time. Any Web design should assist users in moving to a level of accomplishment that is satisfactory. 8) Provide Meaningful and Contextual Help and Documentation. People doing any kind of vaguely complex task will ask for assistance. The designer should provide the right help at the right moment in the most unobtrusive way possible. A good example of assistance is presented in the Schwab stock analyser (3). The site assumes that the user is not aware of the stock market terminology and explains any economic term that uses. It teaches how to evaluate stocks while you analyse the stock. Schwab’s Help is relevant and meaningful.

6.3 Graphical User Interface Graphical User Interface is the medium that allows human and computer

to interact. The first step in building the interface is to move from concepts to pages. A common technique is through drawing boxes and diagrams logically linked together.

Christina Wodtke (1c) as an Information Architect, suggests 5 principals that are not supposed to be treated as absolute rules. They should be refined and improved to fit any different purpose.

1) Simplicity and elegance. Each element on the page should have a

purpose. Sometimes it is functional: a button to submit a form. Sometimes it is business related: a banner ad for revenue. Sometimes it is to make sense of the page: a coloured box groups together several items that are related.

2) Proximity and relevance. Cognitive psychology has proved that

humans have a locus of attention. That cognitive rule implies that humans will focus intently on the object of their quest and all irrelevant items disappear from their view. The visual design is a message to the user, coded in imagery. That code can take many forms. Placing two items that pertain to the same task on opposite sides of the page is telling the user they are not related. Placing a dark line between two items can have the same effect.

3) Focus and feedback. When users embark on a task the designer

should focus on helping them succeed in that task. Unnecessary items are to be removed from the screen and ascertain that each action has clear feedback. The user should be notified about how

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much time he should wait to achieve the task and informed about the exact type of result he should expect.

4) A Hierarchy of Tasks. Prioritisation is very important. The few

critical tasks are to be identified and provide optimum usability, interaction and user interface.

5) The Right Tool for the Right Job. Each tool has a meaning and a

purpose that visitors will cling to when trying to navigate the site. Dr. Jakob Nielsen is a Sun Microsystems distinguished engineer

currently working on advanced Web service projects in the Sun Science Office. Nielsen co-designed the user interface to Sun's internal Web (SunWeb) and led the user interface team for the redesign of Sun's external WWW pages. Nielsen coined the term "discount usability engineering" and has invented several usability techniques for fast and cheap improvements of user interfaces, including heuristic evaluation. According to Jakob Nielsen (4) the 10 usability heuristics are:

1) Visibility of system status The system should always keep users informed about what is going on, through appropriate feedback within reasonable time.

2) Match between system and the real world The system should speak the users' language, with words, phrases and concepts familiar to the user, rather than system-oriented terms. Follow real-world conventions, making information appear in a natural and logical order. 3) User control and freedom Users often choose system functions by mistake and will need a clearly marked "emergency exit" to leave the unwanted state without having to go through an extended dialogue. 4) Consistency and standards Users should not have to wonder whether different words, situations, or actions mean the same thing. Follow platform conventions. 5) Error prevention Even better than good error messages is a careful design, which prevents a problem from occurring in the first place.

6) Recognition rather than recall Make objects, actions, and options visible. The user should not have to remember information from one part of the dialogue to another. Instructions for use of the system should be visible or easily retrievable whenever appropriate.

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7) Flexibility and efficiency of use Accelerators - unseen by the novice user - may often speed up the interaction for the expert user such that the system can cater to both inexperienced and experienced users. Allow users to tailor frequent actions. 8) Aesthetic and minimalist design Dialogues should not contain information, which is irrelevant or rarely needed. Every extra unit of information in a dialogue competes with the relevant units of information and diminishes their relative visibility. 9) Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors Error messages should be expressed in plain language (no codes), precisely indicate the problem, and constructively suggest a solution. 10) Help and documentation Even though it is better if the system can be used without documentation, it may be necessary to provide help and documentation. Any such information should be easy to search, focused on the user's task, list concrete steps to be carried out, and not be too large.

The above generic principles are really important in building or redesigning a Web site. Nevertheless each site has its specific purposes. So some principles become more critical than others. For example a business-to-business application should focus more on efficiency and error prevention rather than aesthetics.

6.4 Navigation Navigation is the ability of the user to guide him through the site pages.

A study conducted in 1956 argued that people could remember only seven items short term (5). In the study, George Miller tested a subject’s ability to remember irrationally linked symbols and found that people could recall about seven. Some other cognitive studies indicated that human mind is used to grouping items in groups of five to be able to recall them later. Today most navigation schemes use five to seven basic tabs-categories.

Hierarchy and prioritisation of the main concepts are also critical factors in navigation. Labels are attracting first the users attention and they should have the appropriate name and communicate what exactly is each label for. Usually labelling is decided from the user perceptions, common conventions and the company’s brand. Metadata is information about information and could be descriptive, intrinsic or administrative. It is used to organize the information in such way to help user identify it and recall it easily.

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Links are the core elements of navigation. The easiest way to stand out a link is to use different colour that the text it’s nestled in. Icons are useful only if are recognized from the user. A few icons have become universal: shopping cart icon, home icon and mail icon. Well-designed search engines are helping the user to locate the exact information in short time.

Navigation can be categorized into: global, local, contextual and pagination navigation.

Global navigation: Global navigation closely follows the site map and sets up the overall organization. This will most likely be present on every page within the site and should be consistent throughout to meet user expectations. These links are more “hard coded” into the site design and are typically located at the top or left-hand side of the site. For instance, Amazon.com’s global navigation includes Welcome, Directory, and some of their featured stores (content areas) such as DVD, Books, Auctions, Music and Video.

Local navigation: Local navigation defines the hierarchy of a content area. Using the Amazon.com example, the local navigation of a main content area such as Books is Best Sellers, Featured in Media, Award Winners, etc.

Contextual navigation. Contextual navigation (6) allows users to browse through content related to content they are viewing. “See also” links or underlined texts, within paragraphs, are examples of contextual navigation.

Pagination. Pagination navigation is the navigation tool that helps the user to flip through like items in complex, long categories. The most common form of pagination is by linking page numbers. As the user moves through the pages, the numbers change colors to inform him where he is and where he has been.

Today a few Web sites are taking advantage of advances in dynamic HTML (dHTML) to overcome the restraints of HTML forms. The International Herald Tribune (7) used dHTML to allow users to clip articles to read later, change the layout from three columns to one and increase or decrease the font size. The number next to the clippings is a link to let you move through the selected clippings. The user can effectively design a customized newspaper with this tool.

Navigation is the end result of a series of logical steps. Designers put in the time to understand the nature of the problem, work through the complexities of organizing the content and designing the interactions, and finally, they give out the users a way to enter their designs and interact with their creations.

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6.5 Interpreting research findings This project is examining and evaluating an online ordering system in a

real business case study. The purpose of this study is to measure if it meets customer expectations in three specific topics: information, navigation and usability. Also it will try to rank the 5 most important customer priorities in a Web based ordering environment: information, navigation, speed, pricing and presentation. Until today there is not any similar publicized research specialized in online ordering systems in Greece.

From the launch of the system in 1999 until now there was not any research initiative from the company that could assess the system performance from customer perspective. This study will add to the company knowledge, as there will be presented for first time the results for a customer survey about the system. Obvious problems will come up and there might arise possible improvement needs.

But this survey could generally point out the most important factors of a Web based online ordering system. For example if speed and price are thought as the most important elements in this study then those results could be compared to similar surveys for validation.

On the other hand analyzing the results, this project should consider that we couldn’t easily generalize those results to any type of online ordering system in every business sector in Greece. Correlating the results with similar surveys in different business sectors we could argue that the results are more general to any online ordering system.

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CHAPTER 7 ¨ Economic environment analysis ¨ Summary Globally, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is used in a wide range of business transactions, mostly employed by large international companies. Nowadays the most prevalent data interchange is Web-based. Although the Internet has disproportional penetration worldwide, its vast growth is undeniable. This fact is indicating that any medium- sized company, is more appropriate to use a Web based system than an EDI. The Greek ICT environment is following the global ICT trends despite the fact that the PC penetration and the Internet access are far less than the EU average. Relating this data to our case study we conclude that the Internet related substructure in Greece is poor. On the other hand local environment data are apposed in this chapter emphasizing the vast growth of Internet in Greece for the last years.

7.1 The global ICT environment

The influences of the information era in the global economy are more than obvious. The flow of information formed demanding customers for better products accompanied with best services in reasonable prices. The companies are forced to change to cope with the new environment. The product lifecycle is shorter and good service matters more than product characteristics. Distribution channels are less intermediated and redesigned to offer shorter delivery time with less cost. Payment systems although they have evolved introducing new payment methods they are still looking for the secure, commonly accepted, electronic exchange method that will change the entire trade standards. Markets have become increasingly global. The barriers for new entrants are low, since they don’t have to invest much on a brick and mortar company by building brunch offices in several countries. They may build a Web site instead. On the other hand, poor government control is responsible for the newborn electronic crime, which is the most important obstacle of the new economy.

Access to the Internet becomes more pervasive through higher penetration of home PC and other channels as mobile phones and digital television. In figure 7.1 we can see the increasing number of Web users as percentage of the population in Western European countries and the US from 1997 to 2001.

In figure 3.1 we can distinguish US and Japan as the countries that spend the highest proportion of their GDP (gross domestic product) in IT. Outside the USA and EU, Asian countries are have been moving even faster to support the

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creation of an information society. Singapore launched a national IT plan as far as back in 1985 and has enjoyed consistently high GDP (gross domestic product) growth. In China, 1999 has been declared ¨the year of getting on the Internet¨ and all ministries are creating Web sites. Asian governments have been the main promoters of Asian E-Commerce.

The data interchange between organisations is basic through EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) and through the Web. EDI is an electronic data transfer mechanism used in a wide range of business transactions. It is usually associated with the automation for the ¨ billing, stock cycle ¨ where invoices and purchase orders are generated and sent automatically from one company to another. There are only 30-40.000 US organisations that use EDI. This represents a very small percentage of commercial organisations, as EDI is only being employed by the worlds largest companies such as: Glaxo, Marks and Spencer, Courtaulds, ICI and Cowie. For smaller companies, the benefits of implementing EDI are often outweighed by the costs and difficulties of implementation.

On the other hand Web based data interchange is more popular in the business world as it is more flexible and more cost effective. Most ERP software packages are compatible with Web interfaces. So the Web became the most popular data communication channel between business partners.

Business-to-consumer e-commerce. Although it is very difficult to gauge exactly the level of purchases that Internet users making, most estimates suggests that consumers were purchasing approximately $35 billion per annum over the Internet by the end of 1999 (1). By 2004, according to the Forester Group, the business to consumer (B2C) market is estimated to be $184 billion.

Business-to-business e-commerce. The potential for the business-to-business market (B2B) is much higher than the business to consumer. Prior to the dot-com bomb, the estimates for the B2B market were wildly optimistic. Forester group estimated $2.7 trillion and on the other hand for the same period the Gartner group estimated $7.3 trillion. However, since the collapse of the Internet companies and in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001 the market forecasts were tempered.

In October 2001, IDC issued a report on the state of the global IT market and forecast a spending of $1.3 trillion over the five quarters beginning in fourth quarter 2001,on information technology expenditures alone.

7.2 The Greek ICT environment In 1999 according to Euro Stat (2) (Table 1) there were 11 PCs per 100

inhabitants (EU average: 34). Of these, 1 were home PCs and 10 were business PCs. The 52 percent of the population have a mobile phone and 43 % use it (EU average 55% have it, and 48% use it). Also there were 7 Internet users per 100 inhabitants by the end of 1999 (EU average: 19), there was an increase of 55 % since the end of 1998 (EU average 51%). The key points of this report are summarized in Table 1,2 and 3.

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In April 2002, Market Analysis, a Greek research company, conducted a survey on behalf of Intel (3), and found that there were 20 PCs per 100 inhabitants and about 35% of the total population were active PC users. Also there were 14 Internet users per 100 inhabitants.

There are just few companies that lately offer DSL Internet connections. Business-to-consumer market segment is smaller than the business-to-business. Several ICT investment programs have been approved from the Greek Parliament-the most promising is called ¨ Information Society ¨ and is providing the small and middle-sized companies, motives to invest in new Information Technologies. A part of this huge project concerns the public sector reorganization through advanced IT technologies. Its scope is to reduce bureaucracy, optimise operations of any public organisation, offering better welfare services with less cost.

Figure 7.1 Web users as % of population (USA and Western Europe) J. O’Connor and E. Galvin (2001) ¨Marketing in the Digital Age¨2nd Ed. Financial Times p(15).

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Table 1

General ITC Statistics-Greece

PC penetration -there was 11 PCs per 100 inhabitants by the end of 1999 (EU average: 34). Of these, 1 were home PCs and 10 were business PCs. (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00)

Desktop computers, laptops and palm computers/persona1 organizers -15% of the population own a desktop computer at home, and 11 % use it; 1 % own a laptop, and 1 % use it; 3% own a palm computer/personal organiser, and 3% use it (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Telephone 1ine penetration -there were 92 telephone lines per 100 inhabitants by the end of 1999. Of these, 54 were conventional lines (EU average: 46); 1 were ISDN channels (EU average: 8); and 36 were mobile ph~e subscriptions (EU average: 40) (R.E.) (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00) \

Voice communication prices 1: loca1 cal1s -the average price for a minute of local voice communication for households was 0.027 euros (EU average: 0.0399 euros); the average price for business was 0.024 euros (EU average: 0.0402 euros) (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00)

Voice communication prices 2: nationa11ong distance cal1s -the average price for a minute of national lοng distance calls for households was 0.204 euros (EU average: 0.091 euros); the average price for business was 0.175 euros (ΕU average: 0.086 euros) (c.f. EU-15)(ESIS*/10-00)

Mobi1e phone penetration -52% of the population have a mobile phone at home, and 43% use it (EU average 55% have it, and 48% use it)

(c.f. Ευ-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

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Source: Euro Stat (2) Table 2

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Source: Euro Stat (2)

Table 3

General Internet Statistics-Greece

Internet users on-1ine -there were 7 Internet users per 100 inhabitants by the end of 1999 (EU average: 19), which was an increase of 55% since the end of 1998 (EU average: 51%). (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00)

Internet penetration in homes -6% of the population have a home Internet connection, and 5% use it. (EU average 18.3%) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Home ISDN access -0% (?!) of the population have ISDN line at home, and 0% (?!) use it (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Internet penetration within companies -32% of all companies had Internet access by the end of 1999 (EU average: 63%), which represents ah increase of28% since the end of 1998 (EU average: 27%) (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00)

Hea1th research -28% of the on-line population have used the Internet in the past 3 months to search for health-related information (EU average 23%) (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Government on-1ine -19% of the on-line population have used the Internet in the past 3 months to visit government web sites (EU average 15%) (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

University Internet access -19% of the total population have Internet access at university (Ευ average 10%) (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

School Internet access -4% of the total population have Internet access at school (EU average 9%) (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Internet hosts -1 % of the 8,651,180 Internet hosts in Europe are Greek (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00) .

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Entertainment

TV penetration -31 of every 100 inhabitants own TV sets. (c.f. EU-15, except D) (ESIS* /10-00)

Satel1ite dish, cable, and digita1 TV penetration -1 % of Greeks own a satellite dish, 1 % use it; 8% have cable television, 8% use it; 3% have a digital TV subscription, 3% use it. (c.f.EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Homes passed by cable ΤV, and cable TV penetration -the percentage of the number of homes passed by cable out of the total number of households is 3%; whilst the percentage of cable TV household subscribers out of all the homes passed is 11 % (c.f. Ευ -15, except Ι) (ESIS*/10-00) ,

Satel1ite TV penetration- the percentage of homes equipped with satellite out of the total number of TV sets is 6% (c.f. EU-15) (ESIS*/10-00) Games consoles -8% of the population own a games console, and 4% use it (c.f.. EU-15) (2000 Ι ΕΒ 53/3-00)

Gaming on-line -54% of the on-line population have played computer games on-line in the last 3 months (c.f. EU-15) (2000 ΕΒ 53/3-00)

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Source: Euro Stat (2)

CHAPTER 8

¨ Methodology of research¨ Summary Chapter eight introduces the methodology of research and the evaluation process of Quest-Online. It describes the statistic methods and the questionnaire design. This project will follow a descriptive research approach, as there is no background of secondary data to focus on specific issues. Consequently this project will conduct a descriptive quantitative research focusing on primary data. It will try to assess basic evaluation criteria based on the company system developers perceptions and on secondary data such as customer complaints and suggestions. The questionnaire structure should consider: the respondent and the interviewing environment, the interesting content, the research objectives, the interviewee culture and knowledge and the appropriate format for the analysis stage. This research project will be based in a random stratified sample. A stratified sample is obtained by independently selecting a separate simple random sample from each population stratum. In a brief competition overview ¨Quest-Online¨ is compared to its major competitor ¨Pouliadis¨. Basic advantages and disadvantages of each system are highlighted. 8.1 Research basis

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There are three main types of research, which may be employed in a research project. Each one has advantages and disadvantages, and each will find their optimal use in certain types of research situation. As one moves from exploratory, through descriptive to causal research, then there is an increase in their degrees of formality and a decrease in the flexibility in the ways in which the research may be carried out.

Exploratory research. Exploratory research is most useful in the preliminary stages of a project when levels of uncertainty and ignorance of a specific situation are at their highest. Information may be derived from secondary sources of data and from personal interviews with expert knowledge; Data may also be gleaned from mini-samples and small-scale experiments. The prime aim of exploratory research is to uncover the boundaries of the environment and the salient variables that may be found relevant to each study.

Descriptive research. The purpose of descriptive research is to

provide an accurate and valid description of the salient variables. Descriptive research doesn’t try to uncover any casual links between the variables it merely describes them. Data may come from a multitude of sources, but the bulk is likely to arise from secondary sources and from surveys. In many cases, a combination of exploratory and descriptive research will provide sufficient data for the research objectives to be fulfilled. However, in other situations, a mere description of the variables at play will not satisfy the research demands; where it is required to prove the relationship between, say variable A and variable B, then causal research is called for.

Causal research. Causal research is necessary to uncover dynamic relationships.

If the data of the research has been collected for some purpose other than one under consideration is called secondary data. On the other hand primary data has been collected specifically to answer the questions posed by the research objectives.

Basically there are two main sub schools of thought in research: qualitative research techniques and quantitative research techniques.

Quantitative research. Quantitative research holds numerical and statistical measurements and is focusing in correlating variables, calculating means, medians and deviations. They form a basis for future sub-group sampling and comparisons. It is most often used for descriptive and causal research especially natural sciences. There are two basic quantitative research methods surveys and observation.

Qualitative research. Qualitative research is more abstract and is trying to increase understanding, expand knowledge, generate hypothesis, and identify human behaviours and interactions. It is most often used for exploratory studies and is common method for social sciences. The qualitative research methods are: group discussions, individual depth interviews, projective techniques and observation.

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Qualitative Quantitative Open-ended, dynamic, flexible Statistical and numerical measurement Depth of understanding Sub - group sampling or comparisons Taps consumer creativity Survey can be repeated in the future and be compared Database - broader and deeper Taps individual responses Penetrates rationalised responses Less dependent on research executive skills Richer source of ideas and creativity

Fig 8.1 Qualitative Vs Quantitative research methods Gordon &

Langmaid (1988) Most of the times it is difficult to dissociate quantitative form qualitative

methods. For example a quantitative researcher will have to evaluate the environment variables that will survey (qualitative research), before designing the questionnaire. A qualitative researcher will probably categorize the answers of an open-ended question for easier data collection. Each method has advantages and disadvantages, they complement each other, and it is upon the researcher, the judgement for the most appropriate choice.

The objective of our research is to measure customer satisfaction of the ¨Quest-Online¨ users. The results will indicate us the strong points of the system and the weak points that need change or further improvement. This project has to consider that this is the first survey that will try to measure customer satisfaction derived from the online ordering system.

Consequently this project will conduct a descriptive quantitative research focusing on primary data. It will try to assess basic evaluation criteria based on the company system developers perceptions and on secondary data such as customer complaints and suggestions.

Primary research, or field research, is of critical importance when developing a new service and in evaluating a system from a customers’ point of view. Because of its importance and, quite often, its complexity, primary data collection is typically managed as a discrete project and sometimes outsourced to specialists.

Primary research in this study will be based on a questionnaire that will be distributed through email to the customers that use the system already. A typical scheme of Marketing Research different stages is indexed in figure (8.2).

Define Research Objectives

Develop Research Plan

Collect Data

Analyze Data

Present Findings

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FiFig 8.2 Stages of Marketing Research J. O’ Connor, E. Galvin (2001)

¨ Marketing in the digital age ¨ Financial Times Prentice Hall p39. 8.2 Questionnaire design The basic considerations that should be highlighted, before the

questionnaire design are: The Respondent and the Interviewing Environment. As companies

have recognized the importance of marketing research, they focused on reducing the factors that cause subjective opinion expressions. An experienced interviewer can detect if the respondent is honest and valuate the interviewing environment but an email survey is impersonal. Furthermore, the huge number of surveys, each customer is exposed to, has caused a negative trend to any surveyor.

It is estimated that over 40 percent of all persons contacted refuse to participate in surveys (1). Each research should first consider the respondent and the interviewing environment before designing the questionnaire.

Interesting Content. To gather completed interviews a questionnaire

should be concise, interesting, and flow in a logical, clear-cut manner. Although a questionnaire is constructed at a person's desk or in a conference room, it is administered in a variety of situations and environments. Busy, or otherwise preoccupied, respondents will terminate uninteresting interviews. In our case study the interviewers will probably receive the questionnaire in their mailbox and they might be busy by the time they receive the questionnaire by e-mail. They will probably deny spending more than 5 minutes to fill in a lengthy questionnaire.

Focus on Research Objectives. "Nice to know" questions are those that seem interesting, but obtain no managerially useful information. By tacking on additional questions not related to the original purpose of the survey, two problems emerge. First, the interview becomes disjointed with topics coming in a dizzying array of unrelated topics. This destroys the flow and continuity of the questionnaire. The second problem is additional questionnaire length. Generally the longer the interview, the more difficult it is to find target individuals who will complete the survey. An interview that is only partially completed is worthless to the researcher. It is also time consuming, costly, and frustrating to the interviewer.

The Interviewee culture and knowledge. One of the most important tasks of questionnaire design is to "fit" the questions to the prospective respondent. The questionnaire designer must strip away the marketing jargon and business terminology that may be misunderstood by the respondent. In fact,

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it is best to use simple, everyday language, as long as the result is not insulting or demeaning to the respondent.

Having the Appropriate format for the analysis stage. The

questionnaire must be convenient for the data collection and analysis stage. It shouldn’t have many open answers and in the same time the survey manager should expect any editing of incomplete questions. Usually research organisations test each questionnaire in a small sample, before any survey, to track any problems in the analysis stage.

The questionnaire (Appendix 1) is short as it contains 13 short questions. The

respondents will be interviewed through telephone. Each respondent needs approximately 3 to 4 minutes to answer the questions. This study considered that the research will take place on working time and it should not be confusing or time consuming. Generally there are three evaluation topics that are being questioned: navigation, information and usability. The system users are asked to evaluate each topic using a scale.

Very good Good Medium Bad Very Bad

The first question will help us identify the volume of the products they

order online daily. This information is useful as the company can identify the customers that use the system often. It could weigh most their opinion than those who do not use it often.

The second question is investigating the appropriateness of the colors and graphics utilized, a Graphic User Interface element (Chapter 6.3). Colors and graphics are elements of the system that continually interact with the user and they communicate the quality level of it.

Questions two to five are investigating the navigational ability the system offers (Chapter 6.4). Question three investigates the link clarity, question four investigates local navigation and question five investigates page logical order. Navigation is most important in a business application such as a Web based online ordering system, where time is valuable (Chapter 6.4). The questions were expressed in a few words as simple as possible to avoid misunderstandings and non-sampling errors. These three questions will give a clear idea about the navigational ability of the system.

Questions six is investigating information accuracy asking if product characteristics are correct. Question seven is about information accuracy asking if inactive product codes are removed immediately from the system. Question eight is about information coverage asking whether the information is detailed enough or is there a need for deeper documentation. Questions sit to eight will point out the information quality the system offers. Site content and information are most critical in Web based business-to-business online systems (Chapter 6.2).

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Question nine is assessing the speed of the system asking if the pages are downloading in less than ten seconds. Question ten is assessing the usability asking if the site is easy to use and question eleven is assessing the learning ability of the system asking if the system was easy to learn. Questions nine to eleven are assessing the usability of the system (Chapter 6.3). These questions are rather general and exploratory, intending to find out if the system has any usability problem. If the users don’t seem satisfied a new research could focus more and find our where this problem comes from.

Question twelve will rank the most important elements of the ideal online ordering system. The results of this question will help this research weigh the importance of each question. This question is critical, as it will try to prioritize the customer needs. The final question is more abstract as it asks for an overall comparison of Quest-Online and its major competitor. This is also an exploratory question trying to find out if competition has a better system. If the results show that the competitive system is better a new research could focus on that and try to find out why competitors system thought to be better.

The respondent is asked to evaluate each topic in a balanced scale: The possible evaluation marks are 5: very good – good – medium – bad – very bad.

No similar survey has been conducted yet, evaluating the online system of Info-Quest and this research has not any indications on which topic it should focus most. The three topics we are investigating have been chosen through literature review, system developers’ perceptions, and customer information such us complaints and proposals. The questionnaire includes instructions about marking each answer that describes best his opinion. Additionally includes information explaining the purpose of the survey and the importance of their participation.

8.3 Sampling

This study will follow a quantitative research approach. After completing the questionnaire, the sample of the customer population must be determined. The desirability of a sampling procedure depends on both its vulnerability to error and its cost. However, economy and reliability are competing ends, because, to reduce error often requires an increased expenditure of resources. There can be two possible errors in the sampling procedure, sampling error and non-sampling error (2).

Sampling error comprises the differences between the sample and the population that are due solely to the particular units that happen to have been selected. There are two basic causes for sampling error. One is chance: That is the error that occurs just because of bad luck. This may result in untypical choices. Unusual units in a population do exist and there is always a possibility that an abnormally large number of them will be chosen. The main protection against this kind of error is to use a large enough sample. The second cause of sampling is sampling bias. Sampling bias is a tendency to favour the selection of units that have particular characteristics. Sampling bias is usually the result of a

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poor sampling plan. The most notable is the bias of non-response when for some reason some units have no chance of appearing in the sample.

A non-sampling error is an error that results solely from the manner in which the observations are made. This type of error can occur whether a census or a sample is being used. Like sampling error, non-sampling error may either be produced by participants in the statistical study or be an innocent by product of the sampling plans and procedures.

Of the two types of statistical errors, only sampling error can be controlled by exercising care, in determining, the method for choosing the sample. Sampling bias on the other hand may be minimized by the wise choice of a sampling procedure.

This research project will be based in a random stratified sample. A stratified sample is obtained by independently selecting a separate simple random sample from each population stratum. The 1000 active customers-population in our case study is divided into three groups based on the characteristic of the sales volume potential of each customer (3). So the stratums that will formulate the sample will be:

• Big-size customers 15% • Medium-size customers 25 % • Small-size customers 60 %

That way this research will try to replicate the population’s distribution

but we will, at the same time, select the respondents from each stratum randomly.

In quantitative research methods the optimum sample size can be determined by the following mathematic equation (4) in normal distribution populations.

n=﴾Za/2*σ/e﴿ ²

Where n = sample size Za/2 = confidence limit σ² = variation of population σ = standard deviation of sample e = statistical error R = the maximum value range X = sample median μ = population median Because it is difficult to know the population variation (σ²) we accept

that the 97% of our observations will be R where R=6σ => σ=R/6. If we want e=(X-μ)=max then e=Za/2 *σ / √n

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In this project, we cannot determine an optimum sample size as the variables are measuring attitude values such as customer satisfaction, customer preferences and perceptions. We will survey a 50 customers sample out of a 1000 customer population, which represents 5 per cent of the total customer base. The sample is going to represent equally the stratums described above but in the same time the customers from each stratum will be randomly selected. Consequently we are going to survey:

• 7 big-size customers • 13 medium-size customers • 30 small-size customers

8.4 Results

The survey took place from 1st of April until the 30th of April 2003 and

the results are described above.

Question1 The total volume of your daily purchases through Quest-Online is:

Answer Observation % Less than 500 € 25 50% From 500 € to 1500 € 19 38% Above 1500€ 4 8% None 2 4%

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1) The total volume of your daily purchases through Quest-Online is:

50%

38%

8%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Less than 500€

From 500 € to1500 €

Above 1500€

1) The total volume of yourdaily purchases throughQuest-Online is:

Half of the respondents are using the site for orders less than 500€. Also

only an 8 % is using the system order higher value products. This could indicate that users prefer to give higher volume orders directly to their account manager because they trust them more, than the system.

Question 2 Is site is aesthetically appealing (colors-graphics)?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 29 58% Medium 12 25% Bad 4 8% Very bad 3 4% I don’t know 2 4%

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2) Is site is aesthetically appealing (colors-graphics)?

0%

58%

25%

8%4% 4%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Verygood

Good Medium Bad Verybad

I dontknow

2) Is site is aestheticallyappealing (colors-graphics)?

A respective 37% of the respondents are not satisfied from the graphical

interface or Quest-Online. Although the graphic interface is less important in a business-to-business application, it is important to offer a pleasant environment for a user that spends much of his working time in it.

Question 3 Are links clearly labeled?

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3) Are links clearly labeled ?

0%

54%

33%

13%

0% 0%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Verygood

Good Medium Bad Verybad

I dontknow

3) Are links clearly labeled ?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 26 54% Medium 16 33% Bad 8 13% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

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Users don’t have a clear idea about where they will be linked when they

click a tab. Only 54% states that links are properly labelled.

Question 4 Can you navigate yourself easily through its pages ?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 34 67% Medium 12 25% Bad 4 8% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

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4) Can you navigate yourself easily through its pages ?

0%

67%

25%

8%

0% 0%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

4) Can you navigate yourselfeasily through its pages ?

Navigation ability is good states the 67% of the respondents. This rate

should be satisfactory for the development team but it could be improved.

Question 5 Do pages follow a logical order?

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5) Do pages follow a logical order ?

0%

71%

29%

0% 0% 0%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

5) Do pages follow a logicalorder ?

Pages are following a logical order according to the 71% of the users

asked. It should be noticed that none of the users evaluated the page architecture as poor.

Question 6 Are the product characteristics presented, correct?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 36 71% Medium 14 29% Bad 0 0% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 23 46% Medium 19 38% Bad 8 17% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

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6) Are the product characteristics presented correct ?

0%

46%

38%

17%

0% 0%0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

Verygood

Good Medium Bad Verybad

I dontknow

6) Are the productcharacteristics presentedcorrect ?

Question 6 is indicating a problem in the system. More than half of the

respondents think that product characteristics are not always correct in the system.

Question 7 Inactive product codes are removed immediately from the system?

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7) Inactive product codes are removed immediately from the system ?

0%

75%

13%8%

0%4%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

7) Inactive product codes areremoved immediately fromthe system ?

The majority (75%) of the users think that the system is often updated

and inactive products are removed immediately from the system. Only 8% of them think that the system is not updated often.

Question 8 The information is detailed enough or there is need for deeper documentation ?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 37 75% Medium 7 13% Bad 4 8% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 2 4%

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8) The information is detailed enough or there is need for deeper documentation ?

0%

75%

13%8%

0%4%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

8) The information is detailedenough or there is need fordeeper documentation ?

The 75% of the respondents are quite satisfied with the information

depth provided from the system.

Question 9 Pages are downloading in less than 10 seconds.

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 37 75% Medium 7 13% Bad 4 8% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 2 4%

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Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 25 50% Medium 16 33% Bad 9 17% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

9) Pages are downloading in less than 10 seconds.

0%

50%

33%

17%

0% 0%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

9) Pages are downloading inless than 10 seconds.

Speed is one of the most important elements in business-to-business

applications (according to question 12 results). 50% of the users find the current system speed good 33% think that the system provides a medium level of speed and 17% of them think that the system speed is bad. Speed is affected from the number of the users connected to the system. On rough hours speed is worse.

Question 10 Is the site is easy to use? Can you easily find meaningful information?

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10) Is the site is easy to use ? Can you easily find meaningfull information ?

0%

75%

21%

4%0% 0%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

10) Is the site is easy to use? Can you easily findmeaningfull information ?

The site usability is good according to the 75% of the users. Only 4% of

them think that the usability is bad. Question 11 Was the system easy to learn?

Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 37 75% Medium 11 21% Bad 2 4% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

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Answer Observation % Very good 0 0% Good 48 96% Medium 2 4% Bad 0 0% Very bad 0 0% I don’t know 0 0%

11) Was the system easy to learn ?

0%

96%

4% 0% 0% 0%0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

120%

Very go

od

Good

Medium Bad

Very ba

d

I don

t kno

w

11) Was the system easy tolearn ?

The system was easy to learn according to 96% of the respondents.

Question 12a Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Information in an ideal online system

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Answer Observation % 1st Priority 16 33% 2nd Priority 16 33% 3d Priority 15 29% 4th Priority 3 4% 5th Priority 0 0%

12) Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Information in an ideal online system

33% 33%

29%

4%

0%0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

1stPriority

2ndPriority

3dPriority

4thPriority

5thPriority

12) Rank from 1 to 5 theimportance of Information inan ideal online system

Information is one of the most important elements in B2B online

ordering systems. The majority of the users state that information should be in the top 3 priorities of any system.

Question 12b Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Navigation in an ideal online system

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12) Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Navigation in an ideal online system

4%8% 8%

79%

0%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

1stPriority

2ndPriority

3dPriority

4thPriority

5thPriority

12) Rank from 1 to 5 theimportance of Navigation inan ideal online system

79% of the respondents think that navigation should not be a top priority.

That result is quite contradictory to the theory that suggests that navigation is very important element in every Web site, architecture. It seems that the respondents are not noticing its importance.

Question 12c Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Speed in an ideal online system

Answer Observation % 1st Priority 2 4% 2nd Priority 4 8% 3d Priority 4 8% 4th Priority 40 79% 5th Priority 0 0%

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Answer Observation % 1st Priority 16 33% 2nd Priority 23 46% 3d Priority 9 17% 4th Priority 2 4% 5th Priority 0 0%

12) Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Speed in an ideal online system

33%

46%

17%

4%

0%0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

1stPriority

2ndPriority

3dPriority

4thPriority

5thPriority

12) Rank from 1 to 5 theimportance of Speed in anideal online system

Speed is a very important element as the 96% of the respondents have

chosen speed among the top three priorities in an ideal online system. Question 12d Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Presentation in an ideal online system

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12) Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Presentation in an ideal online system

4% 0% 4% 0%

92%

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100%

1stPriority

2ndPriority

3dPriority

4thPriority

5thPriority

12) Rank from 1 to 5 theimportance of Presentationin an ideal online system

The majority (92%) stated that the less important priority of an online

system is the site presentation (graphics, colours etc.). It is a rather logical approach, supported by the theory, suggesting that business-to-business applications should not focus much on fancy graphics, sound and advanced presentation techniques.

Question 12e Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Lower Pricing in an ideal online

Answer Observation % 1st Priority 2 4% 2nd Priority 0 0% 3d Priority 2 4% 4th Priority 0 0% 5th Priority 46 92%

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system

12) Rank from 1 to 5 the importance of Lower Pricing in an ideal online system

25%

13%

42%

13%8%

0%5%

10%15%20%25%30%35%40%45%

1stPriority

2ndPriority

3dPriority

4thPriority

5thPriority

12) Rank from 1 to 5 theimportance of LowerPricing in an ideal onlinesystem

Special pricing policy is important element as 38% of the respondents

think that it should in the top 2 priorities of the system. The 42% places it in the third priority. From this statistics this research might assume that pricing is important but information and speed are most important (12a,12c).

Question 13 How do you think of the quality level of ¨Quest-Online¨ compared to

Answer Observation % 1st Priority 13 25% 2nd Priority 6 13% 3d Priority 21 42% 4th Priority 6 13% 5th Priority 4 8%

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other online ordering systems?

13) How do you think of the quality level of ¨Questonline¨ compared to other online ordering systems?

4%

29%

25%

29%

0%

13%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

FarBetter

Better Same Worse MuchWorse

I dontknow

13) How do you think of thequality level of ¨Questonline¨compared to other onlineordering systems?

Generally the quality level of Quest-Online is almost the same since only

a 4% of the users think that it is far better than any other site. Quest-Online was the first business-to-business application and it offered a competitive advantage to the company. Now the situation is changed. New competitive systems are designed to serve their customers and it seems they are doing it successfully. The company now has to find new ideas on how to improve its online system to stand out from competition.

8.5 A brief competition overview

Answer Observation % Far Better 2 4% Better 15 29% Same 12 25% Worse 15 29% Much Worse 0 0% I don’t know 6 13%

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Until recently ¨Quest-Online¨ was the only system in the hardware-

software distribution sector that offered ordering services through the Web. A few months ago the major competitor of ¨Info-Quest¨, ¨Pouliadis SA¨, launched its own online ordering application (fig 8.3). As we will briefly examine both systems we should notice that Quest-Online is developed by an internal business unit, but ¨Pouliadis¨ outsourced the whole project.

Fig 8.3 Login page of ¨Pouliadis¨ SA Online ordering system.

Navigation. The physical interface looks homogenous as it follows a

single colour pattern. On the top and left of the page is indexed the company logo followed by a same colour graphics, as background (fig 8.4). In contrast ¨Quest-Online¨ does not use any graphic presentations.

The basic functions offered are clearly indexed on the top of the page and they are six options. The options are: Products, Orders, General, My B2B, Technical, Reporting. The tool buttons on the top and right link to specific functions as back, close, home, search and shopping cart, using symbolic icon buttons. This approach is shaping a user-friendly interface as the user may view any information by checking each link in a single horizontal layout. On the other hand Quest-Online is offering a less constructed interface (fig 10.3 ).

Navigational functionality is satisfying as in every page is indexed a

short trail of links that led the user to the current page. In Quest-Online there is no such trail and the user cannot view which route is followed until the current page. A search engine is offering advanced internal information search. Both

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competitive systems have built local search engines with no link to external resources.

Product Menu

Category Sub category Brand Search

Fig 8.4 Product menu page of ¨Pouliadis¨ online ordering system. Information. The site maintains simple information architecture. Each

page has a clear scope and the bar with the six main links can be viewed in on the top of each page. We cannot measure information accuracy or if product characteristics or prices are updated often as this project couldn’t get access to the competitive system.

If we would try to compare the product menus of the two systems we would see that ¨Pouliadis¨ has a more structured product menu. Each user chooses first the category of the product he wants and then he chooses sub category and brand. That way the search procedure is short and the user is not exposed to huge amount of information. On the other hand in ¨Quest-Online¨ product menu, the user has to read 40 subcategories – categorized by alphabetical order - before choosing one. The architecture using filters, adopted by ¨Pouliadis¨, is more convenient as the user focuses his search to specific products.

Usability. The structure of the system seems well organized. The

usability of the two systems could not be assessed though.

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A posterior project could assess the performance of both systems if it could have access to ¨Pouliadis¨ ordering system. A group of expert users could measure the efficiency of each system, performing specific tasks. Then each task can be marked in a balanced scorecard.

Furthermore in the questionnaire we could ask from the customers that have used both systems to evaluate each one, in different perspectives. For example:

Please evaluate the navigational functionality in each site.

Very bad -2 -1 0 1 2 Very good Quest Online

Pouliadis

In conclusion, the two ordering systems have advantages and

disadvantages that derive from each development team that undertook the project. ¨Info-Quest¨ decided to assign the development of the system to an internal group of specialists and on the other hand ¨Pouliadis¨ assigned it to a company that expertise in Web based ordering systems. It is obvious that Info-Quest has built a more functional ordering model but poor in user interface and ¨Pouliadis¨ offered an attractive, user-friendly site but with less consideration to an important element, speed.

CHAPTER 9

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¨ Info-quest SA ¨ Summary Chapter nine presents the company main assets, to identify the resources that could be invested in IT to reduce operational costs, and enhance customer satisfaction. Info-quest is an information technology and telecommunication company, which expertises in distributing hardware and software products and in providing ICT services. It sells to more than 1000 wholesalers in Greece and it occupies 600 employees. Its IT system is built on SAP software and on its Web based information network. Customer satisfaction could be improved through advanced Customer Relationship Management practices while Partner relationship management techniques could transform complex partner interactions to profitable relationships.

9.1 The company

Info-Quest is a newborn Greek company, established as a private company in 1981. Today it is a public company; its stock is exchanged in the Athens Stock Market. During the last 20 years Info-Quest, builds a modern organization that provides information technology and telecommunications value added services, covering an increasing number of IT sectors. The company considers as its core business the distribution of ICT products and services basically in Greece. In June 2002 entered the telecommunication market as a service provider.

Financial figures. The total sales volume of Info-Quest in 2001 was 420 € millions (1) and the gross margin profit before tax was about 5%. By 2004, according to Guardian trust-a Greek investment analyst-, it will grow its sales to 630 € millions. For the next 3 years it is estimated that it will not produce any profit, because of the serious new investment.

Products. The company distributes well-known brands as Compaq-HP, IBM, Intel, Sun, Cisco, Microsoft, CISCO, 3COM, Hitachi, NEC, Ericsson. With some of them there are exclusive distribution contracts.

Services. Info-Quest provides technical support services for a wide range of products and clients. Another part of the company focuses on offering IT business solutions (basically with software packages) such as Peoplesoft, SAP and Oracle. Most recently the company entered the telecommunications market as a telecommunication service provider.

Customers. The organisation distributes its product through a network

of 1000 wholesalers and does not sell directly sell to the end customer. People-culture. Info-quest occupies 600 people. The company culture

validates good relationship with the personnel, customers and suppliers.

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Top management proves its commitment to interpersonal relationships and motivates the employees to imitate its paradigm. Innovation and change are also commonly accepted procedures that drive to operational excellence. Info-quest also motivates continuous learning processes through educational sponsorships and the people hold the key role in the organization.

IT system. The company survival and performance highly depends on the quality of the information shared among the members of the organization and the external environment. The IT system is based on ERP software, the company Web site and on a call center.

1) Enterprise Resource Planning Software

Each employee has access to a personal computer running Microsoft Office and SAP ERP (server-client based) software. In that way everybody can access instantly the proper information such as a purchase order, invoice information, warehouse stock, prices, production rates, sales reports, service processes. The access to this huge amount of information is limited for each department. The information, this way is secure, effective and cost and time saving. For each new need for information (for example a new area sales report) a customized ERP routine is being implemented. Such a complex resource planning software is the IT basic tool that may enhance organizational performance or cause total failure. But the system success is interdependent to people’s ability for innovation and creativity. The company develops and maintains a competitive advantage only when transmitting the right information on time, to the customer with less cost.

2) The Web site

The main information channel, which connects the organization with the customers and partners, is the Web site. Through it, anyone can check the latest products, prices, availability, and technical information.

The home page (fig 9.1) is composed by the following unities: a) Company. This session introduces the company and gives

information about company address, products, services and areas of activity.

b) Activities. This session describes the core activities of the company: the distribution of hardware and software, IT integrated solutions (ERP software, CRM software, Business Intelligence software, Human Resource Management implementation, IP telephony services)

c) Product and price catalogue. Almost all the product mix of hardware and software are indexed and categorized.

d) Technical support. There is information about on call support, service contracts, software and hardware installation, on site support and several professional services.

e) Investor relations. The company ID, the board committee composition, financial statements, and references from independent analysts.

f) News.

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g) Job opportunities. h) Telecommunication services. It is a new promising activity,

which includes mobile and fixed telephony services (Q-Telecom).

3) Call center

Today the most common functions supported by call centers are the provision of customer services and the handling of customer complaints. However, successfully resolving a customer’s query presupposes the availability of accurate information to deal with the query. Info-Quest has constructed its telephone centre employing 20 people. The main technologies that are being employed are Automatic Call Distribution system (ACD) and Interactive Voice Response systems (IVR). Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) is designed to receive large volumes of incoming calls, answer the calls automatically, place them in a waiting queue and connect them to the next agent who becomes available. Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems are interactive, using recorded messages and then accepting responses from touch-tone phones to answer queries from callers. The latest technology on call centres is called Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) and it is not yet implemented by Info-Quest. CTI provides the ability to retrieve customer data and deliver to the agent together with the incoming phone call. It can be complex and expensive to implement, as it requires the call centre equipment to be linked to a variety of customer and other databases.

It is obvious that companies that with major international call centres (fig

9.2) are more willing to spent multi-million euro budgets to high tech implementations and are more likely to earn back their invested capital. Info-Quest could not invest to any expensive solution without ensuring first a short and risk free payback-period as its volume of phone calls and queries is not so big. The biggest challenge is that the call centre should reflect a total view of the organisation: manufacturing, sales, delivery, fulfilment and after sales support.

Although the company expertise in SAP software it has not implemented yet any customer relationship software. There are no advanced data mining-analysis techniques although there is a huge database available in the backend system. A CRM system could offer better customer service and higher profit. Sales force automation tools could provide Info-Quest with a holistic view of the customer that allows the salesperson to estimate the value of the individual customer through customer history and communications with the company. Such tools could save valuable time for the sales people by reducing routine jobs. For example when a sales person would pick up the phone, automatically a window flashes on his/her screen, describing the recent and past transactions and interactions with the specific customer, the specific products he/she prefers, the average sales volume per day/month, how is the customer business according to his sales target, how many products are in service, for what reason he uses to complain to his account manager, how many times he visits the Web site and if he pays his checks on time.

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Enterprise marketing automation tools could be used also, for campaign and sales management, response management and customer information intelligent techniques.

As the company mainly transacts with a big number of suppliers, distributors and sub-distributors, faces now the challenge of how to manage effectively its partners. Partner relationship management is more complex than CRM as each partner has a business interest of its own, a set of business processes that are endemic to their company, a group of their own partners and operate with different business models and corporate culture. Obviously there are functional, technical and cultural concerns.

Effective PRM requires a channel strategy and a portal that gives each partner a customized view of their partner programs, leads, opportunities, forecasts, objectives, news, and so on.

Figure 9.1 The Info-Quest home page (www.quest.gr)

Call centre Year established No of agents

Gateway 2000 1994 850 IBM 1996 800 Dell 1993 720

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AOL/Bertelsmann 1995 650 Hertz 1996 500

Citibank 1997 450 UPS 1995 300 Xerox 1998 300

Lufthansa 1998 270 Oracle 1996 250

Compaq 1996 200 Merchants Group 1998 145

Figure 9.2 Major international call centers in Ireland (1999) Source: Industrial Development Authority of Ireland Web site (1999)

CHAPTER 10

¨ Quest-Online - The online ordering system ¨

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Summary Chapter ten is examining the main system elements: technology, services and security. This analysis will point out the strong and the weak elements of the system. The online ordering system is a Web based application, structured on SAP R/3 ERP software. Many options of customisation are provided through ABAP/4 a SAP AG developed language; ¨Quest-Online¨ is an internally developed e-commerce application programmed on ABAP/4. The system offers basic services such as: ordering, searching and reporting. The user interface supports a communication channel between the user and the computer and includes: physical, graphical, logical or even emotionally intelligent interface components. If the system contributes to the company expected level of service, it will enhance customer relationships and customer loyalty. ¨Quest-Online¨ is using secure HTTPs, which are used to provide strong authentication and confidentiality when using HTTP to gain access to content on the World Wide Web.

¨Quest-Online¨ is an online, Web based, ordering system that includes all

the available products of the company. It is available to the whole network of wholesalers and so far a respective part of its sales volume has been through ¨Quest-Online¨. Basically the whole application is built on SAP software.

10.1 Technology In the late 1980s, SAP AG, the German software company, came out

with SAP R/2, a huge piece of software focused on manufacturing companies, which were using mainframe applications. Today it is the fourth largest software company in the world (1).

The SAP R/3 software, which is being used by Info-Quest, is a client-server based enterprise resource planning application is a highly integrated (and highly expensive) system of back-office functions, particularly human resources, financial applications, logistics and manufacturing planning, that are integrally customized and linked to all existing office business processes.

Throughout the late 1990s, there were complaints that SAP R/3 versions

from 1.0 to 3.0 were inflexible and forced you to adapt to their business rules, rather than provide you with applications that could be customized to those business rules you used as your best practices. SAP retooled and by 1997 came out with version 4.0, an object oriented version of the product that allowed the flexibility, but the mindset took a while to change. Introducing the latest

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versions, the German software company, launched an open architecture that could be customized and linked to Web interfaces. Info-Quest is using the latest version (version 4.0).

ABAP/4 is the language created by SAP AG for implementation and customisation of their R/3 system (2). The rough English translation of the acronym would be A Business Application Programming language, version 4. It is a block-structured language that seems to be most resemble a cross between Oracle's PL/SQL and IBM's PL/I. All the Quest online application is built on ABAP/4 language, from the very beginning. Its development came from the company’s software engineers and it took some time but it is well fit to company’s procedures and special needs.

ABAP/4 contains some highly report-oriented event-driven control structures. For instance, events can be defined for:

• INITIALIZATION. • START-OF-SELECTION. • END-OF-SELECTION. • AT NEW-PAGE. • AT END-OF-PAGE.

Reports can be defined with drill-down capabilities, where by ¨double-

clicking¨ on a line on a report, the program may be requested to display a ¨sub-report¨, or perhaps to run an independent report or transaction. There are also events defined to automate access to ¨logical databases¨, that is, to selectively walk down a hierarchy tree defined for a set of related tables. This can be used to provide (without programmer intervention) additional selection and sort criteria as parameters to reports. ABAP/4 is a byte-compiled language.

The virtual machine is fairly well hidden from view, but core dumps can be examined, and appear to resemble IBM 370 assembly language. Operations that work on tables will have to access the database server; for efficiency's sake, there is the notion of a ¨Internal Table¨, which is an array structure that is stored ¨locally¨ on the application server. Using internal tables decreases both the load on the network and on the database server, and is highly encouraged, at least for moderate quantities of data.

Some additional ¨little languages¨ are used to link ABAP/4 code to screen definitions and screen control code to help define online transactions. Jointly with the ¨screen control¨ language, ABAP/4 is used to implement substantially all of the visible R/3 system functionality. The R/3 ¨kernel¨ represents some (albeit fairly large) programs written in C that interpret ABAP/4 byte-code.

There is so much infrastructure built up around this, that most users and indeed many developers, are probably not aware of where or what the kernel is.

SAP AG did not provide until now its customers, with any development tool, although something started to this direction from release R/3 4.6 with the ¨EnjoySAP¨. Standard solutions to specific problems have been developed from ABAP/4 external editors-third party software developers. For example ¨SAPEdit¨ (3) is an external ABAP/4 editor for SAP (appendix 10.1). They are

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focusing on a Java base JavaGUI. This JavaGUI is as same as the standard SAPGUI with some restrictions but the same functionality. It can be used from any Java compatible web browser. This editor is low cost (it costs about $ 50 per license).

Figure 10.1 Overall view of the SAPeditor (version 1.62). http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages 10.2 Available services

¨Quest Online¨ log in page (fig 10.2) is the first window before entering the

main menu. Starting with a welcome message asks first the user to give a customer representative No and a password. Then requests whether to opt for product availability index. At the bottom of the page there are two links, one is regarding to apply for a new registration and another for improvement proposals and complaints.

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CUSTOMER REPRESENTATIVE

PRESS N FOR PRODUCT AVAILABILITY

NEW REGISTRATION

COMPLAINTS / PROPOSALS

WELCOME MESSAGE

Figure 10.2¨Quest Online¨ log in page As the user passes successfully the identification he is permitted to log in

to the product menu (fig 10.3). There are indexed the whole product mix of the company. The user just clicks the product category and the user can easily check each product main characteristics, his discount and if the product is on stock in real time. Furthermore each customer may choose the following options:

Quick order. Choosing quick order the user can create his order if he/she knows the part number of the item that he wants. This path is saving time as the user doesn’t have to wait for products and specs to download and it is usually for repeating routine transactions with small value.

Search. The search engine is helping the user to track any products. Offers. There are announced offers and special promotion programs

updated each week. New products.

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SEARCH OFFERS

NEW PRODCUCTS

Figure 10.3 ¨Quest Online¨ product menu The reporting link (fig 10.4) is a useful tool as the user can check current

and past orders, his account credit limit and payment terms, invoices and find out who is responsible for his account and his telephone number.

By running an open order report (fig 10.5), the system checks all the orders for this customer, for a predetermined time period (3 months). Each order has a unique identification number -1102027250 (fig 10.5)- and when products are on stock a delivery identification number-2102241664- verifies that those are reserved and the order proceeds. There are 3 different colors indicating the credit status of the customer, if the delivery identification number is green then the order is ready to go on the date described on the right of this number (fig 10.5).

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INVOICE No

CUSTOMER REPRESENTATIVE

ALL ORDERS

OPEN ORDERS

CUSTOMER ID

EXECUTE REPORT REDIFINE VALUES

Figure 10.4 ¨Quest online¨ reporting menu

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DELIVERY PHASE

CREDIT HOLD

CREDIT RELEASED NOT INVOICED

INVOICED

QUANTITY

ORDER No

DELIVERY No PRODUCT

Figure 10.5 ¨Quest online¨ reporting menu –search results

10.3 User interface Even the simplest user interface is a complex, multi-tiered structure that

supports a dialogue or communications channel between the user and the computer and between the user and the concepts presented by the software executing on the computer. The user interface includes: physical, graphical, logical or even emotionally intelligent interface components (7).

In the physical interface level sound is missing form the application. Sound could provide a medium-bandwidth communications link between the user and the computer. Moving up the user interface hierarchy, examining the Graphical interface, we note that a two dimensions design with much text and less metaphor symbols do not stimulate users interest and make the communications process complex. On the other hand the quantity of information indexed is optimum and contributes to an easy-to-learn interface. While customers navigate through ¨Quest-Online¨ they are aware of where they are now and where they have been before. Situational awareness is satisfactory as there aren’t so many windows-options that could confuse the user. If the company decides to enrich the application it should think seriously to provide ample situational cues, in the form of graphics or sound. A confused or lost customer will soon log off the site rather disappointed.

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The logical interface level is about rules, guidelines and standards of interface behavior, such as how an interface should display the results of a calculation. The online ordering system is following a logical interface in almost all phases of the application. The reporting menu is a level above common knowledge as it is more complex, it presents accounting data for the user for any transaction and the user should use it for many times, to feel comfortable with it. The primary metric, for assessing the degree to which an interface supports a logical model, is called cognitive ergonomics.

At the highest level of the user interface hierarchy, is the Emotionally Intelligent interface. A fully emotionally intelligent interface would not only express emotions, but it would know how to manage those expressions and how to use its emotions to modify the behavior of the customer. Quest-Online has not yet such advanced level of interface. But it could use a more customized to-each-user interface following the paradigm of Amazon .com. For example when the customer logs on a message could welcome him by his first name. Then he could suggest him some new products according to his special interest -according to his past orders.

An ideal EII system doesn’t have to understand what is important to the customer but it must be able to recognize what is likely to be important to certain situations. A human customer service representative learns to recognize when a customer is getting upset from the tone of the customer’s voice and behavior. An EII might monitor the length of an interaction, assuming that anything over a certain time limit is related to customer frustration. For example, if the average customer transaction takes two minutes, a customer still trying to move a transaction through the system after five minutes probably needs assistance. At this point a banner could appear with an email address for immediate help.

10.4 Customer loyalty practices ¨Quest-Online¨ has to deliver satisfaction at some baseline level of

service that customers come to expect. The level of service will create loyal customer relationships and healthy business in the long term.

The company is currently providing a special discount for those customers that place their orders on line. Also each customer has a target of sales annually, that he should place through the online system, if he reaches the target he gets an extra discount. The user has the ability to check the stock in real time and place an order on a 24/7/365 basis. The disadvantage to real time information is relative delay of the system in rush hours. Any customer representative checks the online orders of his customers and fixes any inconsistency of the system.

Customer loyalty though concerns the total experience of the company including products, services and human behaviour.

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10.5 Security-privacy The system is using secure HTTP. Secure HTTPs are used to provide

strong authentication and confidentiality when using HTTP to gain access to content on the World Wide Web (4). The most common use of secure HTTP is to provide an encrypted connection to an authenticated Web server. When clients wish to establish a secure HTTP connection, typically triggered by browsing to a URL beginning with https://, the client and server jointly negotiate a security protocol to use and then exchange authenticating information. Some of the most common-Microsoft Windows 2000 Server supported- secure communication protocols are:

• Transport Layer Security (TLS version 1.0) • Secure Sockets Layer (SSL versions 2 and 3) • Private Communications Technology (PCT version 1.0)

The online ordering system is running the Secure Socket Layer protocol. SSL, an open, non-proprietary protocol designed by Netscape, provides communications privacy, authentication, and message integrity by using a combination of public key and symmetric encryption (5).

Public key encryption is a technique that uses a pair of asymmetric keys for encryption and decryption. Each pair of keys consists of a public key and a private key. The public key is made public by distributing it widely. The private key is never distributed; it is always kept secret. (6).

By using this protocol, clients and servers can communicate in a way that prevents eavesdropping, tampering, or message forgery. In the case of an SSL connection between a Web browser and Web server, you must enter HTTPS rather than HTTP as the protocol type in the URL. This will instruct the Web browser to use a different port for the communication; the Web server will be listening on this port for SSL requests. By default, Web data (HTTP) uses Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) port 80, while SSL (HTTPS) uses TCP port 443.

Microsoft®, WINDOWS®, NT®, are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. SAP®, R/2®, R/3®,

ABAP®, are registered trademarks of SAP AG. Java® is registered trademark of Sun® Microsystems. All rights reserved

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CHAPTER 11

¨ Evaluation criteria of the online ordering system-Customer Perspective ¨

Summary Chapter eleven is identifying the evaluation criteria of this project’s primary research. The survey will measure the performance of the system on these specific criteria. The online ordering system to address to rising customer needs, should have the following characteristics: easy-to-learn interface, speed, low cost per transaction, special pricing policy, attractive user interface, customized content, secure-private environment, real-time information, accurate information, information coverage, available resources, integration with other company touch points and troubleshooting wizards. Evaluating the system through primary research (survey) we focus on three evaluation criteria: information, presentation and structure. There are important considerations that should be noticed before the questionnaire design such as: the respondent and interviewing environment, the interesting content, the research objectives and the appropriate format for the analysis stage. The sample of the research will be the 5 per cent of the total customer population of the company. It will be stratified according to the population distribution into three stratums: Big size customers, medium size customers and small size customers. Analysing the results, we appose possible improvement suggestions.

11.1 The true customer needs Quest-Online is a business application and the customer needs are

mostly oriented to efficiency rather on aesthetics. Examining ¨Quest-Online¨ from the customer΄s perspective the most important system characteristics that address to the basic customer-user needs are:

Easy-to-learn. An easy to learn system will motivate the user to use it

again in the future. If the user faces difficulties in logging on to the site or in saving his order he will feel frustrated and he will rather not come back. The first experience with the system is always very important as it formulates the user opinion about the system and consequently about the company.

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The customer-user probably will need some help on applying and installing his certificate to access HTTPS. Human assistance is very important at the first steps and troubleshooting wizards could help inexperienced users.

Speed. Speed is the major issue of the World Wide Web further development. Web users as a group exhibit little patience for lengthy page load time. A widely accepted rule puts the waiting threshold for average users to eight seconds. That is, a Web page that takes any longer than eight seconds to download it is in high risk of loosing its audience.

To obtain accurate Web site performance-speed data from the user perspective is for measurements to be taken at customer locations – from different points on the Internet. This is accomplished using intelligent agents: software routines that run on workstations accessing the Internet. They can be set to issue data on a regularly scheduled basis, or to issue notification when certain operational conditions occur-for example, an error condition where a specified Web site URL cannot be found (1).

Time-to-response for any requested action in the ¨Quest-Online¨ should be minimized. The speed of the systems depends on the users that are connected to the SAP server and the volume of requested information so the speed cannot be standardized.

Low cost per transaction. Logging on ¨Quest online¨ costs much cheaper than a long distance call (fig 11.1)(2). The user doesn’t have to wait for a customer representative to address to. Usually technical information is time consuming and on rush hours the time becomes always longer. One to one telephone connection is only available for 8-10 hours daily than the 24/7 one to many Web transaction.

Local Telephone call Long Distance Telephone call Internet Connection € 0,026/min € 0,063/min € 0,006/min

Fig 11.1 Telecommunication tariffs on 7-12-2002 OTE S.A. (Greek Telecommunication Organization). Special-pricing policy. As companies tried to foster their customers to

visit their Web sites and make orders online, offered lower prices to attract their interest. As this pricing policy became common practice for e-commerce companies, customers today, expect to receive lower prices for their online orders.

User Interface. Users are attracted from an aesthetic physical and

graphical interface. Customers expect a logical interface in every phase of the application.

Customization. Web site customization presupposes effective database management and a customer-oriented view of the different company procedures. In a customized environment the user is addressed with his first name as he logs on to the site and he can see his favorite products, services, subjects that usually

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attract his interest. He might even been asked to give permission to get an email regarding a new product or new service tailored to his needs.

Security-Privacy. Electronic crime has forced the E-commerce enabled companies to adopt to secure connection protocols to ensure their transactions with their customers are secure. Most customers today are avoiding transacting online with Web sites that do not declare that they are using secure protocols.

Additionally privacy has become a very sensitive issue and although customer cannot check the company directly on how it is using his data-although he has the lawful right to view and correct the data that concerns him- he demands a declaration of company transparent privacy policy.

On 5 April 2000 at the Spring Internet World conference, 26 companies announced that they have formed an international advocacy group to promote the responsible and beneficial use of technology for personalizing consumer and business relationships. The Personalization Consortium will provide a forum for discussion of personalization technology and will develop guidelines for its application to marketing practices that respect consumer privacy (3).

Real-Time Information. Near-real-time information in its first

integration with e-commerce offered a competitive advantage to the companies that adopted immediately to the new IT standard. Companies spend huge amounts of money on state of the art hardware, advanced software and fast Internet connections to provide near-real-time information. The customers are most probably wholesalers of retail store chains that do not want to stock their warehouses. They need instant information about price or availability as their customer (end customer) asks about a specific product.

Accurate information. The online ordering system should provide accurate availability status, price, product characteristics, accounting data, and transactions history reports. For example a customer will feel frustrated if he orders a flat screen monitor and when he receives it next day realizes that it isn’t flat screen.

Information coverage. Usually information accuracy is important but

not enough. Information depth is also important especially in products that have complex technical terms. In ¨Quest-Online¨ the customer has to know each single product technical specifications but also which products are compatible if combined together.

Available resources. Because of the product/service complexity and in

order to provide the optimum solution, the wholesaler, needs access to internal or external resources to resolve any possible problems that may occur. Frequently asked questions (FAQs) are a popular internal resource that is simple to create and maintain. The system could provide links according to frequently asked questions to simplify the research procedure of the customer. Technical support links could guide the user to more sophisticated inquiries.

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Integration with other companies touch points. Today one of the latest trends in customer relationships management is the 360-degree view of the customer. Often a sales effort fails while the customer has a problem with the service department or the credit control department. Consequently, communication touch points should be integrated with each other, so as to present to the company representative a holistic view of the customer profile.

Troubleshooting wizards. Troubleshooting wizards use mostly a

specific knowledge database delivered to the user, to resolve the most commonly occurred problems. In other words, it is an interactive help tool, based on a logical structure known as a decision tree. A common type of troubleshooting wizard is using questions. Each question is followed by a list of possible answers. The wizard selects each subsequent question based on your answer to the previous one.

The troubleshooting wizard΄s questions become increasingly specific, moving toward a possible cause for the problem and a solution. In some cases, instead of asking another question, the wizard suggests a solution, such as making sure your printer has paper or your network's hub is functioning.

11.2 Basic evaluation criteria In an attempt to rank the customer needs of the system and taking notice

of the special characteristics of the Greek ITC environment we will distinguish the most important criteria for customer satisfaction.

The criteria selection is following the general Web design principles from the literature review and has embodied the system developer’s perceptions and secondary data such as customer complaints and suggestions. Therefore this project will try to identify the possible problems of the system without ignoring generic principals of Web design and Information Architecture. There are no published research projects in the Greek environment to assess the most important criteria for an ideal online system. This project will try to rank the most important criteria from customers’ perspective. The respondent is asked to mark in a scale from 1 to 5 the criterion he perceives as most important: information, navigation, speed, presentation or price.

The basic evaluation sections, from the customer perspective, are: information, navigation and usability.

Information. In this section are examined: information accuracy,

information currency and information coverage. Accuracy criterion will determine if the information is correct and

precise. Currency is whether the information is regularly updated and coverage is how deep is the information provided.

Navigation. In the navigation section are evaluated: the quality of the artwork, the navigation ability and the logical order of the main concepts.

Measuring the quality of the artwork we examine if the site is aesthetically appealing and if the colours and the graphics are attractive.

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Measuring navigational ability we examine if the site links are clearly labelled and if the user can navigate easily from one page to another. Measuring the logical order of the main site concepts we examine if the site is following basic cognitive rules and common sense.

Usability. In the usability section are evaluated the following criteria: speed and ease of use. Surveying the speed criterion we will figure out if the pages are downloading in a reasonable time frame. Surveying the usability criterion we will determine if the site is easy to use and if the user can easily find meaningful information and easily place his orders on line.

As we are going to conduct a primary research based on questionnaire, we cannot possibly examine every aspect of ¨Quest-Online¨. Consequently we are focusing on three basic evaluation sections described above. We don’t examine security issues as we have described above the site has recently introduced SSL and HTTPs, providing strong authentication and confidentiality.

Finally we will not examine the level of the emotionally intelligent interface because it is not yet developed.

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CHAPTER 12

¨ Conclusions and improvement proposals ¨

Summary Chapter twelve presents the conclusions of the survey and proposes possible improvement ideas of the system. Improvement proposals are focusing in navigation, information and usability system elements. Icons, labels and search engines are critical tools for navigation ability. Information accuracy could be improved be ensuring the quality of the data input. Information depth can be enhanced, by providing links to external information resources. Usability can be improved by refining its physical, graphical and logical interface components. 12.1 Navigation Navigation functionality refers to the ability of the user to move easily

from page to page under the instructions of a site map (1). According to this project survey 67% of the customers (Q4) think that

Quest-Online offers good navigational ability and 71% (Q5) think that pages follow a logical order. On the other hand only 46% (Q3) believe that links are not clearly labeled. The human cognitive system unconsciously breaks any information in groups of five. This commonly accepted rule applies also in the ideal web page design and it is followed also in the main page (Figure 10.3 Quest Online product menu). In the product menu, though, the five main topics (Quick order-Search-Offers-New products-Reporting) should be better if were presented horizontally and not vertical. An example is presented in (fig12.1). It is a more common design pattern worldwide accepted.

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A. Current layout of product menu B. Horizontal layout of product menu

Fig 12.1 Presentation of an alternative layout of the product menu of

¨Quest online¨.

The icon buttons are text-labeled. There could be used symbols and metaphors for faster interaction-communication. For example in fig (10.4) (Quest Online reporting menu) there are two text-labeled icon buttons. Those can be better expressed with symbols as indexed in figure below (fig 12.2).

Fig 12.2 Icon buttons using symbols (see Fig 10.4 reporting menu)

Navigation functionality is the ability of the user to move easily from page to page under the instructions of a site map (1).

EXECUTE REPORT REDEFINE VALUES

Quick order Search Offers New products Reporting

Order Search Offers New

Reporting

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Navigation functionality could be improved with the following tools: • Banners that indicate page location within the hierarchy • Table of contents, indexes and overviews • A map • A link to a map to every page • A short trail of links to the pages that led to the current page • Colour coding, same background image • Pictograms for each section of the site • A thumbnail of the site’s hierarchy The scope of the above navigation tools is to provide the user with a

more holistic view of the site contributing to situational awareness. Those tools should be firstly applied in the core information paths as the product menu and the reporting menu fig (10.3)(10.4).

Search engines are especially important at sites that change often and they have large amount of information. ¨Quest-Online¨ search engine (fig 12.3) is a limited information tool as it contains only product-oriented information. It has no links to external resources.

Category

Brand Sub Category

Description

Search Engine

Add to shopping cart View shopping cart

Fig 12.3 Quest Online search menu

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The search mechanism should inform the scope of the search they will conduct:

• Will it search the page? • The section? • The site? • The Internet? The user should know how to operate search controls: • The search engine accepts more than one search key? • Does it have any special features? • Provide examples of the search parameters and results • Finally the user should know what kind of performance to expect and

some examples of how to interpret the results.

Furthermore the lack of a clear main page is obvious. The main page is consisted from the Product menu (fig 10.3) along with the five main icon-functions (Quick order-Search-Offers-New products-Reporting), but the amount of information is too big for the user to absorb. It would be much easier for the user to navigate through a main page with less information and then enter the specific function of his choice. For example the main page could be between the log in page (fig.10.2) and the product menu (fig 10.3). Information architects use card sorts to assure that the page order is smooth and logical.

12.2 Information A respective 75% of the respondents believe (Q8) that the information

presented is detailed enough and the same percentage (Q7) believes that inactive product codes are removed immediately from the system. On the other hand 54% (Q6) state that the product characteristics need more attention from the company. Information is the most important element of an ideal online system (Q12a) consequently the company should focus more on information architecture issues.

Information is divided in two categories, single-input and multiple-input. Single input information is keyed in once from a human and then system recalls that information without any further human interference. In single-input information if we can ensure the quality of the data input then we have zero possibilities for any false information. Multiple-input information is keyed in the system more than one times and the company should focus on the keying in process to reduce human inconsistency. An example of single-input information is the billing procedure; once the invoice has been edited it is stored in the database and can be recalled anytime.

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On the other hand the product menu requires multiple-input information

as each product manager updates the product characteristics and the prices in a daily basis.

Any information presented in ¨Quest-Online¨ should be accurate. Product characteristics, technical recommendations, prices, offers and stock level should be precise. Additionally information must be updated and any change in the backend system should be transferred instantly in the online ordering system. The user will feel frustrated if he puts an order on a specific item and after some time finds out that it is phased out. Finally another aspect, information depth, is critical and reflects the quality of the system. Information must be presented in such way that any user can find with no delay the most common issues that may ask for. Furthermore the site should provide the appropriate links to any external or internal information resources. For example a user wants to order a memory module to use it in old PC. He needs deeper information analysis, as he has to search which specific memory module is compatible with this old PC. The system can provide this kind of information by indicating some external links that could help the user in certain situations or can give the user more generic instructions about were and how to search for the requested information.

Accurate, updated and appropriate analysed information is essential for the online ordering system success. The lack of human interaction points out the need for higher quality in information and communication.

12.3 Usability The system was easy to learn according to the 96% (Q11) of the users and

site is easy to use according to the 75% (Q10) of them ¨Quest Online¨ usability can be improved by refining its physical,

graphical and logical interface components. Physical interface. Sound is missing from the physical layer. It could

enhance the communication between the user and the system in a pleasant and subconscious way. Additionally short sound messages improve situational awareness and the user fells familiar with the system environment. Human voice could be used in higher-level (emotional intelligent) interface, simulating human behavior characteristics. For example a welcome message ¨Welcome John¨ or a ¨Thank you for your order John¨ using the first name of the user would make the user feel more comfortable using the system. Furthermore a short signal when the user clicks a false option could inform him faster about it.

The basic colors blue and yellow, are the same with those used in the home web site and the trademark of Info-quest. There are no 3D graphics or animated banners form a rather static site, with lack of stimulant elements. In the product menu the user can see only the product title, the basic product characteristics but he cannot see any photo of the product. The product photograph is necessary as the user has not any physical contact with the product and he should feel confident that he orders the right product.

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On the other hand the above proposals would delay the system and they would lengthen the average transaction time.

Logical interface. As the online ordering system is relatively new it is

more close to the ERP interface. At its first steps of development the first priority was the functionality of the system with an acceptable graphic user interface. Today the market demands a more sophisticated user oriented interface. The information architecture of an ideal site should be as simple and as clear as possible. Each page should have an obvious purpose and it should be identified within the first few inches of the page.

The log on procedure is the first experience to the system and the instructions provided should be appropriate and protect the user of any unpleasant situation. Until now if a customer applied for a password in ¨Quest-Online¨, a sales representative was responsible to send him instructions about how to acquire a certification and how to optimise his hardware to view https successfully. So far there isn’t any troubleshooting wizard or any Frequently Asked Questions menu to address to and some times sales representatives in lack of time or knowledge do not give appropriate attention to such customer issues. If the user fails to log on to the system several times then he should be unfavourably biased in the future.

First impression is always crucial, and it is shaped in user’s mind as he puts his first orders online. If the user has a bad experience using the site for first time they will hardly ever come back. ¨Elaborative¨ design implies that readers have work at exploring the site and its contents. But one key to creating reader-friendly Web sites is to decrease, not increase, readers' workload (3).

Learning theory in psychology, is confirming: simpler tasks are easier to master. By implication, simpler Web pages and simpler site designs are easier to master, too.

According to this Thesis research only half of the respondents (Q9) are

satisfied with the system speed while at the same time the rest desire better speed. This conclusion is very important as speed, appears to be the second most important element of an ideal online ordering system (Q12c).

Speed and bandwidth are on the top of the user need hierarchy. A state of the art web site is useless if it cannot provide information on time. Company engineers should first evaluate the average download speed. Networking professionals should discriminate the speed factors that depend on the company network, the customer network and the Internet service provider. There are several bandwidth specialized companies that offer several speed tools; one of them is Speed Test (2).

Some web design tools (images, bar separators, oversized icons) are affecting seriously speed; ¨Quest Online¨ keeps a simpler graphic interface to enhance speed.

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Dr Jakob Nielsen suggests 10 golden rules for excellent usability

performance related to invested resources (4):

1. Include a One-Sentence Tagline 2. Write a Window Title with Good Visibility in Search Engines

and Bookmark Lists 3. Group all Corporate Information in One Distinct Area 4. Emphasize the Site's Top High-Priority Tasks 5. Include a Search Input Box 6. Show Examples of Real Site Content 7. Begin Link Names with the Most Important Keyword 8. Offer Easy Access to Recent Homepage Features 9. Don't Over-Format Critical Content, Such as Navigation Areas 10. Use Meaningful Graphics

12.4 Innovative online services – proposals

So far the sales related information that is available on the system is

concerning product availability, product features and price. Accounting info is also available such as invoice record, credit status and payment terms. Furthermore, the system could provide an estimated delivery time of each customer order. Until know customers now that if they put an order today they will most probably get the goods the next day, but they don’t know the exact time the van will deliver the goods. During the fact that the customers usually don’t keep any stock at all, it is critical to know the exact time off the everyday delivery. That way they will be able to pass that information to the end customer and win the sale.

Info-Quest owns a telecommunication subsidiary (Q-Telecom) and could implement a Global Positioning System in each van to project average delivery time in the system. To implement such an innovative service, for the Greek business environment, it is required a short payback period and the top management concern to provide premium services in order to get the green light for a multimillion investment.

On the other hand support related information is provided by a Web page that presents information about repair progress of delivered goods to the service department. The user can give a special code number and check if the goods he delivered are repaired. This on line service can be better if it could inform the user about the average repair time, what caused the damage and how much does the repair costs.

A more customized user interface could increase customer loyalty by using emotionally intelligent interfaces. For example a welcome message using the first name of the user would make him feel more comfortable. A menu with suggested new products the user buys most would help him save time. In addition a reminder about the progress of the goods that are still open in the service department would relieve him.

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Mail bot, or mail agent is called the software, developed for filtering

incoming messages or performing some routine functions. Automate response email is the most promising as it produces mail messages with information customized to each recipient. For example when the order is invoiced and ready to be delivered a mail is sent to the customer informing him about the invoice number and the delivery schedule of his order or the credit balance of his account. Several international companies have adopted mail bots. Intel, which is well known for its performance in channel management, uses mail bots to inform its national distributors about delivery schedule of the orders, or to confirm the quantity of the orders. Additionally to provide accurate and updated information Intel undertakes the whole logistic process, including transportation.

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CHAPTER 13

¨ Critical appraisal¨ Summary Chapter thirteen is critically discussing points of this Thesis and proposes future research. There are several factors that proved critical in this project. The lack of previous published research drove this research to begin from an exploratory basis. Designing the questionnaire, which included thirteen questions, we had to consider the respondents’ willingness to answer, and the response rate. Furthermore competitive online systems were not compared to our case study. Suggestions for future research include: group discussions with expert users, competition based research and usability tests.

13.1 Critical self-evaluation This Thesis tried to enlighten the latest trends in the business-to-business

Web based ordering systems in Greece, focusing in a single company. It tried also to present the electronic customer services that contribute to long-term, profitable, customer relationships.

The lack of previous published research in the Greek environment, constrained the research to begin from an exploratory basis. This project could focus more in specific areas of interest if we had such indication from secondary data. For example if there were results from previous research, pointing out a low performance in usability, the posterior research could focus in usability more.

Another constraint is the respondent’s willingness to answer the questionnaire, as the majority of the respondents, who use the online system, were very busy. This project would face extremely low response rates if it were confusing and time consuming. That is the main reason that forced us to design a short questionnaire of thirteen questions. This constraint deprived this research the validation of each element from different angles. For example the rational flow of the pages could be validated through more questions, to ensure that the respondent understands exactly what to mark.

Competitive online systems were not compared to Info-Quest as it was difficult to have access to. This fact prevented this project from expressing a more holistic view of the current Greek environment.

Finally there weren’t any research results to correlate and validate the findings of this project.

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13.2 Suggestions for future research The company could identify a group of expert users and convey a group

discussion under an experienced moderator. This research could save time while the results can be presented in a very short period of time. Because of the physical presence of the respondents, group discussions allow for the observation of non-verbal communications. Expert users are probably going to express a large number of opinions. The social character of the group will stimulate respondents that are not willing to uncover their deeper beliefs, to express their thoughts freely. Stimulation not only provides help but it has found to be great use of generating ideas. In this group the system developers should participate not to constraint the discussion with the current system capabilities but to be informed from the expert user experiences.

Furthermore a future research could assess each site characteristic in comparison with two or three competitive sites. This different method could point out the advantages and disadvantages of each system. Upon the comparison results a system reengineering strategy could be proposed, delivering the maximum benefit with the less cost.

Finally a usability test could indicate the most effective system format, before implementing any change. A group of expert users would be invited to use the improved system version and express their opinion. The test should be concentrated on specific areas of interest and may be on some areas that seems problematic or on areas users value most. The test moderator should write a script covering what tasks people will be asked to accomplish and what questions will be asked. Usability test results will point out whether the optimised version of the system will succeed or not.

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References

Chapter 2 1 www.digitallivingroom.com (10-01-2003) 2 http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,78563,00.asp (12-01-2003) 3 http://www.embedded.com/story/OEG20030402S0033(15-02-2003) 4 www.thestar.com 7th of August 2002 - www.mit.edu(22-11-2002) 5 www.zabaware.com(22-10-2003) 6 www.bigscience.com(22-10-2003) 7 http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page /0,4057,5928621%255E15306,00.html(05-04-2003) 8 http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article.php/780491(05-04-2003) Chapter 3 1 Bryan Bergeron (2001) ¨The Eternal E-Customer¨ McGraw-Hill p195 2 http://web.media.mit.edu/~aggelos/861.html(17-12-2002)

3 http://www.tpeditor.com/editorials/2000/ed24-6+7.htm(12-01-2003) William H. Melody, Chair, Economics of Infrastructures, Faculty of Technology, Policy & Management, Delft University of Technology

4 Bryan Bergeron (2001) ¨The Eternal E-Customer¨ McGraw-Hill p196 5 http://europa.eu.int/comm/internal_market/en/dataprot/inter/un.htm (9-11-2002) 6 www.zeroknowledge.com(02-02-2003) 7 www.enonymous.com(02-02-2003) 8 www.PrivaSeek.com(02-02-2003)

9 www.epic.org(10-02-2003) 10 www.privacy.org/pi(29-03-2003) 11 http://www.eff.org/Legal/bill_of_rights_online.paper , Harvey Silvergate(12-04-2003)

12 http://developer.netscape.com/tech/security/ssl/howitworks.html (20-04-2003)

13 http://www.setco.org/(20-04-2003) 13 http://www.cert.org/encyc_article/tocencyc.html#WhyCare (20-04-2003)

Chapter 4

1 Greenberg Paul (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ 2nd edition, McGraw-Hill (p115) 2 http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_43/b3704046.htm (20-01-2003) 3 Bryan Bergeron (2001) ¨The Eternal E-Customer¨ McGraw-Hill p55

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4 http://www.findarticles.com/cf_0/m0FNP/5_40/71561019/p1/ article.jhtml?term=customer+service+Frederick+F.+Reichheld+ and+Phil+Schefter++ DSN RETAILING TODAY MAGAZINE ,Moin Uddin, March 5, 2001(19-03-2003) 5 http://hbsworkingknowledge.hbs.edu/item.jhtml?id=1590&t= customer&sid=0&pid=1608(19-03-2003) 6 Paul Greenberg (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ McGraw-Hill p97 7 http://hbsworkingknowledge.hbs.edu/item.jhtml?id=3028&t= customer&sid=0&pid=0(19-03-2003)

8 Segments of the Turnbull and Zolkiewski Matrix, Turnbull and Zolkiewski, 1997, (p 320)

Chapter 5 1 Paul Greenberg (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ McGraw-Hill p15 2 www.searchCRM.com (April 26,2001) (10-12-2002) 3 www.saleslogix.com(10-12-2002)

4 http://www.findarticles.com/cf_0/m0CGC/n38_v24/21207459/ p1/article.jhtml?term=sales+force+automation+ Computing Canada, October 13 1998 by Jeff Read(20-04-2003) 5 Paul Greenberg (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ McGraw-Hill p167

6 www.siebel.com(02-05-2003) 7 www.unicacorp.com(02-05-2003) 8 http://www.findarticles.com/cf_0/m4PRN/2002_June_27/87846284 /p1/article.jhtml?term=CUSTOMER+ANALYTICS+REPORT

PR NEWSWIRE , REAL TIME CRM ANALYTICS, IDC, 2002 9 Bryan Bergeron (2001)¨The eternal e-customer¨ McGraw-Hill p172

10 Champy J. (2000) ¨The Ugly American Lives On ¨Sales and Marketing Management, Vol 151, pp22-25.

11 http://vperson.com(23-04-2003) 12 www.-1.ibm.com/services(23-04-2003) 13 Nelson, S. Kirkby, J. (2001) ¨ Seven Reasons Why CRM Fails ¨, Gartner Research Note

14 IntelligencCRM. (March 2002). Research Reveals Trends in CRM IT Spending, One to One Marketing and CRM Metrics.

www.intelligentcrm.com(20-02-2003) 15 Kellen, V. Stefanzyk, K (March 2002) Blue Wolf White Paper ¨ Complexity, Fragmentation and Emergence in Customer

Relationship Management¨. www.bluewolf.com/news/white_papers/complexity_and_crm.pdf (05-04-2003)

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Chapter 6 1a Christina Wodtke (2002) ¨Information Architecture, Blueprints for the Web¨ New Riders (pp 70) 1b Christina Wodtke (2002) ¨Information Architecture, Blueprints for the Web¨ New Riders (pp 33) 1c Christina Wodtke (2002) ¨Information Architecture, Blueprints for the Web¨ New Riders (pp 204) 2 Alan Cooper is the founder of Cooper a Palo Alto based, consulting firm. He is the father of Visual Basic and the author of About Face: The Essentials of User Interface Design (John Wiley and Sons, 1995) and The Inmates Are Running the Asylum: Why Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity (Sams, 1999) www.cooper.com. (17-01-2003)

3 www.schwab.com(10-02-2003) 4 www.useit.com by Jakob Nielsen(10-02-2003)

5 George A. Miller ¨The Magical Number of Seven, Plus or Minus Two : Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information¨, The Psychological Review 63 (1956) (pp 81-97). 6 www.luminant.com/WP_InformationArchitecture.pdf , author Jennifer A. Vodvarka(11-03-2003) 7 www.iht.com(11-03-2003) Chapter 7

1 J. O’ Connor, E. Galvin (2001) ¨ Marketing in the digital age ¨ Financial Times Prentice Hall pp(14-17) 2 www.europa.eu.int/ispo/ecommerce(01-11-2002) 3 Chip Fax Computer and Communications 30 September 2002

(No838/2002) (30-09-2002) Chapter 8 1 www.dssresearch.com(03-10-2002) 2 http://trochim.human.cornell.edu/kb/sampstat.htm(25-02-2003) http://trochim.human.cornell.edu/tutorial/mugo/tutorial.htm (25-02-2003) 3 SAP provides this potential as it categorizes the customers by sales volume and builds upon that parameter, the company pricing-policy. 4 L.I. Thalassinos (1998)¨Operational Statistics¨ pp(334-335)

Stamoulis Publications Chapter 9

1 www.quest.gr/investorrelations (22-03-2003)

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Chapter 10 1. Microsoft 2.Computer Associates 3.Oracle 4.SAP according to P. Greenberg (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ McGraw-Hill 2 www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/abap4.html(14-01-2003) 3 http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages(14-01-2003) 4 http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/planning/ security/pubkeyie.asp(19-02-2003) 5 http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/en-

us/default.asp?url=/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/en-us/iisbook/c09_secure_sockets_layer.asp(19-02-2003)

6 http://developer.netscape.com/tech/security/ssl/howitworks.html (19-02-2003) 7 Bryan Bergeron (2001)¨The eternal e-customer¨ McGraw-Hill(pp90-107) Chapter 11

1 http://www.keynote.com/solutions/assets/applets/Web_site_Speed and_Reliability.pdf(08-12-2002)

2 http://www.oteshop.gr/maintariffsenglish.pdf#epak(07-12-2002) 3 The 26 founding members of the Personalization Consortium

include American Airlines (NYSE: AMR), BroadVision (NASDAQ: BVSN), Chell.com, DoubleClick (NASDAQ: DCLK), eCustomers.com, Elity Systems, E.piphany (NASDAQ: EPNY), eSupplies.com, Exactis.com (NASDAQ: XACT), Frequency Marketing, !hey software, I-Behavior, icontact, Individualize.com, KPMG Consulting, Magnify, Nexgenix, NextClick, Peppers and Rogers Group, PricewaterhouseCoopers, PrivaSeek, Servicesoft,

SneakerLabs, u1.net, Wheelhouse and Younology. www.personalization.org(07-12-2002) Chapter 12 1 www.luminant.com/WP_InformationArchitecture.pdf , author

Jennifer A. Vodvark(11-03-2003) 2 http://www.bandwidthspeedtest.com/speedtest/(09-01-2003) 3 http://www.pantos.org/atw/35504.html(09-01-2003) 4 http://www.sun.com/columns/jakob/(24-02-2003)

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Bibliography

1. Kotler Philip (1994) ¨ Marketing Management ¨ EMI Interbooks 2. Bryan Bergeron (2001)¨The eternal e-customer¨ McGraw-Hill

3. P. Greenberg (2002) ¨CRM at the speed of light¨ McGraw-Hill

4. L.I. Thalassinos (1998)¨Operational Statistics¨ Stamoulis Publications

5. J. O’ Connor, E. Galvin (2001) ¨ Marketing in the digital age ¨ Financial Times Prentice Hall 6. George A. Miller ¨The Magical Number of Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information¨, The Psychological Review 63 (1956) 7. Christina Wodtke (2002) ¨Information Architecture, Blueprints for the Web¨ New Riders 8. Champy J. (2000) ¨The Ugly American Lives On ¨Sales and Marketing Management, Vol 151 9. John Webb (1999) International Marketing Research Vol 2 University of

Strathclyde in Glasgow.

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Appendix 1 Questionaire ¨ Quest-Online online ordering system evaluation¨

1) The total volume of your purchases through Quest-Online daily is:

Less than 500 € From 500 € to 1500 € Above 1500€

2) Is site is aesthetically appealing (colors-graphics)?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

3) Are links clearly labeled ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

4) Can you navigate yourself easily through its pages ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

5) Do pages follow a logical order ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

6) Are the product characteristics presented correct ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

7) Inactive product codes are removed immediately from the system ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

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8) The information is detailed enough or there is need for deeper documentation ?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

9) Pages are downloading in less than 10 seconds.

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

10) Is the site is easy to use? Can you easily find meaningful information?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

11) Was the system easy to learn?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

12) Rank the most important elements of an ideal online ordering system defining the most important as (1) and the less important as (5).

Information Navigation

Speed Presentation

Price Other

13) How do you think of the quality level of ¨Questonline¨ compared to other online ordering systems?

5) Very good 4) Good 3) Medium 2) Bad 1) Very bad

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Appendix 2 Project Specification

Course MSc in Management of E-Business

Stream: E-commerce

Project Specification

Project title: The ¨info-quest¨ case study: Integrating on line sales with electronic customer services.

Student: Forename: George Surname: Gianedakis Matriculation No: 00/5412/GRF Email: [email protected] Cohort: August 2002 If ‘Upgrade’, Month: Year: Supervisor:MrYannis Psaromiligkos Moderator: Mrs Sue Balint Outline:. Info-quest, is one of the biggest hardware and software distributors in the Greek ITC market. The company promotes brands as HP, COMPAQ, 3COM, IBM, CISCO, INTEL, MICROSOFT in a product mix of thousands of products. It sells to more than 1000 intermediaries (resellers) and a respectful amount of its sales is conducted on line. E-customer relationship practices, are the only way to enhance customer satisfaction and decrease administration costs in a pessimistic global economy.

The project will analyse and evaluate the current electronic on line ordering system of the company. The evaluation will be based on a list of evaluation criteria, which will be created and on data that will be gathered from a customer survey. Analysis of the data will be followed and suggestions will be made for the optimisation of the system. E-marketing and E-customer relationship management will form the literature basis of the project.

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Objectives: The project will:

• Consider the global ITC environment • Analyse the Greek ITC environment • Review the basic logic of customer behaviour, customer relationship

management and relationship marketing in physical and electronic business environment.

• Report info-quest identity and performance over the past years • Present the online ordering system • Look into secondary and primary data of Info-quest customer satisfaction • Create a list of evaluation criteria to be utilized • Evaluate the online ordering system of Info-Quest • Discuss the possible improvements on the system • Project possible future evolutions • Critical self evaluation

Resources (including reading list): http://special.northernlight.com/ecommerce/index.html http://special.northernlight.com/crm/ten_trends.htm#doc www.europa.eu.int/ispo/ecommerce (General statistics of the ICT sector in Greece and Europe) www.mindfultechnologies.com/story/INW20000626S0008 www.internetwk.com/service www.portal.brint.com http://ebusiness.mit.edu/sponsors/common/2002-AnnualConf/pres/DGeorge%20419%20Transformation1.pdf http://ebusiness.mit.edu/bgrosof/paps/wits01-panel-biz-intell-distrib.pdf http://www.crmguru.com/features/2002a/0110bt.html www.acnielsen.com www.microsoft.com www.ascusc.org/jcmc/vol5/issue2/hairong.html www.ecustomerserviceworld.com/earticlesstore_articles.asp?type=article+id=961 http://zdnet.com/2102-1104-874432.html http://www.dmreview.com/editorial/dmdirect/dmdirect_article.cfm?EdID=4148&issue=101901&record=3 John O` Connor and Eamonn Galvin (2001) ¨ Marketing in the digital age ¨ Peppers D. and Roggers M. (1996) ¨The one to one future: Building relationships one customer at time ¨ Linton I. (1995) ¨ Database marketing: Know what your customer wants ¨ Kotler P. (1994) ¨ Marketing management ¨ Whitley D. (2000) ¨ E-Commerce: Strategy, Technologies and Applications ¨

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Andreas Muther (2002) ¨ Customer Relationship Management: Electronic Customer Care in the New Economy ¨ Frederick Newell (2002) ¨ Loyalty.com: Customer Relationship Management in the New Era of Internet Marketing ¨

Marking Scheme:

Introduction 5 %

Literature Review 20%

Research methodologies and design 25%

Presentation of results 20%

Conclusions 20%

Critical Evaluation 10%

Date: 26/09-2002

Signatures Student:

Supervisor: Moderator:

We agree that this specification defines a suitable MSc level project