THE INTERNET-A MODERN FORM OF SALESPROMOTION

Ana-Maria AVRAMThe Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania

ABSTRACTInternet is the new means of communication of a new era in the world’s history. World Wibe Web(WWW) and the electronic commerce turned fast in forces of the great changes from our

society, bringing with them lots of challenges and new opportunities.This paper aims to present and analyze the machanisms that are at the base of the electronic commerce, the advantages and disadvantages of this form of trade and its importance in the future.The digital economy is an economy which developes specific forms, the electronic commerce being the most used aplicative form of the Internet tehnology. In the scientific literature, the electronic commerce is present as beeing that activity which allows the electronic performing of transactions bewteen organisations and individs, and the electronic business refers to the electronic performing and the electronic administration, but of all the activites and process of a business.

Keywords: Internet, site, advertising, suppliers, payment

JEL Classification: L81

Paper type: Research paper

Introduction

Internet can be considered, on the whole, a set of protocols of communications, ways to use and executed functions, a huge library of available information, or a way to connect the people from all over the world, representing a ”network of the networks”, which ”covers” the large areas of the Earth. The Internet is composed of a big number of interconnected networks which have the using of some particular protocols in common. The transfer of information(text, graphics, audio) is made using various links between network and different protocols. From other point of view, Internet represents a global network of computers.

Internet is the new means of communication of a new era in the world’s history. World Wide Web(WWW) and the electronic commerce turned fast in forces of the great chances from our society, bringing with them lots of challenges and new opportunities.

Internet’s interferences in different domains of activity are increasingly diverse, offering new valences to the conduct of the business. The Internet enlarges the field of action of the traders and removes the entry barriers in it, even for the small and medium enterprises. The consumers have the posibily to choose from a big quantity of products and services from the global market and to purchase the best transactions.

Chapter 1: E-economy and E-commerce

The New Economy or the digital economy(e-economy) is a resultant of the interaction from the personal computer, telecommunications and Internet and it is characterized by a series of very special features in comparison with the traditional economy.

1. The Structure of The Digital EconomyIn order to structure the digital economy, it can be useful to group the main

components( digital products, the consumers, the producers, the intermediars, the infrastructre of the company, the creators of web-sites) and other particular ways. A developped sistem by CISCO Systems and the Univeristy of Texas, identifies four components in an hierarchical structure of the e-economy: the Internet infrastructure, the applications of the digital infrastructure, the intermediars and the online transactions.

The level of the Internet infrastructureThis level is composed of the societies whose products and services help to the

demand and the developement of the network infrastructure. In this category we can include the telecommunication societies, the suppliers of the Internet services, those who provide suport for the Internet infrastructure, acces to the Internet and the producers of the network equipment, of the computers etc. At this level the following societies are active: IBM, Dell, RDS etc.

The level of the applications of the digital infrastructureThis level includes societies whose products and services allow the optimal use of

the infrastructure in order to realize electronic business. At this level, the needed software products for the direct transactions on the web are realized. At this level the following societies are active: Adobe, Macromedia etc.

The level of the intermediars in the digital economyEven if they function on the Internet, the socities which are operating at this level

don’t take their incomes directly from the trasactions, they earn them from commercials, taxes, commissions( advertising agency, intermediate agency of selling tickets etc.). At this level the following societies are active: Yahoo, Travel.com etc.

The level of online transactionsThis level, which is called ”the level of the traders”, includes all the types of the

members inside of the distribution chain which realize online operations, producers who sell their own products, traders etc. At this level the following societies are active: Amazon.com, IBM, Cisco etc.

1. The characteristics of the digital economyThe results of a research made by the Univeristy of Texas led to the shaping of the

following characteristics of the digital economy:a. The level of the electronic transactions. From these, the electronic

commerce has an important share, which experienced a spectacular development.

b. The size of the digital economy has become compatible with the traditional one in only few ears from the introduction of WWW, revaling already, as a size, with traditional areas as the energy, the automobiles and the telecommunications.

c. The digital economy has become more important in the world, one of the first 20 economies from the world, being the American one.

d. The digital economy has a great impact concerning the jobs and the responsabilities related to these, remodeling the labor market. A lot of categories of workers(for example, Internet developer) didn’t existed before 1994/1995.

e. The staff who works in infrastructure and applications creates more than a half of the revenue of the digital economy. The incomes of these levels are higher than those of the intermediars and online transactions, which shows the crystallization condition of the digital economy.

f. Organisations from the infrastructure layer have the highest income per eployee. The Internet infrastructure is the most productive from all the leels of the digital economy, a lot of organisations from the infrastructure beng strong and benefiting of competence and important economies of mney.

g. The big companies supply the digital economy. Even if a lot of new orgnisations appear, te big companies keep on playing an important role.

2. The electronic commerceThe digital economy is an economy which developes specific forms of this, the

electronic commerce being the most used and applied form of the Internet tehnology.In the scientific literature, the electronic commerce(e-commerce) is presented as

being that activity with allows the electronic execution of the transactions between the companies and the individs. The electronic business refers to the electronic execution and the electronic administration of the transactions and of all the activities and processes of a business. While the electronic commerce is the process of buying, sale/change of products and services through the computer networks, the electronic business are not limited to buying and selling goods, they include facilites for serving the consumers, for maintaing the contacts with the suppliers, with the clients, with the business parteners and also for the promotion of the products and/or the services offered through electronic means.

The models of the electronic commerce:a. B2B(Business to Business) is the most popular form of the electronic

commerce and includes all the electronic transactions between organisations called type IOS(Inter-organizational Information System). There are more types of inter-organisations systems: EDI-Electronic Data Interchange, VAN-Value Added Network, EFT-Electronic Funds Transfer etc.

b. B2C(Business to Consumer) refers to the retail transactions to individual consumers( for example, a consumer from Amazon.ro is a consumer for this model).

c. C2C(Consumer to Consumer) is a model where the consumers sell directly to the consumers(for example, the people who sell properties, houses, cars, other goods, commercials on the Internet etc.)

d. C2B(Consumer to Business). In this category we can include all the people who sell products and services to the companies and those who look for sellers, negociate with them and, in the end, a transaction takes place.

e. The business of non-profit organisations.It refers to the activites of non-profit organisations, academic, religious, social institutions, governmental agencies, which use various forms of the electronic commerce to reduce the costs, to improve the activities or the provided services. The implication of the governments in the economic activities created some particular models, like G2C(Government to Consumer), G2G(Government to Governmetn).

f. The Intra-business contain the internal activities which take place in an Intranet and involve changes of goods, services, information.

Chapter 2: The characterises of the succesfull web-pages.

A Web site is a collection of web pages, which are typical to a paticular domain from World Wide Web.

The commercial sites are those sites built especially to support an organisation in terms of her economic activity.

The audience of these sites is divided in more categories: The current and potential clients of the organisations; The current and potential investors of the organisation; The potential employees and third parties, as the press and

competitors.Considering this varied audience, the purpose for which a site was created is one of

those presented hereunder, but most often, the site answers to more needs, so the purpose is combined.

The distribution of information-the site is used to present information about the products and services which are given by the company; other kind of information are those about the contact.

The relations with the investors-a company which looks for external investors can build a site to present information about the current financial situation and the opportunities for investments.

Technical support-some parts of the site can be built in order to provide information to help the clients considering the correct use of the products and services which are provided by the company.

Staff recruitment-a site presents information about eomployment opportunities.To realize a site which has the purpose to commercialize products and services on

the global market, people must take under consideration the following aspects: The key words are used for searching similar sites. They must be

included in the key areas of the site. The mentaining of a quick acces to the site using a minimum number

of images, graphics and photographies. The images must be kept under 12 KB, the colors have to be simple and the animations must be kept at minimum.

The provided information must correspond with the things that the visitors of the sites want to know.

The strategic objects of the firm must be presented. It is necessary for the company to offer information about the staff and to show the photos of the key employees.

In the site, the firm must include a complete list of the products. The delivery time, the warranties and the provided technical assistance must be presented in the site.

The client must find the phone number, the fax number, the e-mail adresse and the mailing adrees of the firm on each page of the site.

On the site, the firm has to create a mass-media section. This includes press releases, photographies and biographies of the people who lead the compay.

On the site, in a special area, where only the visitor has acces, the firm must include some information about the costs of transport, holidays etc.

The architecture of the site Most of the sites are divided in subsections and each category includes pages with

a link to the home page, but it allows to the visitor to navigate from a page to another without turning back to the main menu.

The main purposes of a site1. It offers valuable information to the readers. They must find exactly what

they search. It finds solutions for their problems and answers to their questions.

2. The persuasion of each searching engine is the most relevant( at least in thr first 30) resaults for the targeted words. The key words are one of the most important things in the case of optimizing for te searching engines.

Detailed purposes:1. The potential visitors must find the site on the first or the second page from

the searching resaults for the key-words.2. The potential visitors must read the title and the descriptions listed in the

resaults of searching and must consider them interesting and relevant to enter the site.

3. If they find something which help them to solve their problems, they would trust and they would follow the advices, even if it is to buy the product, to sign up to newsletter etc.

The browsersA web browser is a program or a package of programs which realize the

maneuvering of the text or graphic information on the Internet. In the present, the most used browsers are Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. The browser works with web pages.

The time of loadingOne of the most signficant problems that all the web designers have is the low

speed of loading. The web users are usually people who don’t have patience and if the site works slowly, they know that they can take the products, the information, the services from other sites.

The consistencyWhen a profesional site is developed, te consistency is the most important thing

who must be taken in consideration. The background, the colors, the fontsmust have an uniform look. An uniform site let the users to know where they are, it can creat a brand in order to make the site to be recognized.

The navigationEven if the site is difficult to realize, all the work can be in vain. A navigation must

be simple and uniform from a page to other. An efficient navigation should allow the user to know three things: where he is, where he can arrive and how he can return to the starting point. Every page must have a link to the home page.

The fontsIf the site will use fonts that not all the people have in their computers(like

Verdana, Times New Roman, Arial, Calibri etc), the visitor will not see them. There can be used bold or italic to mark some terms.

The resolutionToday, the most used resolution is 1024x768. It’s a good idea to realize the design

of ths site at 1024x768, but the dimension of the text must be kept under 800 pixels. In this way, the people who have old types of computers can read the content too.

Chapter 3: Online acquisitions

The aplications of the electronic commerce improved the operations acquisition and supply chain. Some multinational companies support the idea that the realization of a business thorugh electronic means reduced the number of staff for acquisitions with 60%, reduced the costs with materials with 20% and they reduced the time for the suppliers’ selectrion.

The reasons which determinated these reductions are: The occurrence of some sites for the goods exchange and auctions on

specific areas. The development of some platforms for electronic acquisitions by the

multinational companies The Internet is governed by a lot of standards concerning the

acquistions.

1. The particular tehnologies of the electronic commerce:a. The establishment of the commerce company which will represent the

object of the projection. In the electronic commerce the projection can regard the electronic shop, the universal electronic shop, the third market, the virtual communities, the providers etc.

b. The location in case of the electronic commerce refers to hosting on your own or using of some providers for hosting. The firms which are interested in the implementation of an online shop can choose one of the following versions: the existence of a unique Web site, in which case the client has a site on a server and he can have a unique URL; the existance of a unique page for presentation of the shpw,in which case the client has only one shop on only one server of the host; mall is the a version accordint to which the client has more pages for presentantions of online shops at the same URL adress and data base.

c. The improvement in the electronic commerce reflects the layout of the web page, process which presumes content elements, graphics, links, navigation sistems and media elements.

d. The merchandise displaying requires the implementantion of a particular tehnology, shopping cart. The shopping cart sistems provides information about the following aspects: the nature of the products and their characteristics, the examination and the recording of the data.

e. The tehnology of the supplying, storage, selling and services delivery. In the case of the electronic commerce, outside the merchandise supplying, the firm must take into consideation the suppliers for web hosting services, for web design, web advertising etc. The information about the supplying, storage and selling activites generates different characterises concerning the running modules and delivery arrangements. For the execution of an electronical order it is necessary that the existing interface for the launch of the order to have the following particurites: a guard-page, where all the products and their characteristics are presented, a ”carriage of goods”, which includes the selected products, a form with data about the clients, a form with information about the payment and about the delivery, a form of confirming the order. The delivery terms of the online shops vary from 1-3 days or periods of 2-3 weeks, for the products which are not anymore in stock at that moment or which make te subject of a particular order.

f. The tenology of receivables, payments and discounts. The way of payment represents one of the most important problems of the electronic commerce. The electronic payment systems differ depending on a number of characteristics: security characteristics, the value of the payments, the type of the transaction(online or offline) etc. The most used solutions for electronic payments are: PayPal, SoftNet, CyberCash etc.

2. Models of business in the electroni commcerce The virtual shop is a type of community and represents the virtual

correspondent of the real entites. The electronic supply is necessary for the acquirement of goods and

services by the great companies and public authorities, throught the organizatin of the auctions.

The universal electronic shop is a collection of shops combined in a common organization which accept the same payment methods.

The third market manifest itself thorugh an user interface for the products list of the company.

The colaboration platforms include a set of instruments and an international environment for the colaboration between the companies.

The information and other services brokerage include lists of clients, the selling of business opportunities, consulting in scientific domains.

3. Advantages and disadvantages of the electronic commerceWithout doubt, the Internet has an extraordinary impact on the business world. This

is because of the advantages it presents for the consumers and for the producers. The Internet has also different kind of disadvantages.

a. Advantages for the traders: The posibility of the small companies to compete with the big ones.

Because the launching of a virtual shop includes reduced costs, the small companies have a less barrier to entry on the markets, dominated by the big companies. Contact with the clients 24 hours of 24, 7 days of 7. In contrast to the

usual employees, who need salaries, a working program, holiday, a web site offers information about the firm and its products and processes orders 24 hours of 24, 7 days of 7, with minimum costs.

The facility to enter on international markets. The worlwide network has no frontiers, it is in possesion of none, and the acces and the costs of publication are reduced. The decrease of the operating costs. These costs can be drastically

reduced through the automation of the order process. b. Advantages for consumers:

Disponibility 24 hours of 24, 7 days of 7. This disponibility represents an advantage for the clients, who can buy good even in the night. Comodity. Because of the electronic commerce, each person can buy

things from home, analizing and comparing some products.c. Disadvantages for the traders:

The fraud. The Intert tehnology created new possibilites of fraud. The security. The connection of a company to a public network, where

everybody as acces generates serious problems.d. Disadvantages for consumers:

Privacy. The potential clients are afraid that, because of the Internet, the traders or a person with bad intentions can find detailed information about them. The absence of the human contact. The absence of the seller

represents an obstacle to the spread of this form of trade. The acces to tehnology. As long as a web site willbe accesible only to

the people who know to launch the browser and to write the web adress, most of the clients will prefer the coner store.

Chapter 4: Research regarding the opinion of te clients about the online advertising

1. The purpose of the researchThe purpose of the research was the study of the opinion about the online

advertising .2. Tools for data collection

For this project, a questionary was used to find out the opinion about the online advertising of the people included in the sample.The questionary was composed from a series of questions aimed to gather informtion about the sample(sex, age, income, educational level)and a series of questions aimed to study the people’s opinion about the online advertising.

3. The used sample

The research mehtodology predicted the application of a questionary on a sample of 41 people.

4. The research objectivesConcidering that the purpose of the research was the study of the opinion about the

online advertisting, the objectives may be: The analysis of the impact that Internet has on the population The research of the people’s opinion about how often is the online

advertising on the Internet The study of the attention that the individs pay to online advertising. The highlighting of the products that the individs buy from the

Internet.5. The research hypotheses

All the individes questioned spend each week a part of their time on the Internet. Most of the subjects ordered goods from the Intrnet. Most of the subjects condiser that advertising is often met on the

Internet. Most of the subjects ordered clothes, jeweleries and books from the

Interet.6. Data Analysis41 people answered to the questions, 33 females and 8 males as we can see in

figure 1.

86%

14%

SexF M

Figure 1.the sex of the subjects

Concerning the age(figure 2) of the subjects, the most of the people who answered are between 18 and 25 years, which proves that the young people are interested in the electronic commerce.

5%

76%

5%2%

12%

Ageover 45 years 18-25 years 26-32 years33-38 years 39-45 years

Figure 2.The age of the subjects

Concerning the edutational level(figure 2), most of the subjects have higher education, 44% of them have the bachelor degree, 29% have the master degree , 24% finished the highschool and 3% of them have oter degrees.

29%

7%2%

61%

Educational level

1001-2000 RON 2001-3000 RON

over 3000 RON under 1000 RON

Figure 3.The educational level of the subjects

Concerning the income(figure 4) per month of the subjects, the most people(44%) have under 1000 RON per month, 29% of them have between 1001-2000 RON and the rest of them have high revenues, after 2001 RON per month.

29%

7%2%

61%

Income per month

1001-2000 RON 2001-3000 RONover 3000 RON under 1000 RON

Figure 4. The income per month of the subjects At the first question(figure 5), all the people admitted that they acces the

Internet for more times per week.

100%

For how many times per week do you acces the Internet?

for more times

Figure 5. The first question

At the second question(figure 6), most of the subjects comfirmed that they bought some products from the Internet. This thing proves that the people are drawn by the electronic commerce.

76%

24%

Have you ever bought something from the Internet?

yes no

Figure 6. The second question

At the third question(figure 7), the influence that the online advertising has on the people can be noticed. Most of them purchase goods after they saw a commercial on the Internet.

59%41%

3. Have you ever bought something after you saw the commercial on the Internet?

yes no

Figure 7. The third question

According to the pie-chart, the forth question(figure 8) shows the products that the people use to buy on the Internet. Most ofthe people are interested to buy books, clothes and jeweleries.

What products do you use to buy from the Internet?

jeweleriescomputersbooks, jeweleriesbooks, computersbooks, electronics, animalsbooks, electronicsbooks, clothesbooks, clothes, jeweleriesbooks, clothes,animalesbooks, clothes, computers,jeweleries bookswatches, tickets, booksanything i needelectronicsclothes clothes, book, computerstickets, computers, books

Figure 8. The forth question

The fifth question(figure 9) proves that the online publicity is very present on the Internet, bcecause all the subjects confirmed that they met publicity on the Internet.

100%

Did you meet publicity on the Internet?

yes

Figure 9. The fifth question

Accoding to the sixth question(figure 10), the most found forms of advertising on the Internet are the banner, the e-mail campaign and the sponsorised link.

If you did, what form of advertising did you find?

bannerbanner, e-mail campaign, sponsorized linkbanner, e-mail campaignbanner, sponsorized linkedbanner pop-upbanner, e-mail campaign, pop-upbanner, pop-up, link sponsorizate-mail campaigne-mail campaign, sponsorized linksponsorized linkpop-uppop-up, sponsorized link, e-mail campaign,

Figure 10. The sixth question

At the seventh question(figure 11), most of the subjects confirmed that the online advertising is often found on the Internet.

12%

88%

From your point of view, advertising is often present on the Internet?

acceptable often

Figure 11. The seventh question

At the question number 8(figure 12), most of the subjects confirmed that they are drawn by the provided information, a part of them are drawn by the amusement and a little part of the subjects are drawn by the notoriety of the company from the advertising.

32%

51%

17%

To what do you pay attention when you see an online advertising?

the amusament

the provided information

the notoriety of the company from the advertising

Figure 12. The question number 8

The nineth question(figure 13) expresses the eficiency of the online advertising, most of the students supported the ideea that it is eficient.

88%

12%

Do you think that the online advertising is efficient?

yes no

Figure 13. The ninth question

At the tenth question(figure 14), we can see that the most of the subjects don’t click on online advertising.

yes41%

no59%

Do you click on online advertising?

Figure 14. The tenth question

Conclusions

In conclusion i can say that the e-commerce is the main element of the new economy, and the Internet represents the main environment where itis making his presence felt.

From the shpping made from the armchair to the closing of the traditional shops to enter in the online environment, the electronic commerce has influence on every business decision, at management level and among the consumers.

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