We have covered a wide variety of topics in the quarter. Now is the time to demonstrate your knowledge of those topics and how they would relate to a “real world” scenario. Thus, the objective is not to test your ability to recall the topics covered, but to apply them. You are encouraged to use creativity in your answers here, as a strict knowledge of definitions is of little value in the business world without the ability to apply them creatively.
You are a prospective eCommerce entrepreneur or company manager with an idea. I am a potential investor in your new company or funding manager. It is up to you to address certain questions that I have about your new eCommerce venture. Thus, you must satisfy my concerns on the various aspects of your venture well enough by demonstrating your written ability to communicate. Impress me and make me feel confident that investing money in your venture will be of benefit to me and/or the company.
You must publish all of your work for this exam on the web hosting service that you have been using for your assignments. There must be a main page with links to pages addressing each of the topics below. Note Clarification: Please make this a frames page. The left or top of the page would be have the links to the various sections and the main page would have the content. The default page display would be the Business Product/Service. Name the links with the exact same title as I use for the question. Thus, if the question heading is Business Product/Service, the name for the link should be labeled Business Product/Service. I am not looking for anything fancy on your home page, just your name, course number, heading “Final Exam” and links to each of the questions. Creating the page of links should not take much time at all using MS Frontpage. The due date and late policy WILL be STRICTLY enforced. If it is not posted by Midnight on the 20th of November it will be 20% off; and a subsequent 20% off for each day late.
Note that each answer must be a MINIMUM of 350 words to get full credit.
Some of the Sections of the exam are Required and some are Optional. The Optional Sections will be a choice between various questions, and you must pick Four (4) of the Six (6) choices. THE OPTIONAL SECTIONS ARE NOT OPTIONAL WHETHER TO DO OR NOT TO DO, BUT TO PICK 4 OF THE 6 TO COMPLETE. Thus, the final total for points can be above 125 if you decide to do every part. I will consider both the ideas that you present and how you communicate them, so good writing is key.
Pick any product or service that you feel is suitable for eCommerce. The idea must include something you will be selling over the web(B2C), or alternately, it could be a Business to Business venture or an internal company website. Explain, using at least the criteria covered in the text, notes and lectures, why this product or B2B idea is suitable is for eCommerce.
You must explain each of the eight components of the business model for your business venture, i.e. Value Proposition, Revenue model, etc. from Table 2.1, p. 58 of the text. Each element must be clearly discussed.
List the specific characteristics of your intended customer that you feel are important. This should include at least Age, Income and Education. Include any other characteristics that you feel are important such as hobbies and interests, geographic location, etc. that are particular to the product and service that you have chosen.
List and show in a diagram (can be done in MS Word), at least five pages that would be included in your site and how they are navigated. Discuss the method of navigation and what organizational scheme you would implement.
OPTIONAL:
Pick four (4) of the following six (6) worth 15 points each (Total 60
points)
Estimate what level of usage you would expect within the first year (i.e. how many hits/hour or hits/day). List the specific hardware and software requirements that you would anticipate needing based on either a two tier or three tier web architecture. These would at least include servers (for web pages and databases), internet connections, operating system software, server software, database software, other e-commerce software, and or security software security software, and website development tools.
Extra Credit (10 points): Estimate the cost for each of these components.
Web Presence (15 points) Reference Chapter 4.
Pick a domain name for your venture that is available (use http://www.networksolutions.com/). Discuss how you plan to host your site. In particular, look at the alternatives that are available for web hosting and review the criteria that were used for Homework 3. Pick at least 8 of the criteria from Homework 3 to discuss.
Discuss a plan on how you plan to reach your customers and get them to your website. This plan should at least cover two methods of that were discussed in the lecture.
List and discuss two possible payment methods that you could use in your venture. Discuss the pros and cons of each method and, based on that discussion, pick one primary method and discuss the steps necessary to implement it.
List and discuss the possible security threats that could be anticipated on your site. Evaluate the need to implement Digital Certificates and Digital Signatures as security mechanisms based on these threats. At the very least, even if you do not feel they would be necessary, explain how and where and why these two mechanisms are used. If your plans are to implement a shopping cart mechanism for your site (most likely), discuss how SSL is used for this and how you would utilize it.
Personnel
(15 points) Reference Chapter 4.
List all of the different skills (hint: cover at least six) that you would require for your venture related to the actual site development (not general business/management skills). Give a plan on how you would acquire those personnel.