Effects of technology in todays business world

Effects of technology in todays business world Thanks to the digital revolution, the present business world has entered a new millennium of connectivity, networking and marketing. Now the business world is much more developed and advanced and innovation of new electronic machines and digital networks has made this possible. Technology is now mixed up with every aspect of life and has brought up a revolutionary change in the marketing process. Customers can get their job done by hiring the perfect product in a greater comfort with ease. Old marketing practice needs to be carried out along with technological merge to adopt with the changing market environment. Old business perspective has been changed by the entrance of advanced networking and information technology. Business as well as marketing becomes more dynamic and effective when peer-to-peer (P2P) relationship is firmly established and henceforth intranet and extranet are there to keep the people and companies to connected with each other. People can now be connected with the vast and endlessly growing information repository using internet. Wireless technology has further enhanced the connectivity. Todays economy is standing upon the basis of technological advancement and connectivity. The economy is backed by information system. Information can be accessed, updated, modified, personalized and dispatched via internet very fast. With the help of the information about countless gathered through technical tools, softwares and using networks, marketers can offer now more new individualized products or can update the preceding ones accordingly. For example, a company, named Dell Computers offers the customers to tell them their need-specification about computer components and delivers them a manually configured one within a very short time. By doing so, they are also able to communicate with their customer one to one and build up a strong relationship with them. Changes in Business practice: The changes in technology and economy are bringing out a new set of customs, beliefs, cultures as well as practices on the part of business firms. Such as, Marketing groups are being formed to address the needs of different customer groups. This means a switch from being product-centered to being customer-segment centered. Companies are adding a focus on estimating individual customer lifetime value and offering them the products, designed according to the idea extracted from the evaluation of individuals preferences to make a good profit out of it. Companies now pay concentration on marketing scorecard with a view to interpreting what is happening to their market share, their rate of customer loss, satisfaction of consumer, quality of product relative to competitors and other measures. Since the late David Packard of Hewlett-Packard observed, Marketing is far too important to leave to the marketing department. Each employee has an effect on the customers and should value the clients as the resource of the companys prosperity. To build a purpose brand, companies are now relying more upon performance rather than advertising. New economy companies put much emphasis on customer retention than on customer acquisition. An increasing number of companies are making customer satisfaction a major priority. In short, todays market place is made for traditional consumers (those who do not purchase online), cyber consumers (who purchase online), and hybrid consumers (who performs the same). Hence most companies will need a presence for these offline and online to supply to these hybrid honorable consumers. Organizations need to rethink and revise their overall company strategy and within that, their marketing strategy. Ecommerce: According to Patricia Seybold, a management consultant, e-business is the sign of the opportunity and customer service will be its banner. Those who dont pay attention to the value of e-commerce in lasting the business world will be seriously exaggerated, and those who misjudge the importance of it will perish. Technological revolution of the marketplace has allowed a greater change and customization of the products, services and promotional messages than older marketing tools. It has helped the retailers to build up and maintain a good relationship with the consumers. Conducting commercial transaction via EDI was the first step to use technology in marketplace. Every now and then new technologies come along and replace the relatively older one or combining with it, create a new dimension and paves the way to new possibilities. Competition drives new technology and vice versa. E-commerce is a successively progressing and developing sector. It has added a new dimension in the marketplace to meet the consumers ever-changing demands. It makes the consumers way of shopping and buying much easier and consumers from any remote place can easily access the site, choose their things and begin shopping. Due to comfort and easiness, it has become an integral part of daily lives for some consumers. Moreover, for some products, online purchasing is more suitable. Online sellers can trade non-digital goods successfully and could make a good profit out of it. These products may include embarrassing objects or may be ordered from remote places. Every now and then market researches and surveys are conducted thoroughly by collecting consumers information observing their actions. A point-of-sales system provides information to stores which helps greatly in assuming buyer needs and achieving the goals. Technology gives the consumers ability to research on the products they cherish to buy. With this new technology, they have the power they never had before- the power to review and recheck the products endlessly along with videos and demos and to compare prices from thousands of other vendors within a very short time. Vendors also take advantage of the e-commerce since it doesnt need any live salesman and s/he can keep it open for business purpose 24/7 hours. Additionally, even retailers with small capital can establish an international or global reach with a simple website. For instance, local and national market in many countries conduct their business up to night but an online shop like e-bay is open 24/7 hours and people can visit and shop here at any time. E-business has made the international business door open to all. Internet has changed the way of business through targeted advertising. Companies can direct certain consumers/customers to their business site specifying some keywords and all these are possible by using Google. As for example, Amazon.com is sponsored by Google and therefore people, searching for buying products, will be redirected to that site. Despite the importance, flexibility and potentiality of the e-commerce and e-business, people have taken more time to adopt with this new environment than expected. Of many reasons behind this fact, accessibility and availability are the major key concern. Though it might be accessed from remote places, yet its accessibility and availability are extremely lows in the poor, under-developed and developing countries. There are also transaction and delivery problems. Security concern comes to mind whenever people go for any money-costing occasion like shopping and buying over internet. We frequently see such news of online bankrupting due to either security failure or virus attack in various renowned organizations and thats enough to scare off the people and awaken their fear of insecurity. As such many consumers hold back their shopping or buying, even after having good impression on the product, just thinking about the safety of the money. They feel awkward to use the credit card due t o concern about theft and fraud. Mostly marketers are unwilling to look through the eyes of the customer rather they look through their viewpoint and try to know their customers deeds instead of their needs and wants. When marketers tailor a product to meet the need of typically defined consumers from a geographic segment, it is uncertain whether the individual will buy the product or not. It only expresses the probability of purchasing. New products need to be introduced and developed for sure and marketers are too good at it but it is useless to consumers if it can not meet their demands. Lack of instant gratifying reaction on behalf of vendors often decreases the buyer number and amount of visitors. Even social status of the consumer and the social aspect of online and offline shopping influences the consumers profoundly. Many consumers prefer talking to salesman about the staff or to their cohorts for real which are not quite the same in online auction. Steps need to be taken to implement the market segmentation in the market place effectively to avoid the downturn. Failing to understand certain consequences will eventually lead to that situation. One of them is the failure to understand the customers. Failing to do so will hurt the consumers feeling and push back the potential customers. Products need to be improved but if one fails to realize the competitive situation and is unable to predict environmental reaction, the market share will surely fall down and it will raise problems in future. Thats what happened to the polythene industry in Bangladesh. Polythene bag was very much used and produced amply but suddenly awareness against global warming and environmental pollution was awakened in peoples mind and people started to rise against using polythene bag and eventually polythene industry came to halt. Both over-estimation of resource competence and under-estimation of time requirements are detrimental to marketing plan. Improper co-ordination, inability to follow a plan and inadequacy of e-valiability will downturn the market. Failure to obtain senior management and employee commitment is another key source. Customers demands have increased profoundly along with the entrance of new technology in the marketing over the years. Consumers intend to get it available all the time and if they dont, even for once, they will go for alternatives. So to grab the attraction of the consumer and retain it, availability of the products must be ensured. There are also quality and business to business (B2B) relation issues. To keep pace and compete with others, quality of products has to be ensured along with the consumer service. Otherwise, retailers will lose their share. RED could be findings .