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52 Part 1 Introduction

Introduction

Disruptive Electronic communications are disruptive technologies that have caused major changes in
technologies
industry structure, marketplace structure and business models. Consider a B2B organization.
New technologies that
prompt businesses to Traditionally it has sold its products through a network of distributors. With the advent of
reappraise their strategic e-commerce it now has the opportunity to bypass distributors and trade directly with cus-
approaches.
tomers via a destination web site, and it also has the opportunity to reach customers through
Destination site new B2B marketplaces. Similarly, for B2C organizations such as an e-retail destination site
Typically a retailer or there is the opportunity to market its products through online intermediaries such as search
manufacturer site with
sales and service engines, price comparison sites, social networks, blogs and other publisher sites.
information. Intermediaries Organizations that monitor, understand and respond appropriately to changes in their
such as media sites may
be destination sites for online marketplace have the greatest opportunities to use digital technologies to compete
some. effectively. Understanding the online elements of an organization’s environment as illus-
trated in Figure 2.1 is a key part of situation analysis for e-business strategy development.
Online intermediaries
Web sites which help There is also the need for a process to continually monitor the environment which is often
connect web users with referred to as environmental scanning.
content they are seeking
on destination sites. Knowledge of the opportunities and threats presented by these marketplace changes is
Include new online essential to those involved in defining business, marketing and information systems strategy.
intermediaries such as
search engines and In this chapter we introduce a number of frameworks for analysing the immediate market-
shopping comparison place of the micro-environment. In Chapter 4 we examine the issues of the broader
sites and traditional
brokers, directories and e-commerce environment in more detail using the SLEPT framework to examine Social,
newspaper and magazine Legal, Economic, Political and Technological issues.
publishers that now have
an online presence.

Figure 2.1 The environment in which e-business services are provided