Page 6 - Introduction to Electronic Commerce and Social Commerce

vi Preface

Chapters with Major Changes

• Chapter 1 now includes social networks, media and commerce, sharing economy, social
customers, new business models, and other leading-edge topics.
• Chapter 2 has been expanded to include both traditional EC and social media, including
augmented reality, virtual reality, and crowdsourcing.
• Chapter 3 has been updated to include some e-marketing topics.
• Chapter 4 contains B2B social commerce and social collaboration.
• Chapter 5 has been expanded to include e-health, robotics, and artificial intelligence
applications.
• Chapter 9 includes new coverage of advertising models and strategies.

Chapters with Less Significant Changes

More than 40% of all cases have been replaced and many examples have been added. About
30% of all end-of-chapter material has been updated and/or expanded. Managerial Issues have
been updated as are the figures and tables. Duplications have been eliminated and explanations
of figures and tables have been made more understandable. New topics have been added to
many of the sections to reflect the social media and commerce revolution.

Online Files

The online files are updated and reorganized. The number of online files has been reduced
significantly. (They are located at e-commerce-introduction-textbook.com)

FEATURES OF THIS BOOK

Several features are unique to this book.

Managerial Orientation

Electronic commerce can be approached from two major viewpoints: technological and mana-
gerial. This text uses the second approach. Most of the presentations are about EC applications
and implementation. However, we do recognize the importance of the technology; therefore,
we present the essentials of selling and buying mechanisms in Chapter 2 and the essentials of
security in Chapter 10. We also provide some detailed technology material in the online files,
tutorials on the book’s website (e-commerce-introduction-textbook.com). Managerial issues
are also provided at the end of each chapter.

Social Media and Commerce Orientation

Given the importance of social media and commerce, we related all major topics in the book
to social media, social networks, and social commerce.