College Of Engineering Information Systems Department 311 F

College Of Engineeringinformation Systems Departmentis 311 Final Proje

College of ENGINEERING Information Systems Department IS 311 Final Project (30 Marks) Final E-commerce Project Students are to work in teams of three to plan an e-commerce site for a real or hypothetical business and implement the site using open source tools. Students are to present their plan and implementation in an oral presentation using PowerPoint and in a written summary. The specific requirements for the project are as the following: a. Create an Internet Business Plan (20 Marks) (see the details and guidelines below) b. Implement that plan on the Web (10 Marks) (see the details and guidelines below) First: Sections of an Internet Business Plan 1) Executive Summary: This section must concisely communicate the basics of your entire business plan. Keep in mind that your reader may be unfamiliar with the Internet and its tremendous potential. 2) Business Description: In this section discuss your firm's product or service along with information about the industry. 3) Marketing Plan: With the business described, next you must discuss your target market, identify competitors, describe product advertising, explain product pricing, and discuss delivery and payment mechanisms. a. Customers: You must define who your customers are and how many of them exist on the Internet. There are demographic studies by organizations such as The Internet Society and The Internet Group that can help you determine this. b. Competitors: Use Internet search engines to look for known competitors or similar products to yours. Remember, readers of your business plan will be very interested in how you are going to beat the competition. c. Advertising: Describe how you are going to tell the Internet community about your product or service. Designing beautiful Web pages is only a first step. You must also get the word out about your Web site. Some tips: add your Web address to the databases of search engines, add it to the bottom of all of your e-mail messages, etc. d. Pricing: How are you setting prices for your products or services? If your product is intangible information delivered over the Internet, you should try to create some sort of pricing model to justify your prices. You could start by researching what others are charging for similar products. e. Delivery & Payment: How are you going to deliver your product and get paid? E-mail alone is not secure. 4) Research & Development : This is where to get into the technical aspects of your project. Address where the project is now, the R&D efforts that will be required to bring it to completion, and a forecast of how much the project will cost. Since the Internet is continually developing, you should also address continuing plans for R&D. 5) Management: This segment must address who will be running the business and their expertise. Because the business centers around the Internet, be sure to discuss the management team's level of Internet expertise and where they gained it. Also, describe your role in the business. 6) Risks: In this section, you must define the major risks facing the proposed business. In addition to regular business risks such as downward industry trends, cost overruns, and unexpected entry of competitors, also include risks specific to the Internet. For example, be sure to address the issues of computer viruses, hacker intrusions, and unfavorable new policies or legislation. 7) E-commerce business and revenue models: Name and describe the e-commerce business model(s) used by the business. Explain why this model or models is appropriate for e-commerce for this business. Name and describe the revenue model(s) used by the business. Explain why this model or models is appropriate for ecommerce for this business? 8) Financial : Potential investors will pay close attention to this area, since it is a forecast of profitability. As in a regular business plan, include all pertinent financial statements. Remember to highlight the low expenses associated with operating on the Internet compared to those of other business. 9) Timeline: In this section, you must lay out the steps it will take to make your proposal a reality. When developing this schedule, it might be helpful to talk to other Internet businesses to get an idea of how long their Internet presences took to establish. 10) Conclusion: A summarization for the business plan that shows how is tis plan is promising and expected to be successful. Second: Implementation Requirements: The site must have the following features, at a minimum: · Company background page listing location of corporate headquarters or equivalent; · Business Policies, if transactions are conducted, including; · complete and easy to understand rate charges if the business provides a service · shipping policy and charges · return policy · Privacy Policy · Security Statement In designing your site, the following aesthetics must be considered: · Appropriate use of colors and contrasts · Appropriate amount of information on each page - do NOT clutter your pages · Appropriate use of images (Relativity, resolution, and size) · Consistent corporate image throughout the site Third: Project schedule: Date Requirement Week 3 Students organize teams and begin to develop project ideas Week 4 Students send email to professor with names of team members and the project idea (type of business, product or service sold through e-commerce site) Week 7 Marketing Plan Week 11 Complete Business plan Week 14 Complete prototype Week 15&16 Final report and presentation Good Luck 1 BUSS320 – Marketing Management “Holiday Inn to Turn Bar Into Social Hub†Deadline Due by Saturday at 11:59 pm, ET. “Holiday Inn to Turn Bar Into Social Hub†Now that it is wrapping up a $1 billion overhaul of its 3,400 hotels across the globe, Holiday Inn has turned its attention to its next project: redesigning and expanding it hotel bars to make them livelier. At its annual conference for franchisees in Las Vegas this week, Holiday Inn parent InterContinental Hotels Group PLC unveiled a preliminary concept it calls the “social hub.†The plan makes the bar the center of several Holiday Inn services, including the restaurant, game room and business center. The social-hub plan is partly an effort to address an issue that has dogged midmarket, full-service hotel chains like Holiday Inn for years. These hotels, especially those with 150 or fewer rooms, often don’t generate enough traffic to support full-scale, 24-hour food-service operations – at least not profitably. It is also a response to the findings of a customer study that Holiday Inn conducted in 2007 and 2008, when it canvassed 10,000 midscale hotel guests in six major cities. Among other things, the study found that frequent Holiday Inn guests – who are most often middle managers, route salespeople, entrepreneurs and government supervisors – want to be around other people rather than holed up in their rooms, Holiday Inn executives say. “These are more extroverted, charismatic people who like people,†says Kevin Kowalski, senior vice president of global brand management for Holiday Inn. “They’re not going to hang out in their rooms and watch TV. They’re just social animals.†That’s partly why Holiday Inn wants the bar to play a bigger role at the hotels. The social hub would tailor Holiday Inn’s lunch and dinner menus to bar fare that can be shared, such as gourmet meatballs, sesame chicken wings, hamburgers and a few significant entrees, such as steaks and salmon club sandwiches. Those changes would allow for more food to be served by the bar staff, which in turn would allow Holiday Inn’s franchises to limit their labor costs by reducing restaurant staff, especially at slow times of the day. “We’re not thinking about it as dinner,†Mr. Kowalski says. “We’re thinking about it as this evening social occasion. You may want just a snack or a burger with friends.†Holiday Inn would still treat breakfast as the most substantial meal it serves. But the social-hub concept will make breakfast more of a self-service offering, with buffets and cook-to-order stations for omelets and the like. That, too, would allow Holiday Inn owners to pare labor costs by limiting their wait staffs. Other aspects of the plan call for moving other services adjacent to the bar, such as the hotel’s business center, game room, dining patio and lobby. Holiday Inn envisions that the game room will offer such diversions as a Wii game console and billiards table and the patio will feature fire pits and cabanas. Several Holiday Inn franchisees interviewed at the Las Vegas conference were receptive to the social-hub project, especially because it promises to help them cut costs. “Franchisees have to make sure they are pushing forward and keeping their hotels relevant.†Reference Hudson, K. (2010). Holiday Inn to turn bar into social hub. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from Directions The marketing managers of this business have made certain decisions about the company's marketing strategy. This is what building a marketing plan is all about. For each strategic point below, write a paragraph describing how they are answered in the above article. Be specific in your response, and include examples from the article. Strategic Points: ï‚· Problem definition ï‚· Customer profile: a. Segmentation; b. Target market; and c. Positioning. ï‚· Operations cost In your final paragraph, analyze the strategy utilized in the article. Evaluate and describe whether their planning will be successful. Determine and explain if you believe the plan will work. Justify your response. Support should be cited in APA format. Support should be cited in APA format. Water Truck DeliveryService 1) Executive Summary: The website is a water truck delivering service. It will help the people who live in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia to order water and be delivered to their houses. The user has to register and create an account to make the order. Then, the user will pick the size of the water truck and the date they need it to be delivered to their location. 2) Business Description: The primary goal of our organization is to help organize and manage the process of ordering water to the people who live in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia instead of waiting hours in the line to get water to their houses. 3) Marketing Plan: With the business described, next you must discuss your target market, identify competitors, describe product advertising, explain product pricing, and discuss delivery and payment mechanisms. a. Customers: Our customer will be, the people who are living in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. As ordering water is one of the popular problems in Jeddah. Our demographic will be, any People who have access and use the internet. b. Competitors: Currently, we do not have any competitors as the only place that provide water is the Water National Company and we are working with them on our project. c. Advertising: Social networks are an important tool in this project. People tend to rely on social media to follow new trends. Our application will be considered as a trend that eases up the process of getting water truck to homes. People will rely on the app to eliminate the frustration of going to the water station and stand in long lines to get a truck. Most Saudis use Twitter and Facebook daily; we plan to target the residence of Jeddah on most social networks. I. Twitter: An account will be created to inform the public about the service. The account will require developments of contents that will be posted daily which will create ways for the company to interact with users and develop an interest in the app. II. Facebook: A Facebook page will be created to target users in Jeddah. The plan is to create videos with detailed information about the interface of our application to promote its usage to the customers. A daily content should be developed to increase the level of interaction with clients. When the page reaches a certain level of likes, the website will provide us with statistics to evaluate the performance of our methods in reaching customers. When the page hits a certain number of likes, we should consider using the Facebook ads to promote our page to local residents. The Facebook ads have different levels that could allow us to reach our target audience. III. YouTube ads: The Company should contract with one of the well-viewed channels on YouTube to prepare a product replacement for our application in one of their videos. IV. Google: A well-developed website about our application should be created and signed in Google database to maximize the number of searches on the website. V. Google app and App-store: The application should be provided to both markets with a unique logo that will appeal to the user. d. Pricing: The price depends on the size of the truck. There will be different sizes of the truck depending on the user needs. The smallest truck is about 10 tons and will cost about 100SR, the medium ton it is about 15 tons and will cost about 170SR, and the largest will be 22 tons and will cost about 200SR. e. Delivery & Payment: The ordering process will be through the website itself. Processing the payment will be made using these two methods: · 1- Pay online using Credit Card, Debit Card or PayPal. · 2- Pay when you receive your Water Truck with Cash on Delivery. 4- Research & Development: We would need to first analyze and devise the project scope and document it according to the requirements before we get on with defining either the cost or the timeline for the application. Also, we would like to include the features that are locally acceptable and in demand. In the designing phase, we will introduce a larger database that would support more people from the local front. The truck water app can be customized to match the requirement of the users in a cost-effective manner. 6- Risks: · Technology: Customers are wary of downloading apps, and some online businesses have been hacked for credit card information. We could upgrade its database security system to reduce financial or personal account information risks. · Customer satisfaction: Some customers may experience long waits or inexperienced drivers; so we will use the Internet to check consumer complaints and address them to improve customer satisfaction. 7- E-commerce business and revenue models: The business model of water truck services will make it possible for people to simply tap their smartphone and have a water truck arrive at their location in the minimum possible time. Revenue models: · Different water truck to cater to everyone: Water truck services will not limit itself to a particular segment of trucks or to a particular segment of people. There will be different sizes of the truck depending on the user needs. The smallest truck is about 10 tons and will cost about 100SR, the medium ton it is about 15 tons and will cost about 170SR, and the largest will be 22 tons and will cost about 200SR. · Pricing Technology: Variation in fares according to situation is an important aspect of water truck’s business model. Whenever the demand increases, per mile prices are automatically increased. 10- Conclusion: The whole idea of creating a water truck application is to make an app enriched with features customized to match the user requirement. Our intention is to make water truck services so efficient, trucks so highly utilized that for most people it is cheaper than going to the company and rent a water truck.

Paper For Above instruction

Introduction

The rapid evolution of e-commerce has transformed traditional business models, emphasizing the importance of online platforms that efficiently cater to consumer needs. The concept of an online water delivery service in Jeddah exemplifies this shift, aiming to address local challenges such as long waiting times and inefficiencies at water stations. By leveraging digital marketing strategies and secure online payment mechanisms, this project aims to establish a reliable, accessible, and cost-effective water distribution platform tailored to the specific demands of residents in Jeddah.

Problem Definition

The primary problem faced by residents of Jeddah revolves around the cumbersome process of obtaining water. Many residents endure long queues at water stations due to limited access and logistical inefficiencies. The lack of a streamlined method to order water delivery exacerbates inconvenience, especially for those with tight schedules or mobility issues. This problem demands a technological solution that simplifies water procurement, reduces waiting times, and improves customer satisfaction through an efficient online platform.

Customer Profile: Segmentation, Target Market, and Positioning

Segmentation strategies focus on matching the service to consumers based on their demand for convenience and internet accessibility. The target market primarily includes residents of Jeddah with internet access, spanning various demographics such as working professionals, homemakers, and small business owners who require regular water supply. The service positions itself as a dependable, user-friendly, and efficient alternative to traditional water stations, emphasizing affordability, speed, and convenience. Effective positioning involves branding the online platform as the preferred solution for hassle-free water delivery, reinforced through strategic online marketing channels like social media and search engine optimization.

Operations Cost Considerations

One of the key advantages of this online water delivery platform is the potential for reduced operational costs. Compared to physical water stations, costs associated with staffing, infrastructure maintenance, and physical logistics are minimized. The digital framework allows for streamlined order processing, automated scheduling, and dynamic pricing based on demand. Moreover, targeted online advertising ensures cost-effective customer outreach, while secure payment gateways eliminate the need for cash handling and reduce potential transaction risks, thereby further lowering operational expenses.

Evaluation of the Strategy and Potential Success

The strategy employed in this project integrates digital marketing, secure online transactions, dynamic pricing, and customer-centric service delivery. The emphasis on social media and search engine marketing is appropriate given the high internet penetration in Jeddah, ensuring effective outreach. Ensuring secure, user-friendly interfaces and flexible payment options fosters consumer trust and engagement. Given these strategic elements, the plan is well-positioned for success, provided there is continuous monitoring and adaptation to consumer feedback and technological developments. The tailored approach to meet local needs and leverage digital marketing trends increases the likelihood of widespread adoption and profitability.

Conclusion

This innovative water delivery platform aims to revolutionize how residents of Jeddah access water, leveraging the power of e-commerce to create a more convenient, efficient, and cost-effective solution. By focusing on targeted marketing, operational efficiency, and customer satisfaction, the project stands to significantly improve quality of life for users while establishing a sustainable business model rooted in technological advancement and customer-centricity.

References

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