Ebusiness Plan Online Furniture Shops Marketing Essay

Ebusiness Plan Online Furniture Shops Marketing Essay This report outlines an online business plan for our company known as the Online Furniture Shop. We tend to cater needs of several kinds of customers ranging from large organization, small offices, schools, restaurants, hospitals to homes. We offer a vast variety of products online on our website furniture-online.com. Consumers can not only browse through various categories of products, view their details and prices but they can also order furniture online. The rest of the report will determine several other elements required in the e-business plan for Online Furniture Shop. A.  Ã‚  Ã‚  The E-commerce Infrastructure Electronic commerce can be defined as the type of business or monetary transaction which involves the transfer of goods or services in exchange of some money over the internet. This covers a wide range of several types of businesses. These types include auctions, consumer based retail sites, music sites and business exchanges of goods/services between organizations. This business plan also determines the strategic plan required for establishing an Online Furniture Shop. The infrastructure of the business involves based e-commerce website development which will sell to both businesses and individually through the internet. The infrastructure of this e-business also comprises of DBMS, Web Master, Web-developer, E-marketing, logistics and distribution channels and integration of secure transaction channels.   B.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Markets in E-Commerce There are three types of markets in the e-business sector Business-to-Business, Business-to-Consumer and Consumer-to-Consumer. All the three business types have different business strategies and marketing plans since they focus on different groups of consumers. Our Online Furniture Shop will focus   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   a.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Business to Business Even though early e-commerce based businesses focused on retailing on the interest however it is believed that revenue generated through B2B e-commerce will exceed that of business to consumer revenue. A research published in 2000 stated that ratio of monetary volume of B2B to that of B2C is 10 to 1 (Rouse, 2010). Our company tends to cater the needs of large to small business organizations. We sell as wholesalers when dealing with businesses and selling in bulks. Our clients belong to categories such as schools, law firms, large business organizations, restaurants and other business class categories. We offer them furniture like office chairs, table, revolving chairs, folding tables, executive chairs, kindergarten chairs, hospital waiting room furniture etc. Organizations can view our products online and contact us through mail since we do not take order in bulk online rather we contact with the firm personally to fulfill their large requirements.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   b.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Business to Consumer Even though B2C e-commerce has gone through hard times especially after the dot.com bubble burst in 2000. However there has been an increase in the number of online shoppers since then. Even the future looks bright for B2C e-commerce as household shopping in U.S alone has raised from 39 to 48 percent in 2010 (Patton, 2007). Our other main clients are small scale consumers who want to furnish their homes. We provide high quality furniture like sofas, beds, dining tables, sofa-cum-beds, computer table etc. to our valuable consumers. The consumers can come on our website browse through the products and one they have selected what to buy they can register in simple steps, buy online through our highly secure website and get the delivery at their door-step within 5 business working days. Now buying furniture for home is just a few clicks away. C.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Business Models There are several e-commerce business models a company can integrate in their business plan for enhanced profitability. We will focus on merchant business model since we are the retailer and wholesalers of furniture further we also sale directly to our consumers through our website. Another model we might integrate is affiliation model in which the company might place banners on other websites to increase traffic on our website thus adapting pay-per-click traffic generation strategy. II. Marketing Concepts There are several innovative techniques through which our e-commerce business can market the offering and reach targeted markets. We will look individually analyze the strategies which will be used in our e-business.   A. Marketing Techniques Since the target market is individual consumer along with business sector therefore we will look at some of the ways in which Online Furniture Shop can position and market its offerings. Banners Company can place banners on popular websites with heavy traffic having an integrated link back to the site of the organization just like putting up billboards in real world. Crawlers We also intend to integrate SEO in our websites for search engines which use Crawlers technique to search the internet database so that the websites are ranked higher on the result page whenever a potential customer searches for furniture shops. Pop Up Pop-up ads can also be used as a marketing technique even though they are found quite annoying by some internet users. These are ads which will open up in a new window whenever a user opens an associated website like home decoration or office set-up. III. Communicating in e-commerce A. Social networking The use of social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter for promotion of products and services will be quite beneficial for OFS since its a great way to bring customers to your websites and generate sales. These sites are also a great tool for link building by posting URLs which have a link to your website this method tends to increase the traffic (Introcaso , 2011). Through creation of social media our firm can offer discounts, coupons and announce contests to people following us on such social networking websites. Such sites are also a great tool to interact with the consumers directly and get feedback from them along with any suggestions. B.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Content Marketing OFS also intends to use content marketing as a method of disseminating and creating important content to acquire, engage and attract a potential target market. Content marketing basically is the art of communication with potential prospects and customers. The core essence of this marketing strategy is that if businesses keep giving consistent and valuable information to the buyer the buyer ultimately gives their loyalty as a reward. IV. Problems surrounding E-Commerce Due to a massive out growth in the e-commerce business sector there has also been an emergence of associated security threats. Due to which it is essential for e-commerce based businesses to cater some vital requirements. These fundamental security requirements of e-commerce business are the basis of a secure online business since this sector faces the greatest threat as stated by a report that the attacks in this sector have risen from 2006 to 2007 by 15% (Symantec, 2007). A. Privacy and security Since we also plan on starting an e-commerce based business therefore it is vital for the organization to integrate protection against potential security threats in the business plan.   We plan on carefully monitor and securing the monetary transaction channel before offering credit card purchase option like SSL and Address Verification Systems. Our website will also have a satisfactory site security, encryption, privacy policy and also insurance against identity theft if possible. V. Ethical Challenges in Online Business   Identity theft can be defined as the illegally acquired personal information like names, drivers license, address, Social Security Number, Bank or credit card number and exploiting this personal data for some unlawful activities (Sorbel, 2003). It is ranked as one of the fasted growing crimes in America.   Some laws and regulation which might regulate the rising issue of identity theft and which are also applied to our firm are described below. a. The Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 According to the summary by The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (2000) this act has a clause which requires a disclosure of privacy policy by all financial institutions with regards to the sharing of personal information. This act has another requirement which states that a notice should be given to the consumer to opt out of sharing the personal information with some nonaffiliated third party. b. The Fair Credit Reporting Act This was proposed in order to secure the personal information of consumers which is exchanged during any business transaction. This act tends to promote the fairness, privacy and integrity of the information content of consumer reporting agencies as states by Federal Trade Commission (2011). VI. Conclusion Thanks to easy and cheap access to internet more and more people are buying online. Our e-business model caters almost all the requirements for establishing an online merchant business. The target market we are focusing on is also quite large therefore we expect a successful growth in the market.

Harvest of Joy :: Personal Narrative Essay Example

Harvest of Joy    It seemed pretty simple at the beginning.   My father showed me how to prepare the soil, to plant the seeds and to water them, and to harvest the vegetables.   If I sustained the garden, the garden would sustain me.   But my relationship with our garden has grown much more complicated than that.   Over time, the garden has sustained me more than I have sustained it.    In December, my father suffered a ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm.   His heart stopped twice during the operation, and he was not expected to survive.   He had an intensive recovery period, and I wanted nothing more than to make him better immediately.   His trauma had made me impatient and afraid to hope.   I was having trouble waiting for things to unfold naturally and wanted to know what would happen in the end. Simple, everyday decisions or occurrences took on great importance.      For six weeks, I was running between the hospital, home and work, between fear and hope, anxiety and joy.   One January morning, I went out to the garden to check on a small patch of parsley that my father kept covered with blankets to protect it from the snow.   It had been neglected since he went into the hospital.   When I uncovered it, I was surprised to find bright green and fragrant parsley. I began to become filled with hope that like that small patch of parsley that was still flourishing in the winter despite the odds, my father would flourish again as well.      By the time spring came, my father was regaining his strength.   My father and I tilled and prepared the soil, then began planting the seeds. Though I wanted them to sprout immediately, they had their own timetable.   When they finally did, I was so excited to see them pushing their way up through the dirt and climbing towards the sun. We cared for the seedlings, giving them manure, aerating the soil, watering them daily, doing everything we could so they would keep growing.   But my father would point out that the first rule of gardening is that we are not in control.   We can only wait and watch and enjoy each moment.   As the plants grew stronger, I felt myself growing stronger as well.   Slowly, I was learning to wait and coming to understand that the growth process, like life itself, has a force and rhythm of its own, and that I could rely on it.

Job Evaluation a Cornerstone to Hrm Practices

| | | | |edith cowan university faculty of business and law | | | | | | | |mba 5712- hr | | | | | | | | | |assignment 1 | |JOB ANALYSIS A ‘CORNERSTONE’ OF | |ALL HRM PRACTICES AND ACTIVITIES | | | | | | | |MUTEMA CHELLA 10157835 | | | | | LECUTRER: MR. D. PHIRI Submission Date: 13th April 2010 | | TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION3 RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION3 SELECTION4 TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT4 PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT5 REMUNERATION MANAGEMENT6 PROMOTION OF WORKPLACE SAFTY AND HEALTH6 CONCLUSION7 REFERENCES8 INTRODUCTION To discuss why job analysis is sometimes said to be the ‘cornerstone’ of all the human resource management practices and activities, six Human Resource functions or practices are listed and then showing how job analysis data is utilised in each of these activities. Job analysis is aptly called so because success or failure of the human resource function in an organisation can directly be attributed to the consequences of job analysis (Siddharth, 2009 October). Siddharth (2009) further contends that Job analysis encompasses understanding and closely evaluating the knowledge, skills and attitudes required by an individual in performing a particular role. It’s like performing a Personal Profile Analysis of an invisible person. Once performed, job analysis would throw open a plethora of answers to how Recruitment, Performance Management, Training, Compensation benchmarking and several other processes should follow for the incumbent on the said job. Job analysis refers to procedures for systematically understanding the work that gets done in an organisation and the basic goal is to understand what people do, how they do it and what skills they need to do the work well (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). According to Jackson & Schuler, the results of the job analysis are used to write job descriptions. A job description spells out essential job functions, describes the conditions in which the job is performed and states special training or certification requirements for the job. For employees, job description produced through job analysis serves as a guide to work behaviour while for supervisors and managers; a job description serves as a guide to performance evaluation and feedback. This essay therefore focuses on trying to show that job analysis provides the foundation upon which to build virtually all components of HR system identified as follows;. RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION Recruitment involves searching for and obtaining qualified applicants for the organization to consider when filling job openings (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). In the function of recruitment the job analysis would determine recruitment sources and methods. To find the most suitable employees for jobs and thus for the organisation as a whole, those involved in employee recruitment need to be fully aware of the relevant job description and person specification which can only be derived from comprehensive job analysis (Baired etal, 2008). Effective programs for recruitment should attract suitably qualified applicants and discourage those who are unsuitable. One would therefore say that knowing a defined set of competencies allows one to more efficiently target, within a candidates population those competencies for recruitment. SELECTION Selection is the process of obtaining and using information about job applicants in order to determine who should be hired for long or short-term position. Jackson & Schuler (2003) contend that it begins with an assessment of the requirements to be met by the new hire, including technical aspects of a job and the more difficult to quantify organizational need (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). Applicants are then assessed to determine their competencies, preference, interests and personality. For productivity and retention, companies such as Southwest, Lincoln Electric, Honda GE, and Toyota hire on the basis of whether an individual matches the job requirements and the corporate culture (Jackson & Schuler, 2003) To do a proper selection of the candidate to be employed it is vital to establish the essential features of the job descriptions and person specifications to allow for objective and easier assessment of applicants (Baired etal, 2008). Selection criteria must be demonstrably job relevant and equitably applied, to facilitate comparison between candidates and the matching of candidates with jobs. They are invaluable in the initial short listing of large numbers of applicants, employment testing, interviewing and subsequent referee checking (Baired etal, 2008) Done very well selection practice ensures that employees are capable of high productivity and motivated to stay with the organization for as long as the organization wants to employ them. TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT In general, an organisation’s training and development practices are its intentional efforts to improve current and future performance by helping employees acquire the skills, knowledge, and attitude required of competitive work force (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). Rapidly changing technology, foreign competition, and changes in organisational strategy and strategic business objectives are putting pressure on organizations to train and develop employees for competitive advantage. This requires careful attention to needs assessment, program development and implementation, and evaluation. Four types of types of needs analysis-organisational, job, person, and demographic-are designed to diagnose systematically the short and long term human resource needs of an organisation (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). Any discrepancies between the experience, knowledge, skills and abilities demonstrated by a job holder and the requirement contained in the job description and specification or list of competencies for that job provide clues to development needs (Baired etal, 2008). Training & development is merely the development and assessment of said competencies for both the employee and the employer. However, without job analysis the organisation would have no way to know what to teach; train and develop and when to do it. PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT A performance management system is a formal, structured process used to measure, evaluate, and influence an employee’s job related attributes, behaviours, performance results (Arvey & Murphy, 1998). Two components of performance management system are (a) performance measurement and feedback for individuals and team, and (b) the rewards component of total compensation (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). A well designed performance measurement and feedback process directs employees’ attention toward the most important tasks and behaviours. It informs employees about what’s valued and provides information about whether the employees’ behaviour and results meet the expectations of managers, colleagues, and customers (Jackson & Schuler, 2003) To emphasise the importance of performance management, it is said that; ‘It is estimated that if companies could get 3. 7% more work out of each employee, the equivalent of 18 more minutes of work in each 8-hour shift, the gross domestic product in the United States would swell by $355 billion, twice the GDP of Greece (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). The job description and person specification, the result of the job analysis, provide the criteria for evaluating the performance of the holder of the job. Performance Management can therefore be said to be that by knowing the competencies required for each job or job family allows HR (or management) to track employee knowledge, skills and abilities and distribute them accordingly to wherever they may have the most impact within an organization. These competencies may also be tied to other organizational-level criteria for added impact and a validity check. As has been mentioned this is as a result of job analysis REMUNERATION MANAGEMENT Compensation or remuneration typically includes a mix of several elements, monetary and non monetary forms of rewards. Monetary compensation includes direct payments such as salary, wages, and bonuses, and indirect payments such payments to cover the cost of private and public insurance plans. Nonmonetary compensation include many forms of social and psychological rewards-recognition and respect from others, enjoyment from doing the job itself, opportunity for self-development (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). Many workplace agreements emphasise the close relationship between job requirements, learning and development programs, career progression and appropriate salary and benefits systems. Baired etal, (2008) further contends that inappropriate remuneration packages may reflect a need for change of job requirements or adjusted pay scales, often in consultation with the relevant unions. It can be said that competencies help guide compensation models to a much more precise degree than more gross measures like â€Å"seniority. For example, a highly sought after software developer with very unique skills may be able to demand on the market a much higher salary than a typical MCSE who has been with the company for X number of years. A competency based compensation model would addres s that. Again, a job analysis done properly will help determine pay scale. PROMOTION OF WORKPLACE SAFTY AND HEALTH Another of the Human Resource function is the promotion of safety and health at the workplace. Job analysis procedures can be used to identify aspects of a job that may contribute to workplace injuries, and ergonomic principals can be applied to redesign the work environment (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). Workplace safety and health refers to the physical and psychological conditions of a workforce that result from work environment provided by the organisation. Physical conditions include occupational diseases and accidents such as actual loss of life or limb; repetitive motion injuries, back pain, carpal tunnel syndrome, cardiovascular disease, other forms of cancer and other conditions that are known to result from unhealthy work environment include white central nervous system damage. While psychological conditions result from organisational stress and a low quality of working life, these encompass, dissatisfaction, apathy, and withdrawal and so on (Jackson & Schuler, 2003). If an organisation takes effective safety and health measures, fewer employees will have short or long term ill effects as a result of being employed at the organization (Cooper & Neck, 2000). Both the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974) and the Disability Discrimination Act (1995) of the UK require evidence-based approaches to setting physical and medical employment standards. Proven fitness related strategies include redesigning the most demanding tasks, selecting and training personnel who possess the necessary physical attributes, and assessing and redeploying personnel to jobs within their capability. An essential precursor to pursuing these strategies is to conduct a job analysis to quantify the physical demands of the job (Rayson, 2000) . ). CONCLUSION Job Analysis is quite aptly called the â€Å"corner stone† of all HR activities because the success or failure of the HR function in an organization can directly be attributed to the consequences of Job Analysis. If not carried out or not conducted accurately and comprehensively the other HR processes will be ineffective and the cost to the organisation high in terms of productivity and the ability to retain valuable staff Job analysis encompasses understanding and closely evaluating the knowledge, skills and attitudes required by an individual in performing a particular role. It’s like performing a Personal Profile Analysis of an invisible person. Once performed, job analysis would throw open a plethora of answers to how Recruitment, Performance Management, Training, Compensation benchmarking and several other processes should follow for the incumbent on the said job. Get the job analysis wrong and you'll get the wrong person while recruiting, inefficient and sometimes irrelevant performance management measures, increased training expenditure, improper pay with respect to the market and a whole lot of other issues. . REFERENCES Arvey, R. D, Murphy K. R (1998) Performance Evaluation in Work Settings, Annual Review Psychology 49, 141-168 Baird, M. , Compton, R & Nankervis, A. (2008) Human Resource Management: Strategies (6th ed. ). Cincinnati: South-Western Publishing Co. Cooper, K, Neck C. (May 2000) The Fit Executive; Exercise and Diet Guideline for Enhancing Performance, Academy of Management Executive 14(2), 72-83 Jackson E. S & Schuler, R (2003) Managing Human Resources Through Strategic Partnerships (8th ed. ). Thomson South-Western Publishing Co Rayson, M. P. (2000) Fitness for work: the need for conducting a job analysis, Occup. Med. Vol. 50, No. 6, pp. 434-436, 2000. Retrieved April 12, 2010, from http://occmed. oxfordjournals. org

Private Prisons Vs. Federal Prisons - 1175 Words

Private prisons are supposedly more cost effective than state or federal prisons. Or that is what their representatives say. But regardless of whether they save money or not, are they truly beneficial for our communities? This article hopes to break down some of the myths these private prison corporations have used to push their agenda and discuss how that is far from the case. By doing so, the reader can form his/her own conclusions on how pervasive and detrimental private prisons have become within our communities. Additionally, by informing as many people as possible about the harmful effects of privatizing the correctional system in our nation, we can soon hope to address some of the emerging problems such as our increased prison populations, endangerment of prisoners staff personnel, and whether it truly is cost effective. However, before we can dive into the dilemmas that the prison industrial complex created we must first define what they are and how did they originate within our country. First, the private prison system is not a new phenomenon. Although the first appearances of these facilities are not the ones we think of today, the private sector’s involvement in incarcerating people emerged in the early eighteenth century. These privately operated facilities, in part, gained popularity because they used the prisoners as laborers, artisans, and other needed occupations in the community. By the mid-nineteenth century, providers constructed the ‘modern’ privateShow MoreRelatedPublic Facilities And Private Prisons1116 Words   |  5 Pages Prison is an institution designed to securely to house inmates who have been convicted of crimes. The United States holds the records for having the largest inmate population residing within the walls of the correctional system. 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