Comparative Analysis of International Approaches to the Protection of Online Privacy

The Web provides unprecedented opportunities for Web site operators to implicitly and explicitly gather highly detailed personal data about site visitors, resulting in a real and pressing threat to privacy. Approaches to protecting such personal data differ greatly throughout the world. To generalize greatly, most countries follow one of two diametrically opposed philosophies—the self-regulation approach epitomized by the United States, or the comprehensive omnibus legislative approach mandated by the European Union. In practice, of course, the situation is not so black and white as most countries utilize elements of both approaches. This chapter explains the background and importance of protecting the privacy of personal data, contrasts the two major philosophical approaches to protection mentioned above, performs a comparative analysis of the current situation throughout the world, and highlights how the legislative approach is being adopted as the de facto standard throughout the world. The use of trust marks as an alternative to the self-regulation or legislative approach is also discussed, while the effectiveness of each of these efforts is also examined.

The E-Mode of Brand Positioning

Brand positioning is a crucial strategy to any brand’s strategy. Given the rapid development of technology and its impact on online strategies, changing lifestyles of consumers, and the consumer interaction required as a part of contemporary brand strategy, there may be need for brands to synergize their positioning strategies with online positioning strategies. This would enable brands to adapt to an environment that is increasingly becoming digital. This chapter, after taking into consideration the published literature on brand positioning, attempts to formulate online positioning strategies using different aspects of brand positioning, price, customer interactivity, and consumer community orientation. Implications for marketing managers are provided.

Applications of Internet-Based Marketing Instruments by Multichannel Retailers

Online and off-line retailers fulfill a wide range of functions that are beneficial to manufacturers as well as to individual consumers. In doing so, they apply a mix of marketing instruments for their store-based and Internet-based distribution channels. As the Internet offers many different innovative alternatives of marketing instruments, the question arises as to what extent online retailers apply Internet-based marketing strategies in order to attract online customers. The empirical study presented in this chapter aims at finding out to what extent powerful multichannel retailers utilize these different Internet-based marketing instruments. The study is conducted by Web site observation in order to represent the customer’s point of view. A total of 60 online shops in the United States and in the United Kingdom are analyzed using 17 marketing-related observation criteria. The study reveals that the observed multichannel retailers still prefer “traditional” retail marketing instruments on their online shops and often do without innovative Internet-based marketing instruments such as personalization or content and information offering. Additionally, we identified fewer differences between the observed U.S. and UK retailers than expected. These findings should spur further research on the use of e-marketing by online retailers especially in an explanative manner.

Stance Analysis

In this chapter, we will first discuss what stance is and highlight how we identify and measure stance using multivariate techniques, using an ongoing example taken from an Online Financial Focus Group. We review differences in stance between online real-time focus groups and online chat, as well as between online and face-to-face focus groups; and finally, proffer examples of stance analysis in two very different online focus groups: older adults discussing financial services and teens discussing clothes. As marketers see that online focus groups offer valuable marketing information by understanding the significance of how something is said as well as what is said, their confidence in the use of online focus-group data should increase.

Job Search at Naukri.com

This chapter presents the case study of a successful dot-com venture in India, Naukri.com, in the job search market. We begin by providing an overview of job search methods in both general and the specific Indian contexts. The advent and growth of the e-recruitment market is also discussed. We then provide background information for Naukri.com by focusing on its business model, growth, organizational structure and human resource management. The product/service offerings of Naukri.com for recruiters and job-seekers are discussed next. We then provide a critical analysis of the consumers of the company and its competitors. We conclude by assessing Naukri.com’s marketing strategy during initial (1997-2000) and recent (2001-2004) time periods.

The Internet and Global Markets

This chapter examines the impact of the Internet and related technologies on global marketing activities (global e-marketing), under consideration of the following aspects: • Special implications for multinational corporations (MNCs) and small and medium-sized companies (SMCs) • Distinction between business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) markets • Role of the Internet as a complementary or supplementary marketing channel In order to clarify the special characteristics and challenges involved in global e-marketing practices, the authors have carried out a review of related empirical and conceptual research. The following conclusions can be drawn with regard to the characteristics of reviewed studies: 1. Due to the global nature of the Internet, relatively little research explicitly accounts for the differences between domestic and global e-marketing practices. Further research is needed on issues directly related to the Internet “global reach.” 2. Relatively more studies analyze global Internet marketing from a theoretical point of view. Academics are recently recognizing the need to carry out empirical research, both in B2C and B2B online environments.

Evaluation of Web Sites on Information and Entertainment Properties

This paper addresses the role of consumer involvement in Web site evaluation. We investigate the factors that lead the consumer to be involved with one site more than another. Based on previous research, we use the psychological constructs, information-seeking tendency, and focused attention (Baumgartner & Steenkamp, 1996; Novak, Hoffman, & Yung, 2000) to define the “information profile” of a consumer; and sensation-seeking tendency and mood variability to define the “entertainment profile” of the consumer (Eliashberg & Sawhney, 1994). The information and entertainment factors are hypothesized to affect consumers’ utilitarian (need, value) and hedonic (interest, appeal) evaluations of involvement, respectively, and ultimately, the affect toward the Web site (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982; Mano & Oliver, 1993; Zaichkowsky, 1985, 1994). We examine these evaluations for various Web sites, whose respective information andentertainment profiles are defined using elements such as informativeness, organization, and entertainment properties (Chen & Wells, 1999). The Web site properties are hypothesized to moderate the relationships between individuals’ profiles and their evaluations of involvement and affect. We conducted our study using three surveys: (1) collection of data for classifying Web sites on information and entertainment properties, (2) collection of data for measurement of involvement, and (3) collection of data for time-based measurement of involvement. Our results show that the consumer’s information and entertainment profiles significantly affect utilitarian and hedonic evaluations of involvement. We also find positive and significant relationships between the evaluations of involvement and affect toward the Web site. Further, we find that the Web site’s information-specific properties moderate the relationship between information profile of the consumer and his/her utilitarian evaluation of involvement. A set of results from representative time-based evaluations of involvement shows that the respective elements of evaluation of involvement show increase/decrease over time if there is a match/mismatch between the user and site properties.

The Evolution of Theory and Practice of Marketing in Light of Information Technology

Marketing is a discipline that concentrates on the process of exchange between two market groups, and for this reason, it has been immediately involved with developments in the Internet—understood as a suitable phenomenon for discovering new opportunities and possible threats to modern business management (Burke, 1996) and as a commercial business tool (Alba et al., 1997; Quelch & Klein, 1996). The aim of this chapter is to highlight the marketing elements that, according to an accurate review of international literature, have been involved in the development of new information technology and, in particular, the Internet. The investigation concerns in particular • customers: the buying behavior of Internet users compared to traditional behavior; • relations and communication: in this section we try to understand what are the barriers to the development of these relations: trust, safety, and manipulation are some of the obstacles examined; • marketing research: an accurate review of international scientific literature highlights the online research techniques and tools that are of greater use to companies; • marketing management: products, prices, place (distribution), and promotion are unequivocally decided by the company but may become an area of negotiation between companies and customers thanks to new multimedia tools; and • marketing performance: this section illustrates what are the best performance indicators for measuring the activities carried out by an e-commerce project.

Key Success Requirements for Online Brand Management

In recent years, many online brands (or e-brands) have emerged. For a brick-and-mortar brand to excel in the online environment, the brand manager must appreciate some of the key features of the Internet and make adjustments to the traditional brand management strategy. For example, the control of communication in case of online brand management lies with both the brand manager and the consumer, whereas from the traditional branding perspective, the control by and large rests with the brand manager only. We highlight the differences between traditional brand management and online brand management. We then focus on several key success factors in building a successful online brand, which we believe will help guide the brand manager through a series of steps leading to successful online branding.

Providing Value to Customers in E-Commerce Environments

Effective advertising, good usability, and creating value are important in an e-commerce environment to attract and retain customers. In the human–computer interaction (HCI) literature, research into the success or failure of business to consumer (B2C) e-commerce sites has primarily focussed on usability. While increasing usability is important, even if an e-commerce Web site conforms to the Web design heuristics and usability guidelines, it might not always generate a positive total customer experience (TCE). Therefore, it is important that along with usability heuristics, customer relationship management (CRM) strategies are integrated into the design of the e-commerce environments for developing robust and long-term online customer–organisation relationships. We report on a project that is part of an ongoing cross-disciplinary research programme at the Open University, United Kingdom, which aims to integrate HCI and CRM strategies into the design and evaluation of e-commerce environments. In this project, we examined the customer’s interaction with e-commerce environments and how a B2C relationship can be effectively supported from a customer’s perspective. Based on intensive research that involved collecting data from naturalistic observations of customers shopping on e-tailing environments, interviews, group interviews, and by identifying the negative incidents or obstacles that mar the customer’s TCE, we have developed E-SEQUAL (E-SErvice QUALity), a framework for online service quality. E-SEQUAL is an evaluation instrument consisting of e-CRM (CRM for e-economy) or customer relationship-enhancing heuristics and HCI heuristics which can be applied to integrate customers’ perceived dimensions of service quality into the design and development of e-commerce environments. E-SEQUAL can provide guidance to e-businesses regarding integration of front- and back-end business processes, and across different customer touch points such as phone, fax, e-mail, and so on. It can be applied by Web designers, marketing professionals, and developers to come up with requirements for integrating customers’ expectations, and perceptions of service quality and value into the design of e-commerce Web sites. Furthermore, it can be used as an evaluation instrument by usability professionals for evaluating the conformance of an e-commerce environment against HCI (usability) and e-CRM heuristics.