SMEs ECT Reality: From Ad-Hoc Implementation to Strategic Planning

Abstract

Lack of strategic planning in e-commerce and subsequently e-business adoption within small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has been strongly reported in literature. This chapter presents SMEs’ Web presence implementation patterns and unravels the reasons behind the lack of strategic planning when adopting Electronic Commerce Technologies (ECT). The chapter presents findings from semi-structured interviews from 11 SMEs in the Northwest of the UK. Findings reflect the difference in development and management practices of Web presence, between the more able Need Pull SMEs that identified the need to adopt ECT, and the less able Technology Push SMEs that were mostly influenced by change agent diffusion and awareness efforts. Over time, each group of SMEs reflect a different pattern in ECT implementation. This chapter depicts the issues that hinder SMEs, particularly in micro and small, in moving beyond Web site adoption.