Impacts of Software Agents in eCommerce Systems on Customer's Loyalty and on Behavior of Potential Customers

Abstract

Most of the software agents only perform simple product price comparisons; some support the purchase of products or the negotiation over multiple terms of a transaction, such as, e. g., warranties, return policies, delivery times and loan options. Auctions help to find an effective pricing mechanism in electronic commerce. The active technologies enabling customers to purchase efficiently force the merchants to offer high personalized, value-added and complementary services. The techniques such as rule-based matching or collaborative filtering provide contents that are appropriate to the customer’s preferences or analyze past purchases of other clients. The one-to-one marketing may be especially useful for sophisticated products demanding explanation or to enable cross-selling of other products. The merchants might achieve additional reduction of transaction costs (especially transport, storage and safety measures) using electronic money systems.