Internet-Enabled Business Models and Marketing Strategies

Introduction

The technology-driven initiatives such as the Internet, wireless communications, and other digital technologies are having an imperative influence on the economy. They have done so by changing the ways businesses interact with each other and with consumers. This has not only created an environment in which businesses can be performed at a higher level i.e., faster, cheaper, and smarter but also has created many new business opportunities. Many organizations are still struggling with the basic issue of using the Internet and digital technologies for their best advantage.

With the advent of information technology (IT) and IT-enabled services, new ways of performing business activities are developing. Most of the business models that capture public attention are consumer-oriented. Less publicity is given to the way the Internet can be used for business-to-business electronic commerce, although such commerce is a reality today. New forms of electronic commerce are being piloted in many sectors of industry, for business-to-business, business-to-consumer, and business-public administration relationships. Various business models are used by the organizations and enabling them to have more marketability. These business models include e-shop, e-procurement, e-auction, e-mall, third party market place, virtual communities, value-chain integrators, value-chain service providers, collaboration platforms, information brokers, etc (Timmers, 1998).

The Internet and digital technologies have created new opportunities for business organizations to create value. The value-adding activities such as search, evaluation, problem-solving, and transaction have enhanced by Internet capabilities. Search activities include processes for gathering information and identifying purchase options. Evaluation activities refer to the process of considering alternatives and comparing the costs and benefits of various options. Problem-solving activities include identifying problems or needs and generating ideas and action plans to address those needs. Transaction activities involve the process of completing a sale, including negotiating and agreeing contractually, making payments, and taking delivery. These activities are supported by different types of content that Internet businesses often use. These contents include customer feedback, expertise, and entertainment programming (Lumpkin & Dess, 2004).

Internet business models provide a context for enacting value-adding activities. The adoption of different business models by organizations has been proving successful for use by Internet organizations. Strategic use of value-adding activities, as well as the different business models, can help organizations build competitive advantages and contribute to profitability. Organizations have also found that combinations of the Internet business model can contribute to greater success. Organizations that want to benefit from these new value-adding approaches need to ask how the Internet is affecting their current operations and how they might effectively implement Internet capabilities. Identifying the practices and models that will enhance and not weaken from an organization's value proposition is central to using the Internet to create wealth.

There is growing recognition that the IT-enabled business models used by the business organizations while transacting with suppliers, customers, and partners are structured and executed. This has been a distinctive source of value creation and appropriation. However, the concept of business models’ (BMs) enabling IT remains uneven in the information systems and strategic management (Rai & Tang, 2014). Digital capability reflects on the organizational ability to identify IT-enabled opportunities and organize IS/IT to mobilize resources and structures to exploit those opportunities. Business model reconfiguration captures management schema to raise value propositions for customers, partners, and other stakeholders to create and capture value. It entails altering organizational resources and processes to enable such value propositions (Golshan, 2018). The transformation of the traditional marketplace into an Internet-enabled market environment and the digitization of information products have had a major impact on contemporary marketing practice. These technological advances have also significantly affected the marketing of non-information products as a consequence of the digitization of their information attributes (Varadarajan & Yadav, 2009).