Assignment: Internship Activity

Double-spaced, one-page report in response to internship request. To provide an adequate response, the minimum length for this report is 250 words.

Internship Activity Chapter 7 - E-Business and E-Commerce Industry: Retail

One difficulty of moving a small business from a traditional retail store to an online store is channel complications. In many cases, everything has to be reconsidered. For example, how will you communicate with your customers? How will they find product information? How will you accept orders? Manage payments? Shipping? These questions and many more have kept Harrison Kirby from making the e-commerce plunge. Harrison runs a local golf course with a shop of around 150 products. He would love to have a website that would facilitate e-business for his golf course. He wants online scheduling of tee-times (including coordination of group play), online shopping, and social network integration. Below you will find a letter from Harrison explaining what he would like for you to do:

Hi! I have an interesting project for you. I am interested in an online presence for my golf shop. Specifically, I want to offer a few (less than 150) products online for in-store pickup or delivery. I would also like online scheduling of tee-times. I want you to search the web for companies that provide this type of product. Ultimately, you may recommend a combination of providers to accomplish all that I am trying to do. For example, your final recommendation may include a web hosting solution, logistics provider, and a CRM tool (Customer Relationship Management). Or perhaps you will find product that can be customized to provide all the functionality in one piece. Keep in mind that my shop is a small business and I do not have resources to manage a complicated system. I needs something that is fairly easy to implement, use, and manage. I have heard of online, cloud, as-as-service platforms that do not require local hardware. I think that this type of setup would be most useful to me, but I have no idea on the type of software I should use to support my business. After you complete your research, please send me a report with the following items: overview of the companies you learned about, your selections (and why you chose them), and how you feel this will help me accomplish my goals.