Assignment Specification

Assignment requires you to research and develop a report to examine contemporary issues in the e-commerce management sector, including further extending your prototype website.

Your research report and prototype website must be related to the online business category assigned to you. Failure to do so will result in your assignments being rejected and no marks will be allocated.

Report: E-commerce Research:

Report Structure and Presentation-

Your report should include a title page, Table of Contents (including List of Tables and List of Figures if applicable) and Appendices.

Report Letter of Transmittal, Executive Summary and Introduction (Introduction - approx. 500 words)-

Your report should include a letter of transmittal, executive summary, and introduction to the report.

Report Section 1- Cloud Computing (approx. 1000 words)

Cloud computing is a model where businesses obtain computing platform and resources over the Internet, rather than installing and maintaining the required hardware and software.

Discuss several cloud computing models that your online business may consider for its operations and select a model that you think will work best for your business? Justify your selection.

What are the advantages and risks associated with adopting cloud computing for your online business?

Report Section 2 - E-commerce Presence (approx. 1000 words)

Before you begin to build your online business, there are several critical questions you need to answer regarding your e-commerce presence. Some of these overarching questions could be:

• What's the big idea for the business?
• Where's the money and funding going to come from?
• Who and where is the target audience?
• What is the size and characteristics of the market?
• What are the strategic and development timeline goals?

The answers to these questions will drive the development of your e-commerce presence. Select three critical questions for e-commerce presence that you think are highly relevant for your online business and discuss the answers to those questions for your business. You may pick three questions from the list above or generate your own critical questions for e-commerce presence if you wish.

Report Section 3 - E-commerce Security Environment (approx. 1000 words)

The e-commerce environment holds threats for both consumers and business owners, such as malicious code, phishing and identity theft, hacking, cybervandalism and data breaches.

What are the measures that you should consider to achieve a secure e-commerce environment for your online business?

Report Section 4 - E-commerce Retailing (approx. 1000 words)

Several retailers that have both online and offline sales channels are undertaking cross-channel integration, e.g. in-store pickup of online orders, or gift cards bought online that can be used in-store.

If you assume your online business also has an offline sales channel, e.g. physical store -discuss what are the key challenges of such integration in the retail sector?

If you assume your online business is a purely virtual business and does not have a physical presence - discuss what are the unique challenges of your business compared to the physically operating retailers?

Report: Conclusions and Recommendations to the Business (approx. 500 words)

Your report should include separate conclusions and recommendations sections.

• Conclusions provide a summary of your key findings from the body of the report.
• Recommendations provide a summary of the recommendations to your online business based on the research conducted in the report.