Web Site Evaluation

This exercise requires students to access Web sites for international organizations exporting their products to the Philippine market.

Select Web sites for several different international organizations in different industries. (Five (5) international companies).

Prepare an evaluation of each using the following criteria:

1. User-friendliness (easy to access and use, speed, provides needed information and instructions).

2. Interactive (provide space for customer suggestions or recommendations).

3. Overall effectiveness and suggestions for improvement on specific dimensions (missing or unnecessary content, layout and sequencing, eye-appeal-appropriate use of graphics and color, animation, audio options, presence or absence of all necessary service features, use of hypertext links, etc.).

4. Compare and contrast the different Web sites in terms of what each is trying to achieve. Which is the most successful? The least? Why?

5. How does the Web compare as an information medium relative to other media used by service marketers? What do you see as its potential for the future?

CASE: The Globalization of eBay

eBay was founded in 1995 and has expanded rapidly in the United States and around the world (see Table 11.1) with net revenues of $3.2 billion and gross margins of 81% in 2004. eBay is a Web-based forum that provides an efficient market for buyers and sellers of products that typically don't have an efficient distribution system because of either information or price inefficiencies. The company is really nothing more than an intermediary software program linking buyers and sellers, charging listing fees, payment fees, and final value fees to its sellers. After establishing a strong base in the United States, eBay has aggressively pushed the idea of global expansion and has developed or acquired local on-line auction sites in more than 20 countries. Overseas markets are seen as having tremendous growth potential, but they do present a number of challenges. Language differences, the lack of widespread Internet access in many countries, cultural attitudes about e-commerce, and government regulations all pose significant obstacles to eBay's expansion plans. Furthermore, as eBay has rushed to globalize, it has spent large sums to acquire and develop foreign operations without strong prospects for immediate returns. eBay sees these moves as part of a long term strategy, however, and believes that future growth will justify current investments. The company's lofty vision, according to CEO Meg Whitman, is to "transform countries and cities and villages and empower people to make a living in ways they could not before" and to create "new trade on a global basis that the world has never seen." Whether the company can realize this vision remains to be seen, but it is clear that eBay has already had a transformative effect on markets for many products in many countries that is only likely to intensify in the future.

Questions

1. What is eBay's core competency? How does it relate to their chosen strategy?

2. How would you explain how eBay has decided to configure and coordinate its value chain?

3. Would you characterize eBay's value chain as virtual or real? Why?

4. Consider again your description of eBay's strategy. Is it different from what it was ten years ago? Why?

5. What implications to the challenges identified in the case have for eBay's strategy-today and in the future?