The e-Business Glossary

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A

Affiliate
Companies that sell other manufacturers or retailers' (sponsoring merchants) products on their Web sites. Users select a product at the affiliate Web site, but the sale is actually transacted at the sponsoring merchant's Web site. Affiliates are similar in concept to industry-based manufacturer representatives that sell multiple manufacturers' product lines.

 

Agent
Software that acts as an intermediary for a person by performing some activity. Agents can "learn" an individual's preferences and act in the person's best interest and may even negotiate and complete transactions. A purchasing manager's agent may learn corporate specifications, determine when inventory is low, and search the Internet for the lowest-cost supplier.

 

Aggregator
Enables buyers within a market to select among various competitors by aggregating information about the market and its suppliers and providing this information via a Web site. Aggregators may provide decision-support applications that integrate supplier information with third-party information and with user requirements or preferences to allow users to differentiate services and features of the various competitors. Content aggregators aggregate information and match it to user preferences. These preferences may be declared actively (user explicitly specifies) or passively (software discerns preferences from user behavior or interest) and are used to filter aggregated content and deliver only what matches user preferences.

 

Application Hosting Services
All continuous activities associated with providing a reliable application environment providing all the facilities a particular application uses. One can think of providing diskspace and CPU power.

Application Integration Method (AIM)
Application Integration Method, the ASP approach of EAI projects.

Application Management
All continuous activities associated with securing the reliable use of the application, for example, monitoring of the availability, performance and integrity of the ebusiness application, incident and problem management. Change management and Software Distribution and Control. Logging activities.

 

Application Service Provider (ASP)
ASPs aggregate, facilitate, and broker IT services to deliver IT-enabled business solutions across a network via subscription-based pricing. EASP - Enterprise Application Service Provider - is a variation of ASP wherein a level of customisation is introduced into the application functionality and service levels while still based on a shared service architecture.

Application Service Provisioning
This is a delivery model that provides software application services on a rental basis according to a service-level agreement and delivers these services on a one-to-many basis via an IP network.

Application Services
Discrete application services, such as consultancy and transformation services and continuous application services such as application management, application hosting and application support services.

Application Support
All continuous activities associated with keeping the application in line with the business requirements. One can think of development of configurations or customizations and changes thereof.

ASP Service Delivery Model
The ASP standard based on ITIL and augmented with ASP experience that enables the uniform delivery of continuous services. See channels for more info.

Auction
The sale of goods or services by bids (to buy) from potential buyers. In the internet world eBay offers the opportunity for private sellers to set up auctions for bidders. Other goods may be auctioned to a limited market, as for instance in the case of eCement which sells raw materials to buyers who are given access to that market. This dynamic pricing mechanism may take a variety of forms including:

a) An English Auction where buyers call ascending prices.
b) A Sealed Bid Auction where buyers place sealed bids, possibly specifying quantity.
c) A Dutch Auction where a market manager calls descending prices to obtain buy bids.
d) A Japanese Auction where a market manager calls ascending prices to obtain buy bids.
e) An Open Request for Bids where buyers call ascending prices and the seller selects the winners.
f) A Sealed Request for Bids where buyers submit sealed bids and the sellers selects the winners.

Available to Promise (ATP)
The uncommitted portion of a company's inventory or planned production. ATP is maintained as a tool for promising orders to buyers.

B

Banner
An advertisement that appears on a Web site. The ad format is a "banner", a combination of graphic and textual content entreating the Web site user to "click through" for further information on the advertised product or service.

Best-of-breed
Using technology from a carefully selected and mutually compatible set of technology components such as eBusiness applications and infrastructure all coming from very well recognized (and often leading) players in the market.

Bill of Material (BOM)
BOM represents that part of the procurement process within an enterprise that is very much specific to the business and the production process. An alternative commonly used term for non-BOM is non product related (NPR).

Bricks and Mortar
Describes a traditional company with non-Web channels as the sales outlet for its products or services.

Browser
A software program used to locate and display information on an intranet, extranet or the Internet. Browsers are most often used to access Web pages. Most browsers can display graphics, photographs, and text; multimedia information such as sound and video may require additional software called "plug-ins".

Business case
A proposal with an appropriate level of justification.

 

Business Fundamentals
The set of business factors that are not pliable and that do not readily change to market forces or other non-disruptive forces.

 

Business Intelligence (BI)
An interactive process of analyzing and exploring structured, domain-specific information (often stored in a data warehouse) to discern trends or patterns, thereby deriving insights and drawing conclusions. The BI process includes communicating findings and effecting change. BI domains include customers, products, services or competitors.

Business Model
A representation of the business, including methods for generating revenue, interacting with customers, suppliers, employees, etc.

Business process integration (BPI)
BPI, the next step in EAI. This will be the future, not only the applications will be integrated but also the business processes will.

Business Process Re-Engineering (BPR)
Fundamental analysis and radical redesign of business processes and management systems to achieve dramatic change or performance improvement. BPR uses objective, quantitative methods and tools to analyze, redesign and transform business processes including their supporting organization structures, information systems, job responsibilities and performance standards.

Business-to-Business Commerce (B2B)
Using electronic interactions to conduct business among enterprises, typically as a result of formal, contractual arrangements. B2B functions include sophisticated Web authorization and control (WAC) for delivery of sensitive price, contract and content information for each partner; catalogs that provide custom views based on access control and parametric search for serious business buyers; and order entry functions such as standardized "ship to" locations, dynamic order recalculation and payment options.

Business-to-Consumer Commerce (B2C)
Using electronic interactions to conduct business with consumers. B2C may include formal relationships (e.g., customers with assets under care or with subscription services or content) and ad hoc relationships (formed in real time to enable a new user to buy, sell or access information).

Buy Side
Processes for companies to purchase products. Includes requisitioning, product catalogs, approvals, user identification, purchase order creation, payment processing and integration to other systems.

 

C

Call Management
See CSS

Campaign Management System (CMS)
A CMS is a database management (DBM) tool used by marketers to design single-channel or multichannel marketing campaigns and track the effects of those campaigns by customer segment over time. CMS applications are also used by sales organizations to execute sales campaigns, such as achieving a specific market share with a particular product by a certain date.

Chief Executive Officer
Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

Chief Financial Officer
Chief Financial Officer (CFO).

Chief Information Officer
Chief Information Officer (CIO).

Chief Technology Officer
Chief Technology Officer (CTO).

Collaborative Commerce
cCommerce is defined as a set of collaborative, electronically enabled business interactions among an enterprise's internal personnel, suppliers, business partners and customers throughout a given trading community. A trading community could be an industry, industry segment, specific supply chain or supply chain segment.

Collaborative, Internet-based Network
See Extranet

Commerce Service Provider
Service providers that specialize in Web-enabled e-commerce services, as well as those offering specific software or outsourcing support for these services.

 

Community
A constantly changing group of people collaborating and sharing their ideas over an electronic network (e.g., the Internet). Communities optimize their collective power by affiliation around a common interest, by the compression of the time between member interactions (i.e., communicating in real time), and by asynchronous "postings" which potentially reach more participants and allow for more reflection time than real-time interactions.

Competitive Advantage
The market or structural advantage that a company generates to through its strategy to sustain revenue and profit, on a long term basis.

Competitive Intelligence (CI)
Analysis of an enterprise's marketplace to understand what is happening, what will happen, and what it means to the firm. CI business goals may be offensive: to confidently position the firm in the marketplace, to plot a course for future positioning and to allocate short- and long-term resources; or defensive: to know what is happening, what may happen and how to react.

Contact Centers
Traditional call centers handle voice-only customer contact, whereas contact centers include all types of channels of customer contact, including voice (e.g., telephone, IVR, speech recognition and voice verification), the Internet (e.g., e-mail), the Web, fax, video kiosks and mail. This is an inbound and outbound service-based environment in which agents handle all types of contacts regarding sales, customer service, marketing, telemarketing, collections, and other functions. A contact center is logically consolidated, but can have a physically decentralized environment.

Content expert
The content expert (CE).

Content Management Systems
Also known as marketing content management (MCM) systems or marketing encyclopedia systems (MES), this category of applications allow enterprises to view and access marketing content.

Content provider
A firm whose products are information-based (content), including services to access and manage the content.

Cross boundary collaboration
eCKM is enabling collaboration across geographical, cultural and organizational borders.

CSS
Once known as the complaint-handling department, CSS is responsible for retaining and extending customer relationships once a product or service is sold.
Customer service interacts with customers, on a reactive or proactive basis, more frequently than any other organization and is critical for maintaining customer satisfaction. Due to the increasing complexity of customer interactions, customer service organizations need a complex technological infrastructure that is flexible, extendible, scalable and integrated to meet customer needs on a timely and accurate basis.

The components of CSS include the following:

·         Call Management

·         Field Service and Dispatch (FS/D) Systems

·         Contact Centers

Call Management
The core functionality of CSS applications. This component is used to log all incoming telephone calls and transactions and to manage the transaction from initiation through closure. Internet-Based Customer Service Suites - Also known as e-service suites, these applications and tools empower customers, partners and prospects for self-service and interactions with the enterprise via the Web, Internet, intranet or extranet.

Interactive customer service Web sites should be integrated with front-end servicing applications (customer service, sales, marketing and e-commerce), back-end systems and databases and the contact center to facilitate interaction between users and the enterprise.

The five essential functional components of e-service suites are:
1) tracking and escalation software, which is integrated with the front-end CSS servicing application for Web-based inquiry management;
2) problem-enabled knowledge management software to provide natural-language-like interfaces and allow customers to research inquiries by themselves;
3) an ERMS for managing inbound and outbound e-mails;
4) a universal queue management system, which functions as a funnel, integrating multiple channels - such as telephone, interactive voice response (IVR), speech recognition, the Internet and the Web - to standardize the handling of all customer inquiries; and
5) Collaborative chat, which facilitates integration between enterprises and their customers via the Web.

Voice over IP (VoIP), while immature, will be an essential component of e-service environments by 2002.

Field Service and Dispatch (FS/D) Systems
FS/D has historically been a back-office function that was closely associated with manufacturing enterprises and utility service providers. It is critically important in the service economy, has become an essential element of complete CSS suites, and is an important element of CRM.

FS/D software is evolving from solely back-office functionality to an enterprise system that tightly couples the back office with the front-office servicing systems.

FS/D applications must be integrated with the contact center and the call management system and, in the future, will be integrated with the sales organization.
FS/D systems are also referred to as "service delivery chain management" software, which is intended to assist organizations in increasing sales revenue, reducing labor and parts costs, improving productivity, reducing outages, and increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty.
FS/D involves complex systems that include modules for call management, workforce forecasting and scheduling, contract management (for purchased and leased assets), warranties, entitlements, depot repair/overhaul, technician dispatch, service parts planning and management, infrastructure maintenance, inventory, defect tracking (i.e., quality assurance) and reporting. FS/D systems need to support mobile (connected and detached) and Internet computing, as well as data synchronization.

Contact Centers
Traditional call centers handle voice-only customer contact, whereas contact centers include all types of channels of customer contact, including voice (e.g., telephone, IVR, speech recognition and voice verification), the Internet (e.g., e-mail), the Web, fax, video kiosks and mail.

This is an inbound and outbound service-based environment in which agents handle all types of contacts regarding sales, customer service, marketing, telemarketing, collections, and other functions.

A contact center is logically consolidated, but can have a physically decentralized environment.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
A technology-enabled strategy to convert data-driven decisions into business actions in response to, and in anticipation of, actual customer behavior. From a technology perspective, CRM represents the systems and infrastructure required to capture, analyze, and share all facets of the customer's relationship with the enterprise. From a strategy perspective, it represents a process to measure and allocate organizational resources to those activities that have the greatest return and impact on profitable customer relationships.

D

Data Analysis
Also called business intelligence, this involves the use of software for ad hoc query, reporting and analysis capabilities, supporting strategic decision-making processes with a data warehouse or data mart. A data warehouse is a consolidated database that stores all - or significant portions of - the data collected by an enterprise's multiple business systems. Data from online transaction-processing applications and other sources is selectively collected, extracted, integrated, transformed, and cleaned. A data mart contains a subset of the data typically found in a data warehouse and is designed to support the unique business intelligence requirements of a specific business process/application requirement.

Data Cleansing
This involves the use of tools for data support (e.g., cleansing, manipulation and reconciliation) to produce quality data and data consistency.

Data Mining
This functionality involves the process of discovering meaningful correlations, patterns and trends by sifting through large amounts of data stored in repositories. Data mining employs pattern recognition technologies, as well as statistical and mathematical techniques.

DBM
This technology encompasses the database management system (DBMS) and relational DBMS (RDBMS). Such software packages enable end users or application programmers to share data and provide a systematic method of creating, updating, retrieving and storing information in a database. The DBMS is generally also responsible for data integrity, data access control, and automated rollback, restart and recovery.

Digital Economy
The set of interlinked, interconnected, and networked business models.

Disaggregation
Disaggregation is the process whereby a value chain is reorganized because various functions no longer provide value to the end consumer or customer.

Distribution and Logistics
This category involves product distribution management and warehousing functions, including the physical movement of parts, components, spares and products between two or more locations. These processes include rating and routing of both inbound and outbound freight, tracking and tracing of shipments, freight bill payment and auditing, import and export compliance and documentation, and load optimization. Advanced concepts utilize logistics modeling, financial optimization, and third-party logistics management tools.

Domain Name
A unique identifier for an Internet site which consists of at least two (but sometimes more) parts separated by periods (e.g., http://www.info-edge.com). Enterprises must register top-level domains with the Web Internet Registry and pay a yearly fee to maintain the registry.

Dutch Auction
See Auction

 

E

eBusiness
Using digital technologies (Web, Phone, etc.) to interact with customers, suppliers, employees, partners, competitors, and other stakeholders.

eBusiness Plan
See ePlan.

eBusiness Strategy
A plan for using various digital technologies to redefine business models to achieve success, especially in relation to competitors.

eCommerce
eCommerce involves the use of communication technologies to transmit business information and transact business. Taking an order over the telephone is a simple form of e-commerce. Internet commerce is also e-commerce; however, it is only one of several advanced forms of e-commerce that use technology, integrated applications and business processes to link enterprises.

eCommunity
A constantly changing group of people collaborating and doing eBusiness over an electronic network (e.g., the Internet). Communities optimize their collective power by affiliation around a common interest.

Economic Value Added
The economic theory of added valuation, whereby the implementation of various technology or process enhancement will change the cost structure of a business, such that it generates more revenue, or spends less on expenses.

eCustomer Portal
A website that acts as an entry point to the entire web and provides a variety of services including web searching, news, white and yellow pages, free email, discussion groups, online shopping and links to other sites.

 

eFulfillment
Services which support the delivery to customers of goods and services procured over the internet. In the simplest case this would mean the storing, transportation and delivery of goods and services. In a more complex case it might mean managing the supply chain, monitoring and managing demand and supply (inventory, manufacture, purchasing) as well as transportation and delivery.

eFulfillment might hence include any of the following services:

a) Financial fulfillment such as credit checks, insurance, legal advice, factoring, tax;

b) Physical fulfillment such as collections, delivery, order tracking, inspection, returns, inventory replenishment;

c) Transactional fulfillment such as order checking, billing, post sales customer service, order amendments, mediation;

d) Planning such as supply chain design, demand planning/forecasting, production scheduling, logistics optimisation;

e) Decision support using knowledge managemement tools; and

f) International fulfillment assisting in import/export, legal, tax matters.

eInitiative
A set of eBusiness projects that support both an eBusiness Strategy and the business strategy and fundamentals.

Electronic Catalog (eCatalog)
An aggregation mechanism that presents goods or services for sale and enables users to buy goods or services in electronic marketplaces.

Electronic Commerce
See eCommerce

Electronic CRM
eCRM involves the integration of Web channels into the overall enterprise CRM strategy. The goal is to drive consistency within all channels relative to sales, CSS and marketing initiatives to achieve a seamless customer experience and maximize customer satisfaction, customer loyalty and revenue. A component of CRM and e-business, it includes such Web-based customer channels as e-sales, e-service, e-marketing and e-retailing.

Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
The electronic exchange of trading documents (e.g., invoices and orders) to enable e-commerce. Originally conducted only through value-added networks, EDI is gradually moving to the Internet.

Electronic document management
Electronic document management (EDM).

Electronic ERP
eERP represents the Web-enabled elements of an ERP business strategy that improve shareholder and customer value by integrating inter-enterprise manufacturing, financial and distribution functions to dynamically balance and optimize the resources of the enterprise together with its trading partners.

Electronic Software Distribution (ESD)
ESD enables software to be installed by transmitting it over a network. It is designed to help users distribute programs and files in their environments. The development of client/server and mobile client/server applications has made ESD a critical requirement. Without an effective means of automating the distribution and installation of software, most applications of client/server and mobile client/server technology will not be viable.

eMall
A Web site that maintains catalogs from multiple suppliers. Buyers enter the site, view many suppliers at once and purchase products or services. E-malls often charge a fee for tenancy or membership, may take title to the goods themselves, and are selling environments based on traditional notions of print and broadcast advertising that entice visitors to buy.

eMarket Maker
Intermediaries that develop a B2B e-marketplace of buyers and sellers within an industry, geographic region, or affinity group. They enter supply chains introducing new efficiencies and new ways of selling and purchasing products and services by providing content, value-added services, and often e-commerce capabilities. They are generally managed by a third party within a trading community.

eMarketplace
A Web site that enables buyers to select from many suppliers. E-marketplaces - which focus on putting the buyer in control - are buying environments that aggregate supplier content and provide decision support tools that enable a buyer to make the most informed decision.

Employee Self-Service (ESS)
Electronic services for employees to access or edit information previously controlled by an internal support staff. Examples are procurement (ordering supplies) or human resources (training registration or update of benefit choices).

Enabling technologies
All technology and infrastructure required to underpin and support the deployment of the ASP eBusiness solutions in a stable way.

English Auction
See Auction

Enterprise Application Infrastructure (EAI)
EAI is the unrestricted sharing of data and business processes among any connected applications and data sources in the enterprise. This means that all data will be shared with all connected applications and other data sources.

Enterprise Application Outsourcing
A model for the delivery of application services completely dedicated for the use of a single enterprise. This may involve takeover of staff and assets that traditionally supported the application.

Enterprise Application Service Providing (EASP)
A model for the delivery of application services like provided by an ASP, but augmented with enterprise specific customisation and integration services possibly at a cost of full exploitation of economy of scale and deployment speed effects. The idea is that only the part of the IT components is dedicated that needs to deviate from the standard to achieve the required customisation. The remainder is shared to maximally profit from deployment speed advantages.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)
This is a business strategy that improves shareholder and customer value by integrating manufacturing, financial and distribution functions to dynamically balance and optimize an enterprise's resources.

ePartner
Also known as extended selling enterprise (ESE), this includes applications and technologies provided by the enterprise to assist third-party selling channel partners (e.g., brokers, agents, distributors and value-added resellers) in achieving selling objectives. epartner is a component of partner relationship management.

ePlan
The eBusiness Strategy and the eWay Forward (or Roadmap).

eProcurement
The procurement process when it has been automated via Internet technology. Logically then, this includes the work flow from selecting the item required by the user, creating the requisition, obtaining approval to purchase, then communicating the Purchase order to the supplier.
At this point eFulfilment takes over, handling the logistics associated with delivery of the purchase. An integrated eProcurement and eFulfilment system would also be capable of managing the accounts payable facility through invoicing and payment.
Therefore eProcurement is not restricted to the realms of Non-Product-Related goods and services alone, but is equally suited to the process management of Direct-Materials for Original Equipment Manufacturers.

eSales
Also known as technology-enabled buying (TEB), unassisted selling or Web selling, this component of TES involves customer-direct, business or consumer Web-selling applications. These are customer-facing technologies and applications that allow consumers and businesses to "sell themselves" and conduct transactions without the assistance of a salesperson. E-sales are considered to be a part of e-CRM, and e-CRM is a part of e-business.

eService Suites
See CSS

eWay Forward
An eWay Forward, sometimes called the Roadmap or action plan is the specific set of actions that will enable the strategy and eStrategy.

Exchange
See Net Market brings together buyers and suppliers by electronic marketplace.

Extended Selling Enterprise (ESE)
See ePartner

Extranet
A collaborative, Internet-based network to link an enterprise with its suppliers, customers, or other external business partners and to facilitate intercompany relationships. Extranets use Internet-derived applications and technology to become the secured extensions of internal business processes to external business partners.

 

F

Field Sales
Also known as mobile sales or sales force automation (SFA), this includes applications for salespeople who most often work outside the boundaries of the enterprise and without the benefit of continuous LAN or high-speed WAN connections. To perform their jobs, they need to be able to access applications and databases; share data; and roam, connect and disconnect from the network freely. Applications for managing opportunities (i.e., leads or objectives), territories, accounts, contacts and activities, as well as for configuring products, pricing, contracts, orders, quotes and promotions are common requirements, as is the ability to leverage technology in face-to-face sales meetings and to access all types of marketing materials.

Fixed price
A price which is set by the supplier for a set period or for the forseeable future. In more complicated examples it may have quantity price breaks and include specific terms and conditions (e.g. discounts for prompt payment). It may also vary for according to a customer's specific requirements (e.g. quality checks). Different customers may be able to negotiate different fixed prices usually depending on the level of annual spend with a supplier.

Full Lifecycle
ASP's full life cycle approach can be characterized as the coherent and integrated process used to deliver and manage a solution across the complete period of its use. This is achieved by aligning our skills and capabilities to deliver value through three clearly defined phases i.e. eConsult, eTransform and eManage. Value is further enhanced through an continuous re-assessment of the business benefits that the solution delivers. This is known as eRefresh.

 

G

Game Theory
The set of theories about the interactions amongst market players in a closed and open situation (or game). Game theory is very important in defining the "moves" that are best for a company to maximize value.

 

H

Hybrid Business
A brick-and-mortar business that has responded to Internet threats by creating a Web front end with links to back-end systems; or a dot.com (virtual company) that is creating traditional infrastructure, such as a warehouse and logistics system, to meet customer expectations.

 

I

Inside Sales (Telesales)
Also known as telesales or inside selling, this involves applications for salespeople who most often work inside the boundaries of the enterprise and with the benefit of continuous LAN or high-speed WAN connections to perform their jobs, they spend a majority of their time using the phone or Web/e-mail. They may work in a contact center.
Common application requirements include opportunity management, dynamic scripting, order processing and management, quoting and proposal generation, lead management and collaborative Web selling (i.e., the integration of the Web and telephony, which allows the seller to take control of the Web site from the visiting buyer, while engaging the buyer over the telephone).

Intellectual Assets
Intangible assets including employees' knowledge; data and information about processes, experts, products, customers and competitors; brand names and image; and intellectual property, such as patented, trademarked or copyrighted materials and regulatory licenses.

Internet Sales Outlet (ISO)
A third-party Web site that attracts visitors looking to buy goods or services. ISOs make money by selling links or ads that lead directly to the merchant Web sites, or by selling products or services on behalf of Web merchants.

Internet-Based Customer Service Suites
See CSS

IT
Information Technology. The computers and systems that are assembled to enable various business goals.

IT Strategy
The set of actions, standards, and technologies that will be employed to support the business (generally). Not synonymous with eStrategy.

 

J

Japanese Auction
See Auction

 

K

Knowledge Management (KM)
A business process that formalizes management and leverage of a firm's intellectual assets. KM is an enterprise discipline that promotes a collaborative and integrative approach to the creation, capture, organization, access and use of information assets, including the tacit, uncaptured knowledge of people.

 

L

LMS
Learning Management System

 

M

Maintenance, Repair and Operations (MRO)
The activities and material purchased to support activities associated with the operation and repair of any facility, equipment or asset.

Market Capitalization
The value of the firm. Most commonly calculated as the stock price multiplied by the number of shares outstanding.

Marketing Automation (TEM) TEM involves analyzing and automating the marketing process. Because the role of technology in all aspects of business is growing, marketing departments must make it a strategic imperative to use information and IT to build competitive differentiation. TEM includes a proactive strategy for using information and IT in marketing, with the ultimate goal of TEM is to allocate marketing resources to the activities, channels, and media with the best potential return and impact on profitable customer relationships. The new metrics of customer profitability, customer lifetime value and share of customer will be needed to supplement the traditional metrics of market share and penetration.

The components of TEM include the following:

·         Data Cleansing

·         Data Analysis

·         Content Management Systems

·         Campaign Management Systems

Data Cleansing
This involves the use of tools for data support (e.g., cleansing, manipulation and reconciliation) to produce quality data and data consistency.

Data Analysis
Also called business intelligence, this involves the use of software for ad hoc query, reporting and analysis capabilities, supporting strategic decision-making processes with a data warehouse or data mart. A data warehouse is a consolidated database that stores all - or significant portions of - the data collected by an enterprise's multiple business systems. Data from online transaction-processing applications and other sources is selectively collected, extracted, integrated, transformed, and cleaned. A data mart contains a subset of the data typically found in a data warehouse and is designed to support the unique business intelligence requirements of a specific business process/application requirement.

Content Management Systems
Also known as marketing content management (MCM) systems or marketing encyclopedia systems (MES), this category of applications allow enterprises to view and access marketing content.

Campaign Management System (CMS)
A CMS is a database management (DBM) tool used by marketers to design single-channel or multichannel marketing campaigns and track the effects of those campaigns by customer segment over time. CMS applications are also used by sales organizations to execute sales campaigns, such as achieving a specific market share with a particular product by a certain date.

Marketplace
Brings together buyers and suppliers by electronic marketplace Matchmakers Web sites that refer a buyer to a Web merchant willing to sell a good or service at the price specified by the buyer.

Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A)
The process of reconfiguring the set of companies competing within a value chain to achieve economies of scale. Divestiture is the closely related field of selling businesses that are valued less as part of a larger entity.

Message Brokers
Message brokers are a kind of software that has the function one interface for all applications. The biggest advantage is that you only need an interface from the application to the massage broker.

Micro-Marketplace (MM)
A narrowly focused market that aggregates multiple vendor offerings, content and value-added services (such as comparison of features) to enable buyers within a particular industry, geographic region or affinity group to make informed purchasing decisions.

Middleware
This term is used in many ways. Basically, middleware is the software "glue" that helps programs and databases that may be on different computers work together. More formally, GartnerGroup defines middleware as "runtime system software that directly enables application-level interactions among programs in a distributed computing environment". Its most basic function is to enable communication between application programs or DBMSs within a single-application system or across multiple-application systems.

Mobile Client/Server (MC/S)
This is an approach used to transport information between mobile computers and host systems. At a minimum, this approach provides communications and database replication and synchronization.

N

Net Markets
A net market is a digital marketplace that supports all of the functions of a marketplace, on line, in a digital format, including trading, payments, dispute resolution, etc. See also Exchange.

 

O

Open Request
See Auction

P

Partner Relationship Management
This is the CRM element that extends sales, marketing, customer service and other enterprise business functions to partners to foster more-collaborative channel partner relationships.

Pay-as-you-grow
A pricing model that dictates a price per transaction or price per user. This provides a customer with a predictable and justifiable way to pay for the services.

PCard (Purchasing Card)
A credit card used by buyers to purchase on behalf of their company. In Philips it was used for indirect materials of low value, the Purchases were not recorded and payment made when the credit card bill arrived. It is of course possible to implement Purchasing Cards and record the purchases. Suppliers receive their payment; Buyers streamline their purchasing/accounts payable process.

Personalization
Using continually adjusted user profiles to match content or services to individuals. Personalization includes determining a user's interest based on his or her preferences or behavior, constructing business rules to select relevant content based on those preferences or behaviors, and presenting the content to the user in an integrated, cohesive format.

Portal
A high-traffic, broadly appealing Web site with a wide range of content, services, and vendor links. It acts as a value-added middleman by selecting the content sources and assembling them together in a simple-to-navigate (and customize) interface for presentation to the end user. Portals typically include services such as e-mail, community, and chat.

Profile
A definition of customer preferences, behaviors, or demographics.

 

R

Re-aggregation
This is the process whereby a value chain is reorganized to include various functions that were previously thought to provide no value to the end consumer or customer.

Reverse Auction
Purchase of goods or services by obtaining bids (to sell) from potential sellers.
This dynamic pricing mechanism may take a variety of forms including:

a) A Reverse English Auction where sellers call descending prices.
b) A Reverse Sealed Bid Auction where sellers place sealed bids.
c) A Reverse Dutch Auction where a market manager calls ascending prices to obtain sell bids.
d) A Reverse Japanese Auction where a market manager calls descending prices to obtain sell bids.
e) An Open Request for Quotes where sellers call descending prices and the buyer selects the winners.
f) A Sealed Request for Quotes where sellers submit sealed bids and the buyer selects the winners.

Risk Management
The process, strategy, and actions taken to minimize the uncontrollable risks faced by a business. (e.g., weather; civil unrest; etc.)

Roadmap
See eWay Forward.

S

Sales Force Automation (SFA)
See Field Sales

Sarbanes-Oxley
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act was passed in 2003 to regulate certain aspects of business and financial management. Legislative information: Thomas. Commercial resource: The Sarbanes-Oxley Toolkit

Sealed Bid Auction
See Auction

Sealed Request
See Auction

Selective Outsourcing
Term to indicate that many enterprises consider outsourcing of a part of their IT to a service provider like ASP. Mostly this is for relatively new applications (like eBusiness applications) for the reason that there is no in-house experience available.

Sell Side
Processes for companies to sell their products, including catalogs, transaction processors, payment processors, and supply chain management methods and tools.

Spot price
A price which increases and decreases dynamically according to market demand and supply. One example of a spot price would be the price of shares on the stock exchange.

Strategy
A plan for achieving success including the actions (initiatives, programs, and projects) necessary to achieve that success.

Supply Chain Management (SCM)
The process of optimizing delivery of goods, services, and information from supplier to customer. SCM is a set of business processes that encompasses a trading-partner community engaged in a common goal of satisfying the end customer.

Systems Administration Management (SAM) Tools
This is a flexible set of application maintenance utilities and application administration tools. The key value of such tools is derived from how well they manage changes. A well-designed tool permits an administrator to describe either a database or a form field change, ensures the integrity of all of the application components tied to the change and propagates the change to all affected users.
SAM tools for central administration are used by system administrators and thus provide a level of technical competency, whereas administrative functionality for managers (e.g., sales managers, marketing content managers and call center supervisors) must be limited by the capabilities of the end user.

 

T

Technology-Enabled Buying (TEB)
See eSales.

Telephony
A generic term for voice telecommunications.

TES
Also known as sales automation, this refers to the application of technology to enable selling through all desired sales channels, including field/mobile sales, inside sales/telesales, selling partners (i.e., e-partners), Web selling (i.e., e-sales) and retail sales. The goal of TES is to integrate technology with optimal processes to provide continuous improvement in sales team effectiveness, as well as balance and optimize each enterprise sales channel.

The components of TES include the following:

·         Field sales

·         Inside sales

·         ePartner

·         eSales

·         Retail sales

Field Sales
Also known as mobile sales or sales force automation (SFA), this includes applications for salespeople who most often work outside the boundaries of the enterprise and without the benefit of continuous LAN or high-speed WAN connections. To perform their jobs, they need to be able to access applications and databases; share data; and roam, connect and disconnect from the network freely. Applications for managing opportunities (i.e., leads or objectives), territories, accounts, contacts and activities, as well as for configuring products, pricing, contracts, orders, quotes and promotions are common requirements, as is the ability to leverage technology in face-to-face sales meetings and to access all types of marketing materials.

Inside Sales
Also known as telesales or inside selling, this involves applications for salespeople who most often work inside the boundaries of the enterprise and with the benefit of continuous LAN or high-speed WAN connections to perform their jobs, they spend a majority of their time using the phone or Web/e-mail. They may work in a contact center. Common application requirements include opportunity management, dynamic scripting, order processing and management, quoting and proposal generation, lead management and collaborative Web selling (i.e., the integration of the Web and telephony, which allows the seller to take control of the Web site from the visiting buyer, while engaging the buyer over the telephone).

ePartner
Also known as extended selling enterprise (ESE), this includes applications and technologies provided by the enterprise to assist third-party selling channel partners (e.g., brokers, agents, distributors and value-added resellers) in achieving selling objectives. ePartner is a component of partner relationship management.

eSales
Also known as technology-enabled buying (TEB), unassisted selling or Web selling, this component of TES involves customer-direct, business or consumer Web-selling applications. These are customer-facing technologies and applications that allow consumers and businesses to "sell themselves" and conduct transactions without the assistance of a salesperson. E-sales are considered to be a part of e-CRM, and e-CRM is a part of e-business.

Retail Sales
Also known as retail selling, this component of TES includes applications that enable retailers to sell their products to consumers through traditional brick-and-mortar outlets (such as department stores, specialty shops and outlet malls) or via new options such as home shopping, the Internet and warehouse clubs. Merchandising, relationship marketing and e-retailing are typical examples of retail sales applications.

 

U

Uniform Resource Locator (URL)
The character string or Web address that identifies an Internet document's exact name and location.

U-Shaped Table
A table that looks like the letter "U" such that all participants can clearly see each other, AND a meeting facilitator.

 

V

Value Based Selling
Value Based Selling (VBS).

Value Chain
The series of functions and interactions (by market participants) that generate value for a customer or client.

Virtual Company
A company integrating several ideals: outsourced noncore competencies; a focus on core strength/business; little or no physical presence or infrastructure; a network of business alliances; the exploitation of intellectual capital; and a heavy reliance on telecommunications. Virtual companies have outsourced the physical processes and administrative attributes of traditional business, and expanded and combined intellectual activities (e.g., problem solving) with standard business processes such as marketing.

Voice over IP (VoIP)
While immature, it will be an essential component of e-service environments by 2002.

 

W

Web Selling
See eSales

Web Site
A collection of files accessed through a Web address, covering a particular theme or subject, and managed by a particular person or organization. Its opening page is called a home page. A Web site resides on servers connected to the Web network and is able to format and send information requested by worldwide users 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Web sites typically use the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) to format and present information and to provide navigational facilities that make it easy for the user to move within the site and around the Web.

Workflow Management
There are two types of workflow management:
1) Internal and external process integration is a workflow approach that allows for the definition of business processes that span applications, including those that come from different vendors. This usually requires a standards-based commercial workflow development environment.
2) Automated events or processes - a workflow approach that enables automated tasks (e.g., the automation of steps in a marketing campaign or a sales process) to be performed.

 

X

XML
The standard for providing Supplier catalogue information.

 

 

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