Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
in turn often thought to be different from e-retail. To clarify, e-business is
not the same as e-commerce. e-Business is, rather, an integrated approach
to every aspect of online business and features the continuous optimization of
a company's value proposition through adopting digital technology and the
Internet as channels of multiple business activities. This means that e-business
includes online communications, client relationship management, consumer
monitoring, Internet marketing, experiential marketing, branding, retail,
logistics and their connected dimensions like merchandizing and after-sales
support. e-Retail or e-commerce on the other hand uses the Internet and dig-
ital applications and systems to enable the buying and selling process and
transactions.
With the arrival of e-business, the luxury business is currently facing
both multiple challenges and as many opportunities, although these are not
immediately apparent as their identification requires a strategic and organized
approach. The Internet serves as an ample breeding ground for the evolution of
luxury, both in the creative aspect as well as in communications and business.
Before exploring these opportunities, let's first look at the main challenges.
The principal challenge and main drawback that luxury companies face
in their move towards adopting Internet strategies is that of corporate ori-
entation. As already mentioned, the intricate features of managing a luxury
business means that luxury companies are structured to function in a manner
that is unaccustomed to change. The arrival of the Internet has created an
imperative need for a change of corporate orientation from rigidity to open-
ness and flexibility. This doesn't mean completely changing a company's
corporate strategy and culture or discarding the intricate codes of luxury, but
simply acknowledging that communicating and, indeed, operating on the
web platform requires a new way of thinking and re-thinking existing prac-
tices across all business aspects. Of course this is easier said than done, as it
remains a well-known fact that some CEOs of luxury companies neither use
the Internet nor have email addresses!
A change of orientation also means recognizing the important place of
the Internet and new technologies in the overall corporate strategy, and allo-
cating the appropriate position (and budgets!) to this channel in corporate
planning. This means ensuring that a real Internet department exists and
dispensing the multiple functions of the department to suitably qualified
managers. It may not be news to you that several established luxury com-
panies don't have Internet units and those that do have only webmasters in
this department. This is a real dilemma because a webmaster may be skilled in
systems integration and web traffic monitoring but they are in most cases ill-
equipped to make strategic decisions linked to e-communications, e-commerce,
e-branding, e-marketing and client management, and the social web to name
just a few. The multi-faceted functions linked to these activities ought to
be integrated in a department designed to function as a complement to the
marketing, branding and communications business units and executed by
