The objective of this assignment is to increase your knowledge about how businesses are leveraging the internet to conduct business. Because you will be using public websites to do your research, the...

The objective of this assignment is to increase your knowledge about how businesses are leveraging the internet to conduct business.  Because you will be using public websites to do your research, the focus will be on marketing, sales, and customer service transactions with end-consumers (B2C).


    Choose an industry of interest where several companies have developed online e-business strategies with public B2C web sites. This industry might include traditional companies operating as bricks-and-clicks firms, as well as dot-com companies.
    After you have looked at several public websites for companies in this industry, select 3 or 4 companies you think will provide an interesting comparison about how companies are leveraging the internet today. (Hint: you might want to include one company with a website you think is significantly inferior to at least one other company’s site.)
    Analyze each of the websites in terms of the overall “look and feel” of the site from the perspective of the targeted consumer, as well as how well each website has addressed the 7Cs in the model developed by Rayport and Jaworski (described at the end of Chapter 7 in the textbook).
    Write up your findings, including the following content:


    Introduce the industry you selected and the websites you selected.  Include the reasons why you chose this industry and these particular companies, and include the URL for each site.
    Describe and also compare the ways that these companies’ websites address the 7Cs and any other characteristics you wish to emphasize. For example:


    How easy was it to identify the content or services available?
    How easy was it to navigate between pages?
    Did the site download easily?
    Was the use of graphics and animation appropriate for the target audience?
    Were the linking capabilities of the Web exploited?
    Was there a sense of “community”?
    Was a privacy policy available and easy to find?


    Based on your analyses, provide some recommendations for the company whose website you considered to be the weakest. Be sure your ideas are appropriate for the industry you selected, and take into account whether companies in this industry traditionally have sold directly to end-consumers or not and using what channels (e.g., catalog, physical store, or via a distributor).


    Use outside resources to provide current statistics and forecasts for the industry you selected, as well as any information about B2B applications that the companies may be using. Be sure to provide full citations to all third-party sources, including a “last date accessed” for all references to a URL.