The Internet is changing the way customers, suppliers, and companies interact to conduct business, communicate, and collaborate. It also changes the way we interact, learn, communicate and negotiate. At the same time, new consumer patterns are emerging due to the Internet and e-commerce. An increasing number of enterprises are using the Internet in order to get higher added value to their business and keep their competitiveness in the global market.  More and more companies are trying to use the Internet to develop e-Strategies.

           

Let’s look at the definition of e-strategies at first:

E-Strategy prioritizes business initiatives and defines key performance indicators for developing e-business systems.[1]

 

E-Strategy is “the use of Web-based applications and services to select and segment customers, develop and execute marketing campaigns, and distribute leads to the right sales channels.”1

 

E-Strategy “provides the broad framework for the transformation” from a business to an e-business.  It provides vision, goals and objectives, and the map upon which a company can performs the transformation.1

 

All in all, e-Strategy is the use of the Internet, automated systems and email to develop methods for carrying out strategic initiatives and developing new markets or more business opportunities. 1

           

There are lots of important issues in building a successful e-Strategy. In this paper I will choose the following top ten issues to discuss: 

 

1.      Privacy

2.      Security

3.      Tax

4.      Fraud

5.      Globalization & Localization

6.      Bricks-and-Clicks

7.      Customer Relationship Management & Personalization

8.      Value chain

9.      Legal issue

10.   Internet marketing Strategy

 

 

The issue of privacy is one of the most debated and hottest topics in the online environment and e-strategy today. Privacy not only affects consumers’ online confidence and trust, but also may cause potential legal and ethical problems. If consumers are not satisfied with e-privacy and businesses’ online practices, it is hard to imagine that e-commerce will have a prosperous future.

 

In fact, according to a recent poll... Americans said they were more concerned about a loss of personal privacy online than they were about health care and crime. And according to research conducted for The DMA by Wirthlin Worldwide, nearly 60 percent of shoppers said legislation would be needed to make businesses observe good privacy policies. [2]

The Internet industry is built on trust between businesses and their customers – and privacy is the number one ingredient in trust. Unless they effectively address the issue of privacy, Internet companies will lose the trust, and the business, of their customers.[3]

 

The World Wide Web is an enormous easily accessible source of information and databases that provides easy access to a number of people, companies, agencies and many other sources.  This brings about concerns about privacy on the Internet.  Consumer privacy has received substantial attention as we move into the new age of online business environment. The growth of the Internet has developed many new concerns for the future about protecting the privacy of the consumers.