Networking Technologies

How is commerce conducted on the internet today?

Business or commerce on the internet is a straining beast, which the federal and state governments are attempting to control. In both cases, it is a matter of the technology out-pacing the abilities of both bureaucrats and politicians.

E-commerce or business on the internet as it is called, promises speed, efficiency and security. First, it is essential to understand some of the history of the internet. It was originally created by DARPA (Department of Advanced Research Project Agency) for project administration as well as command and control to strategic armed forces in the event of a nuclear or conventional attack against the United States of America.

The bulk of those projects were involved in “black operations” such as stealth aircraft, advanced surface-to-air missile defense, phased-arrayed radar for early warning and remote spy satellites. Other highly classified intelligence databases were shared between various government agencies during the cold war. This provided us the speed and reaction time necessary to win the counter-intelligence war by the end of 1990. In 1994 DARPA and the Federal Government essentially sold the existing five networks or “backbones” of what was to become the internet.

Understanding of how commerce is conducted on the internet today requires that you first understand how the internet works. When you shop on the internet, you may see something in a merchant website that you wish to purchase. The merchant’s web site has a catalog on one or many web pages through an ordering software embedded in the web page, this is named a “shopping cart”.

This software supplies an order identifier that specified the amount of product order, cost per item, delivery address and credit card payment information. This order is sent through the internet using security protocols to an online transaction server. The order is logged into the database and is sent to a designated processing network that negotiates the payment from the consumer’s bank to the merchant’s bank.

Upon completion of this financial negotiation, the order is filled by the merchant and shipped to you the consumer. This process can take minutes where it once involved hours either driving to the shopping center or waiting on the telephone line talking with a customer representative (Gibson John ).

There are several advantages to a business using the internet. It offers speed of commercial transaction, lower and more efficient stock management, reduced personnel costs and timely deposit of funds. It also allows you a wider area to shop; the entire world is your market with e-commerce.

Essentially, it provides your customer with a total satisfaction packet if handled correctly. It is a superlative platform for marketing your product, offering a means to display your inventory. If an e-commerce is handled correctly, it can mean that a business can provide a product in a timely fashion. It also means that an e-commerce can operate with less overhead if it can guarantee customer orders and store restock.

There are certain privacy issues and security matters for individuals and businesses using e-commerce on the internet. Internet Merchant Bank Account provides e-commerce the means to manage financial transactions directly with the merchant’s bank without the need for an online transactional server. It provides security directly with a thinner IT process, which translate into faster e-commerce. It also allows the business to conduct overseas transactions.

If you are an internet business you should also obtain a Digital Certificate, this allows credit card transactions securely without the possibility of identity theft. These are obtained from the web host as part of the monthly charge or as an additional charge. A Digital Certificate is mandatory if you use credit cards as a basis of your financial transactions while conducting an e-commerce.

E-commerce management control issues. One of the many management issues is finding the correct web host. A web host should have high-speed connections with the internet at least T2 or higher. The speed of doing business online is determined by not just the speed of the connection to the internet server provider but of the ability of the web host to handle a specific number of web site transactions. This is known as the transaction allocation; if it is too small then the time necessary to transact business is too long and will cost you clients.

If you are a large internet-based business, consider an Internet Merchant Bank Account, or if you are a smaller business, consider using an Online Transaction Server. These are entirely focused on financial transactions performed on the internet and offer focused response.

Shopping cart software is either available for several hundred dollars or obtainable from either web hosts or Online Transaction Server providers for a monthly fee.Timeliness of filling orders at warehouse, credits and debits to various banks can be addressed through choosing the best bank or Online Transaction Server or credit card companies.

The future of e-commerce can be as great as or even greater than any other business outside the internet. This is because it is based on the same principles of “regular” businesses. Successful businesses are built when there has been adequate marketing research on their product, a professional management team, efficient post-sales services, achievable and realistic business goals, an outstanding IT staff and computer equipment.

Success in e-commerce or any business will succeed if you understand the customers, know that you are in a competitive environment, know your market, know your abilities, coordinate, obtain the cooperation of employees and senior management, maintain strict attention to a schedule, follow the business plan and avoid security compromises.