How the New Media are Used in Business

New media has changed the way businesses connect with consumers and other businesses. Where traditional media consisted of businesses using physical means to promote and conduct activities, new media has revolutionized the business world to one that relies heavily on technology and the internet. E-commerce (or electric commerce) refers to the buying and selling of goods and services via electronic channels, primarily the Internet. . The newest phenomenon is M-commerce (or mobile commerce), which refers to the use of wireless handheld devices such as cellular phones and laptops to conduct commercial transactions online. .



E-Commerce
E-commerce refers to the sale and purchase of goods over the Internet. This form of online retail is convenient due to its 24-hour availability with the ease of staying indoors.

Business-to-Business
Business to Business (B2B) is a type of e-commerce that allows companies to do business with each other. An example of this is wholesalers selling to retailers.

Amazon


Amazon is the foremost electronic commerce purchase website. Additionally, it is an example of B2C commerce which means business sells to consumers directly. Individuals can find a variety of goods and items available for purchase through Amazon. The company was founded in 1994 by Jeffery Bezos. During it's early years, Amazon focused on selling books. The business strategy revolved around on how physical book stores were able to hold only up to 200,000 books or so while purchasing and viewing books online could be endless.

Amazon's vision was to be a customer-centric corporation. This is reflected in their company-values statement which states: "Customer Obsession: We start with the customer and work backwards. Innovation: If you don't listen to your customers you will fail. But if you only listen to your customers you will also fail." Amazon has lead business in New Media with their research and development. The corporation is pushing the envelope and even expanding to creating TV shows!

Business-to-Consumer
Business to Consumer (B2C) is a type of e-commerce business that allows businesses to sell to the general public through websites with shopping cart software and no human interaction.

Consumer-to-Business
Consumer to Business (C2B) is a new type of e-commerce which allows a consumer to post a project online with a budget and businesses to bid on the project. After reviewing the bids, the consumer can choose which it prefers to give the project to.

Consumer-to-Consumer
Consumer to Consumer (C2C) is a type of e-commerce that allows individuals to buy or sell their products. It usually consists of online forums to help connect buyers with sellers.

Etsy
Etsy is a type of C2C e=commerce and can be considered a website dealing with business. It allows anyone, even people who don't have much time to pursue their interests, to put what they create up for sale. It has categories like art, gift ideas, and a section especially dedicated to weddings. Anything you can possibly want can be found on this website. Someone who finds their work on Etsy extremely successful can then have enough confidence to start their small business. Etsy went so far as to allow people to create wedding registries from anything on the site.

Cyber Monday


Cyber Monday, the first Monday after Thanksgiving, is the biggest online shopping day of the year. The term was coined as a result of companies wanting to shift their audience to shopping online as opposed to the traditional Black Friday habits consumers were used to. After first beginning in 2005, Cyber Monday in 2013 was the biggest yet, showing a 20.6% increase in sales from the previous year. . Average order value decreased 1% from the previous year to $128.77, showing that consumers were continuing to find cheaper deals online. . In fact, Cyber Monday 2013 sales were up 31.5% over Black Friday for the same year, while shoppers paid 5% more on Black Friday than they did on Cyber Monday. . Of these online sales, 11.7% were done via use of tablets while 5.5% were as a result of smartphones. The trend seems to be headed toward the direction of a "Black Weekend" instead of a "Black Friday" and then a "Cyber Monday". Experts say that as online shopping gains traction consumers may begin a shift between visiting brick and mortar locations and simply bargain hunting from home, online. .

Social Networking
Social networking has also had a major effect on the way consumers and businesses conduct commercial activities, especially in the e-commerce and m-commerce world. Advertisers find value in the information they receive from Twitter and Facebook users about their interests, but entrepreneurs are starting to make this transformation from user activity to businesses to an even more direct level. Platforms such as Pinterest, which allows users to share cut-out shaped images of products they like, does just this. . With about 50 million users, Pinterest is a gold mine for advertisers as they are directly see what consumers in various demographics are interested in buying. . According to the Pinterest Executive Ben Silberman, " there is a direct link between the things you pin and the things that you spend money on." . This phenomenon itself is very interesting and we'll see how Pinterest utilizes their data to turn a profit in the coming years.

M-Commerce
Many choose to think of mobile commerce as meaning "a retail outlet in your customer’s pocket." .



Mobile Payments
With the surge of m-commerce, the mobile payments industry is an up and coming sector that is transforming the way both consumers and businesses conduct commercial transactions. Mobile payments refers to payment through the convenience of their mobile device. The industry ranges from big companies such as Google and Apple offering these services to the smaller but innovative startups such as Square & Braintree. Entrepreneurs and business executives are seeing this product as one that may gain a lot of traction among consumers in a decade or so, where they expect consumers to use such platforms the way they use credits cards today. According to industry experts, the trend in international commerce is towards a "cashless society". This places mobile payment companies up against traditional commerce giants like Visa and Mastercard.