E-commerce has been a buzz word for the past few years now.  Much has been said and written about the benefits and issues related to e-commerce.  Still there are a lot of misconceptions in the minds of businesses who want to set their online e-commerce setup.  Many contemporary businessmen think of e-commerce as just setting up their website and selling the products online.

The reality is that e-commerce is not just a website selling online products.  Infact, e-commerce is a complete drift of your business strategy from conventional to online.  Businesses have to realize that e-commerce requires a complete business model.  The same way as you operate your businesses, similarly you need to form a model for e-commerce business.  Since this is different from conventional business, the model also needs to be different.

For deployment of model, there could be need for organization redesign.  Such organizational redesign involves, as *Kalakota and Robinson (1999) put it, ‘the complex fusion of business processes, enterprise applications, and organizational structure necessary to create a high-performance business model’ (p. xvi) that can capitalize on the opportunities accorded by the Internet as an effective medium for commercial activity.

Also there needs to have a business strategy backed by business plan that would allow business keep abreast with the vision.  There should be a SWOT analysis as you do for any other kind of business and based on the outcome need to have your strategy deployed.

* Kalakota, Ravi and Robinson, Marcia, e-Business: Roadmap for Success, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Mass, 1999.