How Does Technology Affect Today's Business
How does technology affect today’s business
by Feline Ng Han Xua
When
we talk about business in the past, the thought of consumers buying products
face-to-face with merchants or businessmen would came into our mind. However,
with the emergence of technology around us, E-business (electronic business)
was born. Based on Berisha-Shaqiri (2015),
E-business contains of business processes online where it includes buying and
selling products, supplies and services (servicing customers; processing
payments; managing production control; collaborating with business partners;
sharing information; running automated employee services; recruiting and many
more).
For
example, in the past, consumers would browse through the shops or department
they desired physically in order to purchase products or services but with the
aid of technology today, consumers would just have to use their mobile gadgets
to shop online using websites like Shopee, Lazada, Zalora and Mudah. On the
other hand, for sellers or service providers, the capital of starting a
business will not be as much in the past as shop rentals or mortgage payment
and other utility bills are not needed with the online business platforms.
Nevertheless,
advertising and marketing businesses has to be utilized in the other landscape
like social network today due to the rise of technology. Based on Malaysia Digital Associationn (2016), the estimated
Malaysia Digital Revenue on Social Media Advertising would increased from 40
million US Dollars to 100 million US Dollars in year 2020. (Refer to Figure 1)
Figure 1: Digital Advertising Spending in Malaysia 2014 – 2020. Source
from Malaysia Digital Association.
From
our observation, it is undeniable that technology had brought great
contribution to our business sector but this great contributor had also brought
negative changes to the business sector too. In terms of online shopping,
people could purchase anything without borders (place and time). But this had
also brought up the issue of online business scams. A staggering percentage of
28% of all online retail orders are affected by scams which gave a direct
impact on the ecommerce profitability, operating efficiency and scalability (Singh Bist, Agarwal, & Bansal, 2012) .
Last
but not least, online business may not give as much assurance as “physical”
businesses as consumer does not know the seller most of the time. Hence, the
product bought may not be as good quality as it is shown in the picture given
by the seller. Besides that, for electrical appliances, the guarantee may not
be 100% assured if it is faulty.
In
a nutshell, technology had indeed brought a lot of changes in the business
sector. But the question of is this a positive change globally is still a
debatable question.
References
Berisha-Shaqiri, A. (2015). Impact
of Information Technology and Internet in Businesses. Academic Journal of
Business, Administration, Law and Social Sciences, 1(1), 73-79.
Malaysia Digital Associationn. (2016,
August 4). 2016 Malaysia Digital Landscape. Retrieved February 24,
2018, from Malaysia Digital Association:
http://www.malaysiandigitalassociation.org.my/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Malaysia-Digital-Landscape-August-2016.pdf
Singh Bist, Y., Agarwal, C., & Bansal,
U. (2012). Online Business Frauds: A Case Study of an Online Fraud Survey
Company. International Journal of Modern Engineering Research (IJMER), 2(6),
4396-4404.
Hi in my opinion, online shopping does help me when I wanna save my shopping time or if I am too busy to go to the store to purchase the products/services physically. But I still have trustworthiness issues with online retailers. I think the technology does give positive impact towards today business but still its have its own weaknesses.
ReplyDeletehi, thank feline rising up this Hot issue. From my own perspective, i like online shopping as there are a lot of item even for a same item like phone casing. No doubt that, online shopping actually bring many convenience for us as whenever we tend to have a look on certain item, we can check the price through the online shopping platform like Lazada, Taobao, Shopee and others. This can greatly save our time to being went to a shop and seek for the item we need.
ReplyDeleteHowever, in online shopping, there might have the issue about scam. From my past experience, i bought a headphone from a dealer in shopee, even though i have clearly state the color and the phone model, but when the item arrived, it have deficiency, and the dealer denied it have problem and when i sent it back for repair under warranty, it still charge me the maintenance fees and the shipping fees. Even report to shopee customer service, but seem no action been taken.
Thus, online shopping can bring convenience, but we have to be alert when we do online shopping .
Hi, I think it is very great discuss about this issue. There's a lot of problem that can rise up from changes such the increase of crimes when there is modernisation . Safety issue such as scams and many others. There are pros and cons in many things in our life but as long as we know how to delal with it and be more careful, i think there is no problem for that.
ReplyDeletehi ladies and gentlemen. thank you feline for highlighted this issue. due to according to E-Commerce in 2017 shown that 70% of us in Malaysia are using E-Commerce likes shopee, lazada, zalora and others in buying and selling products. So its shown that Malaysia are developed well in technology and have a truthfulness in using online platform compared to previous year people are not 100% believed in online platform even though from a professional level. hence there are also have a pros and corns about it likes natasha said about our security data will be know of someone else.
ReplyDeleteAssalamualaikum, and hai everyone. Thank you Feline for raising this issue. I do agree with Feline that technology do help a lot in expanding the business. As the example given, by using our mobile phone we can purchase anything that we want online as long as we have money with that we can save our time. Online business not only giving the benefits to the consumer but also to the seller as they can get in touch with all the potential costumers around the world but I also agree with Janatul that the technology does have advantages and disadvantages and we as the user must aware of its.
ReplyDeleteYes! I totally agree that online shopping nowadays is much more easier and fun! Whenever I want to shop something, I can just visit websites like Lazada or Shopee to search for a variety of product brands and reviews from consumers, this actually saves lots of time for me. Of course safety issues are still the main concern, but I believe that with proper surveys and researches done, online shopping should be no problem at all!
ReplyDeleteYES i really agree what you said. Online shopping nowadays is convinient and easier. It not only save time and also cost of transportation too. But i think reviews of others are important for them to do research and judgement.
ReplyDeleteInteresting issue, online shopping is becoming more popular nowadays that people seldom go to shops and buy things they want anymore. Regardless of the risks of online shopping, people are willing to buy the online product compared to the local stores due to the great price range, as well as the ability to just buy items from a smartphone. In the near future, I believe online shopping will take over the preference of people whenever they want to buy products.
ReplyDelete