WHY USE ELECTRONIC COMMERCE FOR INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS?
Today, more than 600 million people throughout the world are connected to the Internet. This global interconnectedness offers a tremendous potential customer base for entrepreneurs. B2B e-commerce is rising significantly as well. Increasingly, corporations in Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Africa are migrating many of their marketing programs on-line to seek new business in regions and countries they had heretofore thought beyond their resources. They also seek new supply sources, services to meet their internal needs, and partners to share manufacturing and marketing responsibilities. For certain industries, products and services, going on-line reduces variable costs associated with international marketing. Tasks such as order processing, payment, after-sales service, marketing (direct e-mail), and advertising on various sites, may lower an enterprise’s international market development costs that would be incurred if the firm employed conventional market penetration strategies. One
