Managing IT in Government, Business & Communities

The spreadsheet model contained a number of other decision support modules within its operation. An example of one of these modules is where the model recommended whether a particular Web site feature should be adopted based upon the identification of overall business strategy by the user and the particular cost or differentiation benefits that the feature could offer the business.

Figure 5 shows the screen that users could use to record the overall direction of the business.

Figure 5: Input Form to Select Overall Business Strategy

The idea behind this form is to allow the business to make sure that its Web site strategy is in line with its overall business strategy. In this instance, we are interested in whether the user selects that his business has adopted a "cost" (try to lower costs) or "differentiation" (try to differentiate their products and services from their competitors) strategy. The model recommends various Web site features if the user has selected one of these categories. Table 3 shows the Web site features and if they are nominated according to the user's selection.

A description of each of the decision support recommendations follows:

• The small business should consider listing the basic detail of its products on the Web site. If it has adopted a cost strategy, this could be to save costs by not having to print as many catalogues. If differentiation has been recommended, the feature may allow the business to provide more information about the quality of the products versus that of its competitors.

• Online transactions (ordering and purchasing) will be recommended (based upon the suitability of the product or service, which is not covered here) if a differentiation strategy has been selected. The business may be able to differentiate itself on the speed of the transaction, and therefore delivery, of the product or service.

• Provision of product support will be recommended for both cost and differentiation strategies. This is because it may save employee time (and costs) in relation to answering customer queries and allow the business to differentiate itself from competitors by offering superior and faster product support.

• The business may even be able to differentiate itself by the provision of very basic information about the business, like where it is located. If a customer is ready to buy and happy to travel, information about where the business located (or even how to contact it easily) may turn out to be the difference.