TEAM NIMBUS
REPORT 2: PRINCIPLES

This team report will compare the book principles to our selected companies: Amazon.com, eBay.com, and iVillage.com. However, some principles may not have been used or applied by the company.

PRINCIPLES

1. The race belongs to the swift: Amazon.com is the leader among online booksellers because the company was able to get into the market quickly and establish a strong and loyal customer base.
2. Reversing Markets: Amazon benefits from reversing markets because of the ability to keep its inventory low relative to traditional bookstores. Here, the customer pulls the product through the system rather than the vendor peddling the books themselves.
3. The new economic of virtual communities: This web site is very customer-oriented and member-focused.
4. The shape of thing to come: How virtual communities will evolve: How virtual communities will evolve: Amazon is a great example of a virtual community that is able to bring in revenues all the while exploiting the knowledge of its members by getting online book reviews from its customers.
5. Choosing a way in: The company found its niche in the online, discount bookselling market.
6. Laying the Foundation: Amazon laid the foundation well in that you could get the books at a discount and they could be delivered quickly.
7. The gardener’s touch, managing organic growth: The growth of the site seems to be well-managed with its customers’ needs in mind.
8. Equipping the community: Amazon continues to utilize proven technologies that to capture customer and visitor information that they believe will help improve customer service. The company has invested in payment technology, data collection software and integration technology. Amazon is very customer-focused and realized early on that the people in the community are what make a good site, not only the technology.
9. Rethinking functional management: Amazon's innovative approach in managing its resources have made the Internet more appealing and give their customers a reason to not buy products using traditional methods. Their e-commerce site gives Amazon the competitive advantage of reduced overhead while passing along cost savings to the customer.
10. Reshaping markets and organizations: The company seems to be well-equipped to sense the changing needs of its market.

TEAM NIMBUS
REPORT 2: PRINCIPLES

PRINCIPLES

1. The race belongs to the swift: Ebay has established itself as the leading auction site online. Where else would you go if you were seeking something like a Centipede video game from the early ’80s or a steering wheel for a 1963 Austin Healey?
2. Reversing markets: The auction site is based on reverse markets. The individual vendor just offers up the goods and then the customers either fight to buy for it or don’t.
3. The new economic of virtual communities: This is purely a member-participation site.
4. The shape of thing to come: How virtual communities will evolve: This site has great potential for the future, but site managers must be keenly aware of the competition and the changing needs of customers.
5. Choosing a way in: Ebay quickly found its niche as the largest auction site.
6. Laying the Foundation: We found no indication no apparent indication of this principle in our research otherthan eBay desire to build its customer base.
7. The gardener’s touch, managing organic growth: This company has been able to expand and grow quickly without losing site of the customers’ need for ease of use and the need to see the product (if the vendor allows.)
8. Equipping the community: The site is very functional, easy to use and provides insight into sales history and delivery of the vendors.
9. Rethinking functional management: More information is needed to make this determination.
10. Reshaping markets and organizations: More information is needed to make this determination.

TEAM NIMBUS
REPORT 2: PRINCIPLES

PRINCIPLES

1. The race belongs to the swift: iVillage has a lot of competition and not on the web but any other place women could go to chat and find information that piques their interests. So, with this in mind, iVillage has done very well in establishing itself quickly as the leading web site targeted to women.
2. Reversing Markets: iVillage really doesn’t have a product per se, but, in a sense, the customer holds the power buy being in control of whether they visit the site or not.
3. The new economics of virtual communities: More information is needed to make this determination.
4. The shape of thing to come: How virtual communities will evolve: iVillage is a great example of a virtual community. The site has many topics and channels to draw women in and keep them there. The key to a successful virtual community is its membership and iVillage has more than 960,000 members. A good virtual community must also be able to track its members’ usage and what their needs are. This iVillage does by requiring women who wish to chat online to register as a member and log in every time they wish to chat.
5. Choosing a way in: iVillage’s "way in" was through its distinctive focus.
6. Laying the Foundation: The target market for iVillage is women aged 25 to 49 and with this distinctive focus, the company has been able to lay a solid foundation for itself to become the biggest web site dedicated to women.
7. The gardener’s touch, managing organic growth.: iVillage is growing but all the while isn’t being over managed, which is key to the site retaining its "sense of community"
8. Equipping the community: The site is well-maintained and user friendly.
9. Rethinking functional management: More information is needed to make this determination.
10. Reshaping markets and organizations: iVillage is forming strategic alliances with Ford (which will help design web pages that will deal with automobile-buying tips for women), ZDNet (which will provide technology-driven content) and other big players in the market to help the company grow.