Big Sky Network

No, not the ability to do business on the web.  The term “eBusiness” is now redundant.  All businesses are essentially eBusinesses these days.  And it doesn’t even require a website.

IBM  has been the industry leader in eBusiness, and defined the term as the “transformation of a major business process using internet technologies.”   We’ve all seen the commercials where a business puts up a website and proudly proclaim itself an eBusiness.  Er, not really.  Simply putting up a website enhances your marketing, but it doesn’t transform your company into an eBusiness. 

True eBusinesses use the internet to make their business work better. For instance, credit card processing.  Remember those carbonless paper slips, hand swipe machines and trips to the bank to submit all of the receipts?  Now you swipe your customer’s card in a terminal and the information is sent via your internet connection to your credit card processor.  That’s a major transformation of a business process.  If you are doing this, you are an eBusiness.  Even if you don’t have a website.

It’s not the website that makes an eBusiness.  It’s using internet technology to make your company work better.  And chances are the software that runs your daily operations sends information to suppliers or customers via the internet, which makes every business an “eBusiness.”