We have become increasingly reliant on technology that everything we do would involve technology – studying has become amazingly convenient (imagine a world without computers and photocopying machines), and communications and social networking has revolutionized greatly making work a lot easier and more convenient than ever before. Indeed, the way we do business has greatly evolved with technology.
The fast exchange of information through technological innovations in communications and connectivity, has seemingly made the world smaller and smaller – we feel more connected, we can do more things, faster, and more efficiently. Now, we look back to how technology, particularly information technology, has changed the way we do business and how it’s likely to shape the future of the world of commerce.
Marketing Shifts: From Print to Digital Marketing
Marketing – the fuel that drives sales to a business – greatly evolved with technology through time. Formerly, entrepreneurs rely on print ads, and then, televised advertisements (which are expensive, by the way).
Many small businesses may not be able to afford televised or radio-broadcast advertisement. But this changes when the Internet and the World Wide Web was introduced. From print, television, radio-broadcast marketing, we’ve found new ways to reach out to our markets – online marketing. In many ways, online marketing can be more valuable to the small business than a perfect spot on primetime television.
With the introduction of search engines like Google, Yahoo, AOL, and Bing, marketing approaches have also shifted attention to targeting visibility in these search-engines. Thus, the birth of search-engine marketing (SEM), search-engine optimisation (SEO), social media marketing (SMM), email marketing, side-by-side with content marketing.
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Greater Levels of Opportunity
Information technology not only enables businesses to reach out to its customers. It also helps businesses with their business-to-business transactions. Prior to the internet and the worldwide web, entrepreneurs used to spend days searching for distributors and suppliers. Now, it can be done in an hour or two with just a few clicks and keyword search on search-engines like Google.
This consequently increases product availability and dramatically reduces operational costs of a brick-and-mortar store.
Greater Efficiency, Greater Productivity
Imagine if we are to do our bookkeeping, and data management the old-fashioned, imagine the stack of papers, and drawers we have to deal with! Good thing, we can store files on a computer, or in the Cloud. Bookkeeping can be done with the help of personal computers, too. Indeed, with a personal computer, we can do a lot of things.
Collaboration Made Easy
There is a continuing effort among developers to create the perfect Internet-based platform for various organizations as more and more people have experienced the convenience and efficiency of online business practices.
The Cloud has proven to be a potent efficiency-fix and productivity booster. The Cloud and other enhancements like it increases productivity as employees and other workers can work virtually from anywhere.
Read: 19 Tools to Boost Your Productivity
Internet Business: A New Way of Doing Business
e-Commerce sites are ubiquitous. They sell products online, even without a physical store like the Amazon (although it opened its first physical store recently in Seattle), while selling goods locally at the same time. Facebook is also another example of a platform that caters to online businesses.
Today businesses no longer have to rely on walk-in customers thanks to online methods. It’s like having a second store without the overhead costs.
Blurring the Line Between Professional and Private Lives
There is a world-view positing that technology is blurring the line between the professional and the private life. This is due to increasingly connectivity aided by wireless internet, smartphones, laptops, and other digital devices that have made it easy to work virtually from anywhere (even from the beach).
Blurring National Boundaries and Cultures
Globalization benefits from information technology a lot. Or, is it safe to say that information technology made it even more easier for the states of the world to successfully launch the new paradigm of international trade and international relations – globalisation? Well, as far as the world of business is concerned, information technology played a significant role.
Globalized Business Operations
Information technology has made global collaboration possible. Today businesses realise it is easier to outsource some of their needs from the outside of their firm, even halfway across the world.
We came to know outsourcing – the practice of hiring employees who work outside the company or remotely — and even halfway across the world. Today we outsource duties such as computer programming and telephone customer service. Tedious in-house business operations such as that in human resource – sourcing and recruiting candidates, are also outsourced. We call this recruitment process outsourcing (RPO). From a business perspective, it seems like the wisest route, saving companies between 30 and 70 percent.
Professional Social Networking
Imagine professional network building in the 19th century. I bet it would take a heroic deal of legwork, and phone calls to build one. However, today, we can meet and interact on sites such as LinkedIn. We know how important a professional network is in terms of meeting our business goals. And, information technology made it easier for us. And is continuously innovating to make connectivity even more convenient.
Needless to say, the impact of information technology to the way we do business is behemoth and significant. Information technology continuously evolves as new innovations are being pursued endlessly; the way we do business will forever evolve, and the good news is, it’s towards the better.
Looking for information technology professionals to help you achieve your business goals? Contact Sysgen today, and let us do great things together.