Assignment 2 Section 2

Type of Site
smh.com.au and nzherald.co.nz are both media reporting websites. They represent online versions of newspapers but with a wider variety of reporting mediums. These include Text articles, Video, sound clips to name but a few. We will discuss the features further on in this report.

Competition
Competition for these newspapers comes from a variety of sources. Their main source of competition comes from other news reporting websites that report on the similar content to them and are aimed at the same target audience. e.g. NZHerald would be competing with other news agencies reporting national and international news to New Zealanders.

They primarily compete for readership within the online population market within New Zealand and Sydney respectively.

Company Profile
NZHerald is based in Auckland and Owned by APN News & Media. The website was originally called Herald Online and was established in 1998. Currently, it attracts approximately over 2.1 million users per month and has the largest readership in New Zealand.

Wikipedia claims that political alignment of the Herald is generally "editorially centre-left on international geopolitics, diplomacy, and military matters" & "On domestic matters, editorial opinion is centre-right, usually supporting socially conservative values and self-reliance over social welfare, government fiscal restraint, and reducing the government's role in the New Zealand economy". Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Zealand_Herald#cite_note-UB_info-7.

SMH is linked to the Sydney Morning Herald which is fairfax based. Website was launched in 1995 and known to be a politically conservative newspaper. Fairfax media also own a host of other online interests and newspapers.

User Friendliness
Here are my thoughts and first impressions from viewing the site and comparing the two

New Zealand Herald	Sydney Morning Herald
A large banner add is the first thing that you see when you visit the site. Weather, time, date etc are all missing from the top section of the page and scrolling is need to view them. This I presume is to increase the views of the adds at the cost of user friendliness.	The site and its content is right at the top of the page. A wealth of information is located at the top including links, weather, time, date all make for easy viewing and navigation.
Adds tend to stand out a on the website as they are situated in key areas and dont fully integrate into the site.	Adds are less obstrusive.
In terms of layout, most article snippets are located on the main section (left and Middle) and there is a "toolbar" or column with various tools and navigation links to choose from. There does not seem to be any clear layout style or rules which makes navigation and understanding whats on the front page difficult.	Tends to have a very similar layout to NZHerald
The Choice of colour scheme makes articles easily read	Colour Scheme makes reading easy and is similar to NZHerald's colour scheme.

Commercial Opportunities
Generally online newspapers earn a lot of their revenue through the sale of advertising space.  Pricing for advertising spaces vary depend on placement on a page, size, and on which page it is put. Prominant front page adverts are extremely expensive in comparison, and are usually charged for on a 'daily' or 'weekly' basis. With online news there is no physical newspaper to sell so revenue through physical newspaper sales is not possible.

Due to the ability to link to many other owned, associated or relevant sites opens up many other commercial opportunities. Often advertisers having a special promotion or giveaway of products will at the same time as advertising, have a link to the promotional products homepage. This is also another way of generating income for the the news agent and the advertising company. The sheer exposure that comes with having something on a major news site alone is definately worth while and some of the benefits arising form it are not necessarily financial benefits, such as free advertising, perceived to be better than another company because it is advertised on a news site. Free advertising could include word of mouth or a link being emailed to a readers friend.

Often a major website like NZHerald or Sydney Morning Herald will add / trial new content such as blogs or special columns on their site. If the trial model is successful, the media company may re-launch it on its on website thereby increasing the revenue potential and commercial opportunities for the media company involved.

Advertising
"With more than 82% of New Zealanders using the internet daily, online advertising is an essential part of the marketing mix. It is fast, efficient and cost effective". (NZHerald, 2010). Retrieved from http://advertise.nzherald.co.nz/advertise.php

Fairfax media advertising offers the prospective advertiser the opportunity to advertise with almost any of their subsidiaries websites or newspapers, depending on what the target audience is and what type of advertising the business wants. Some of the websites available for advertising on include Drive.com.au (Cars), Domain.com.au (Property), mycareer.com.au (Jobs). Fairfax media's online newspapers SMH, The Age, Illawarra Mercury, Warrnambool Standard, Fairfax Community Newspapers.

Numerous contact details are provided and are easily accessible. Cost and publication details are provided when you place an add request.

NZ Herald provides a very extensive detailing of their advertising opportunities as well as guidelines for creating content. Their lineup of advertising opportunities is similar to that of Fairfax only difference is that they also offer magazines as well. Once again pricing is provided upon add request or inquiry.

As mentioned above they provide extensive guidelines and specifications for their advertising content which can be viewed at http://advertise.nzherald.co.nz/technical-specifications.php

Blogs and RSS

Sydney Morning Herald:
RSS feeds are lost amongst a whole bunch of links at the bottom of the page, the average user would never ever find it! Clearly there is little push with this type of functionality.

Even worse once I followed the link I could not get anything to load in my browser so that effectively ends that.

Blogs feature prominently on the SMH site. Once entering into a news sub section there is a tiled section with various blog names and their authors. From my perspective they seem to be an important part of this site. The author personalities shine through in these blogs and create a different kind of content that adds another layer of content and interest in each section. In sections like technology where a reporter may not necessarily have enough knowledge they have bloggers providing rich quality content.

NZ Herald:
RSS feed buttons are clearly displayed at the bottom of the page where they are normally found. Makes selecting, setting up of this type of content easy. Instructions are clear and easy to read. RSS feeds can be found for all news sections. Links are displayed that tell you exactly what RSS is which is good.

Upon inspection of the nzherald site I can find no mention to blogger content or similar, however upon further inspection with their "Integrated Opportunities Page" on their advertising page I discovered that they do offer paid services in relation to blogs, quoted from their site:

"We can work with you to create and develop commentary on a particular subject, news comment or personal diary to aid in brand development or help with the seeding of a communication platform in the users’ minds. Key to the execution is the ability to leave comments and interact with the editorial." (NZHerald, 2010). Retrieved from http://advertise.nzherald.co.nz/integrated-opportunities.php

Target Market
Both sites target similar readership market. Late teens right up to 65+. A wide range of content ensures that there is something for everyone when coming to this site. They provide news content, product reviews, classifieds, blogs(SMH) etc which all appeal to a wide range of readers. However due the content being largely news and current events under 35 age group is going to be less interested. So the 35+ will be the bulk of the user base.
"What’s more, with nzherald.co.nz, you can reach a highly affluent, educated and savvy audience". (NZHerald, 2010). Retrieved from http://advertise.nzherald.co.nz/advertise.php

Estimated readership/hits daily
Information provided by Alexa - The web information company, http://www.alexa.com

NZ Herald	Sydney Morning Herald
Estimated Monthly Visits - 5 255 200	Estimated Monthly Visits - 16 420 000
Worldwide Rank - 2 960	Worldwide Rank - 738
New Zealand Rank - 9	Australia Rank - 14
Websites Linking to It - 9 266	Websites Linking to It - 22 572

Search Engine Ranking
New Zealand Herald:
URL - http://www.nzherald.co.nz
Keyword - nz news

Google - #1

Yahoo - #1

Msn - not in top 100

Sydney Morning Herald:
URL - http://www.smh.com.au
Keyword - australia news

Google - #7

Yahoo - #7

MSN - not in top 100

Social Networking

New Zealand herald has a link at the bottom of their page that allows you to view and if you wish follow them on Twitter. All news articles have the ability to be posted onto all major social networking sites. Twitter show all the major headline updates so that they may be viewed easily.

Sydney Morning Herald, there appeared to be no obvious way of viewing or visiting their Facebook or twitter pages or any of their social networking pages from the main page. However just like NZHerald you are able to comment on various articles on Twitter or share them via Facebook.

Sample User Testing

Sample user testing was carried out on both websites by me. Results are listed below:

New Zealand Herald:

• White and blue interface makes text, graphics, headings easy to read. Neutral colours.
  

• Main page seems very cluttered which detracts from your first impressions upon entering the site. Also makes viewing and finding the required information difficult.

• Some buttons and functionality are either in out of the way places or plonked right in the middle of a whole bunch of other links and get lost.

• Banner ad at the very top of the page makes the heading and title area look unusual and out of place. Heading seems squashed or made to fit in the spare space.

• There appears to be simply too much text confronting the user on any one page. This makes the layout feel cluttered and confusing.

• Sheer size of the main page makes reading and scrolling it a pain.
  

Sydney Morning Herald:

• Again white and blue colour scheme enables easy reading of text, graphics, heading. Neutral colours.

• Main page has a much clearer layout structure with less text and more headings. Navigation and viewing are made easier.

• A lot of the functionality buttons are located at the top, good move!

• Ads are situated in less obtrusive places so makes view of content better for the average user.

• Bulk text is kept down on the main page making skimming the page possible.

• Again the sheer size of the main page is a problem.

Channel Conflict/Subsidy

There does not appear to be any significant dis-intermediation within the two websites.

NZ Herald appear to have a link to NZH Shopping that I found whilst browsing through articles. They sell a variety of manufacturers products including Apple, Baxter, Scanpan etc.

Sydney Morning Herald appears to have a column when you scroll down the page that lets you compare pricing on a variety of products and services that interest you. SMH appear to focus more on advertising existing company products and services using their price comparisons rather than selling products straight from manufacturers and cutting out the middle man.

References:

NZ Herald: New Zealand's Latest News. (May 2010). Retrieved from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/

Sydney Morning Herald: Business & World News Australia. (May 2010). Retrieved from http://www.smh.com.au

NZ Herald: Advertising with APN. (May 2010). Retrieved from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/advertising/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501097&objectid=10394028

NZ Herald: Premium audience. Innovative advertising solutions. (May 2010). Retrieved from http://advertise.nzherald.co.nz/

Site Report Card: Search Engine Ranking Tool. (May 2010) Retrieved from http://www.sitereportcard.com

Wikipedia: Usability Testing. (May 2010). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usability_testing

Alexa: Web Information Company, Site Rankings. (May 2010) Retrieved from http://www.alexa.com

 

Assignment 2 Section 1

E-Commerce Assignment 2: Section 1

Chosen E-Commerce:

For this particular assignment the topic I have chosen to cover is e-banking in all its forms. e-banking is an extension of traditional banking services provided to enhance customers experience.

Examples of E-Banking:

Two examples of organisations that are involved in this type of e-commerce are as follows:

• The National Bank

• Kiwi Bank
  

How the changes influenced by e-commerce have changed the business model/s for this sector?

e-commerce has significantly changed the way in which traditional banks do business and also changed their business model.

Branch-Based Banking Model vs Online-Based Banking Model

Since the rapid establishment of Technology, The Internet and Perceptions the banks have both taken advantage of the changes and also been forced to evolve. Where once the physical bank was the cornerstone of the business environment this has changed to a great degree. We now see a push for banking to be performed online, bricks & mortar banks as well as staff have been downscaled in favor of electronic banking.

We are now seeing the online banking shifting not just as an extension of existing banking services but the core services of a lot of banks.

In the past most customers were very familiar with their local bank and its manager. They would regularly venture in to perform all manner of their banking tasks. But the average customer at present would be hard pressed to even tell you who works in their local bank. Younger generation would be completely unfamiliar with these procedures in favor of online banking, electronic bill payment, depositing money online.

Two Business Models that have evolved with the use of e-commerce are detailed below:

Electronic Bill Payment

All bill payments can be made online and there has been a shift by both banks and companies to move to this type of payment. Most companies now allow you to make payments online and using your banks bill payment service you can search for the required company and their account information to make payment with. This has made bill payment much easier and accessible to everyone. As this new business model evolves and grows it has had an impact on other areas.

The use of the traditional Cheque for payment has greatly declined (Insert Figures Here). An easier and better way is slowly but surely superseding it.

"View your bill online", "Online Bill Payment", "Electronic Bill to your Inbox" all of these services have had a combined effect on another seperate but integral part of banking and that is Snail Mail. Traditional mail has seen a great decline in use as electronic services become more widespread, user friendly and adoption increases.

"Despite a slow start, on-line banking, insurance and financial services are here to stay. In some cases, they are forcing others to change the way they operate" (Mike Cunningham, 2002, p53)

Mobile Banking:

As mobile devices become more than just telephones we now have mobile banking. Now you no longer have to be either be at a computer or in a branch to perform all of your banking needs. With the prominance of such devices like the iPhone using this as a banking tool has been a natural progression now that surfing the web from anywhere is possible. Some of the services that are offered using mobile banking are as follows:

• Mini Statements

• Account Activity Alerts

• Balance Checks

• Money Transfers

• Various other loan, credit statements
  

E-Banking World-Wide

World-Wide there are multiple forms of E-Banking taking place. You see the traditional banks who have evolved into offering online banking as an extension to their existing banking services and slowly as adoption takes place they have become core banking services. Examples of these are Bank of America, Barclays UK where the e-banking services have slowly evolved over time.

You will also see Online-Only Banks that have come to pass solely because of the online environment and the increasing need for banking flexibility and have no bricks and mortar branches for customers. One example of this type of bank would be Wells Fargo (https://www.wellsfargo.com) in United States of America. Other traditional banks are offering online accounts that are the same service as the online only banks where your account is managed solely online and assistance is provided either by email or over the phone.

Typically online only banks or online only accounts offer cheaper bank fees and higher interest rates. This is provided because of the reduced overhead costs associated with such an account because of there being no need for branch based services and all of the account services are handled online.

E-Banking in New Zealand

E-Banking in New Zealand in the majority of cases are traditional banks with online services. There is only one bank offering online only services and that bank is RaboPlus bank. However they do not provide full online banking services but rather Savings and Investment schemes and state themselves that they prefer to be (etc al "Your Significant Other Bank" - http://www.raboplus.co.nz/about-raboplus/default.aspx, 2010).

It seems that in New Zealand we are a step behind in terms of online banking offerings but on par with other services like mobile banking, online bill payment etc.

Below is a graph which show the proportion of customers for each bank who use online banking as of 2008. Image retrieved from http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU0802/S00307.htm

Comparison between between NZ and Global E-Banking:

Whilst there are minor differences between offerings Nationally and Globally the main difference is the scale variety of online services. Global online banking customers see a wider variety of online banking features at cheaper rates. This is largely due to the services having been offered for a greater period of time which in turn has given them a longer period of time to evolve. For example some American banks catalog everything you purchase using your cards Eftpos / Credit Card from the very first time you use it and automatically categorize it depending on the type of product that it is. When you log in and view your purchases you can see exactly what you have spent your money on and where. e.g. What percentage of your spending goes on groceries.

There also seem to be some evidence that New Zealand banks have been slower to react to the evolving business environment. As an example National Bank still use two factor authentication when logging into their site whilst Kiwibank has a scheme called Keepsafe that asks you a answers to preset questions each time you log in. Thus adding a third layer of authentication when logging in.

"There has to be an executive sponsor from the top that has the E-business religion," says National Semiconductor's Phil Gibson. "If that person isn't up there saying that the Web is one of the most important things in our business today, you're simply not going to move fast enough." (as cited by Mike Cunningham, 2002)

References:

Mike Cunningham. (2002). Smart Things To Know About E-Business. Capstone Publishing Ltd, Oxford, United Kingdom

Jonathan Groucutt & Paul Griseri. (2004). Mastering e-Business. Palgrave MacMillan, New York, United States

Robert DeYoung. (May, 2005). The Performance of Internet‐Based Business Models: Evidence from the Banking Industry. Retrieved from http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/429648

University Newcastle. (Sep, 2002). Internet banking creates biggest shake-up in 400 years. Retrieved from http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=45514&CultureCode=en

Kiplinger's Personnel Finance Magazine. (July, 2005). The top 10 online banks. Retrieved from http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Banking/BetterBanking/TheTop10OnlineBanks.aspx

RaboPlus Website - http://www.raboplus.co.nz/about-raboplus/default.aspx

John Crawley. (Feb, 2010). U.S Postal service seek 30,000 job cuts via buyouts. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE57O6A920090826

Anick Jesdanun. (Feb, 2008). Postal agencies respond to mail decline. Retrieved from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22992125/ns/technology_and_science-tech_and_gadgets//

Press Release, The Nielson Company. (Feb, 2008). Two-thirds of online kiwis use Internet banking. Retrieved from http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU0802/S00307.htm

Statistics New Zealand. (April, 2009). Business Operations Survey: 2008. Retrieved from http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/businesses/business_growth_and_innovation/BusinessOperationsSurvey_HOTP08/Commentary.aspx

Internet Banking News. (April 2010). E-banking (Online Banking) and it's role in today's society. Retrieved from http://onlinebanking.getsnews.com/e-banking-online-banking-and-its-role-in-todays-society

Group Approach & Member Contributions

Due to the fact that I am and e-learner and have been learning from home I chose with this assignment to perform it alone. This was due to my schedule and not being able to attend class often. So I have been the sole contributer to 100% of the tasks.

The approach that I have taken with this assignment is careful research of my chosen topic and designated websites. The most important factor for me was getting my personal opinion across within my assignment and then having evidence to back up my viewpoint. I wanted to steer away from using another's views and making them my own, this did not seem to be what the assignment was all about.