The business community in the past decade has been characterised by debate over the value or effectiveness of e‑Commerce and how this type of technology needs to be implemented. During this period the business world has witnessed many examples of failures of Internet based business. There is little doubt that the high failure rate in Dot.Coms had much to do with misconceptions regarding the ease with which e‑Commerce could be implemented. Unrealistic expectations caused tried and tested business rules to be abandoned as hyperbole over took sound business sense. Although it is clear today that the Internet and the Web can facilitate business processes to add value to organisations, this technology has to be managed with considerable care. This paper reports on a case study conducted in kalahari.net, a well known South African e‑Tailing business. This case study highlights several valuable lessons to do with the evaluation of an e‑Commerce investment and how to ensure its success. Specifically the case study closely examines aspects of kalahari.net's IS management policy, and identifies a set of preliminary e‑Commerce success dimensions.

This article considers the possibility of a link between organisational performance and information technology (IT) investment intensity in SME organisations practising e‑Commerce for the period 20012002. The answers to the research questions note that in top performing organisations; (i) IT costs as proportions of operating costs were higher; (ii) IT costs as a proportion of turnover was lower, than in weak performing organisations; and (iii) that a positive correlation exists between the Computerisation Index (CI) and the Operating Costs ratio. The investigation also reveals that Chief Executive Officers (CEO)'s expect additional output while planning e‑Commerce operations and keeping IT budgets constant. Evidence is presented that company performance is linked to the level of IT investment intensity in the sample of organisations investigated, even though more output was expected from the IT department.

With the continued growing investment in WWW technologies by e‑Commerce businesses the measurement of Information Systems (IS) effectiveness in this business sector has become increasingly important over the last decade. As business users, especially in the SME sector, have become reliant on outsourced IS service providers for a wide range of services, the quality of service rendered by the latter is an important issue which impacts on IS effectiveness. Researchers have since the 1990s recognised the importance of service quality as a measure of IS performance. The literature suggests that IS service delivery to e‑Commerce businesses needs to be evaluated differently to that of traditional brick‑and‑mortar businesses. There is however a paucity of research regarding IS evaluation in e‑Commerce environments, including that of the application of service quality principles. It is thus difficult for managers of IS service providers in this context to develop a complete picture of the effectiveness of the IS they deliver. This paper reports on a study which investigated whether IS service quality criteria and dimensions applied in large brick‑ and‑mortar organisations, are also applicable to SME e‑Commerce businesses in the tourism sector in South Africa. In pursuit of this objective an IS‑adapted SERVQUAL instrument was tested in an e‑Commerce SME environment. The research results indicate that, although SERVQUAL principles are applicable to the e‑Commerce SME context, the service quality dimensionality is different. The research derived four new dimensions for service quality expectations of e‑ Commerce SMEs viz., Credibility, Expertise, Availability and Supportiveness. A fifth dimension is the Tangibles dimension, which is retained from SERVQUAL. Furthermore the results indicate that the Credibility dimension was the most important dimension in this research context, while the Tangibles dimension was the least important.

Since the advent of the Internet, B2C e‑Commerce has grown substantially across the globe. Whilst much research has examined factors influencing adoption of e‑commerce, not as many studies have investigated the post‑ adoption phenomenon of success. Those studies that have investigated IS success and the extensions required to accommodate e‑commerce have mainly been conceptual. Few have attempted to test and validate the models empirically. The purpose of this study was to fill this gap. By drawing from the technology acceptance model, expectation‑confirmation theory and IS success theory, a revised conceptual model was derived. The model and relationships were tested and validated using data gathered from 166 online consumers in South Africa. 7 interrelated dimensions of B2C e‑commerce success were confirmed, namely service quality, system quality, information quality, trust, perceived usefulness, user satisfaction and continuance intentions. Direct relationships between dimensions were identified. These showed that user intentions to continue using an online retail site are directly influenced by perceived usefulness, user satisfaction and system quality. User satisfaction is directly influenced by service quality and perceived usefulness, whilst perceived usefulness is directly influenced by trust and information quality. Trust in the online retailer is directly influenced by service quality and system quality. The implications of these and other findings are discussed.

E‑Commerce is a global trend and can be a viable source of economic reform in a nation. Nigeria, a third world country is leaving no stone unturned to make life easier and more comfortable in this electronic age. Though developed countries are on the verge of conducting e‑commerce securely and comfortably, Nigeria is absorbing techniques involved either by espionage, knowledge transfer or other means. Hence, the need for ensuring effectiveness, awareness among inhabitants, and security of resources involved must be taken into account. This paper highlights different levels of e‑commerce participation among banks, service providers and the public in Nigeria. A business‑inclined metropolitan suburb of Lagos was used as a case study to evaluate citizenry involvement and opinions. Recommendations on the most suitable payment method (s) for citizenry was made based on their opinions.

The Internet and its World Wide Web service have reshaped the promotion of cultural and tourism products. Well designed and user adaptable e‑commerce websites improve business promotion as they attract more e‑visitors. Multilingualism, dynamic and thus frequently updated content, email communication and searching capabilities are crucial options of websites. In this paper we empirically build an evaluation methodology to assess the technologies and services of Greek e‑tourism and e‑cultural websites. The primary focus of our work is to evaluate the technical capability of tourism and cultural websites and to realize the available options offered to users. A number of tourism e‑commerce websites and e‑museums were randomly selected and their content and technologies were analyzed based on the methodology proposed. The results of this statistical examination are analyzed and discussed. The main conclusion is that although the reviewed websites are rich in multimedia content they need to support customers more efficiently by offering more services or by refining the offered e‑services.

A number of regional Internet electronic marketplaces (REMs) have failed or are floundering, partly due to the lack of proper evaluation of their costs and benefits. This paper uses a conceptual REM Success Model to examine the costs and benefits of a REM in Western Australia. The model has been derived from an extension to the Updated DeLone & McClean IS Success Model. The findings from the case study indicate that the REM Success Model, which includes cognisance of SME‑profile and motivation of the market maker, allows up‑front identification of the costs and benefits to all stakeholders.

This paper presents the process of developing an evaluation instrument specifically for the evaluation of e‑Commerce Web sites from the first‑time buyer's viewpoint. The development process is based on theoretical discussions of the Web evaluation and Web user satisfaction literature. A draft evaluation instrument was developed. To enhance its reliability and validity, several iterative trials on e‑Commerce Web sites were conducted. Some modifications were made to the instrument. The final version is capable of evaluating e‑ Commerce Web sites effectively. The instrument provides implications to both Web evaluation practitioners and academics.