Webcology: Seasons of Life

There are three standard stages websites go through when uploaded onto the Internet. These are Presence, Interaction, and Transaction. These are like a seasonal cycle a website goes through.

Presence
This is the stage at which a website is first introduced onto the Internet. At most, the idea is to make it known only. More effort is invested in retaining web consumers. The enterprise goes all the way to give freebies, infotainment and attractive webverts. Retention and Hit rate are very important at this stage. Many websites take up an informative behaviour, news being the most popular.

It is not advisable to jump this stage, as this may cause premature growth, or future abortion. On the other hand, it is important to plan and have the second stage on standby. A good example of these scenarios is Amazon.com. When it was launched, Amazon.com could interact and transact and the same time. Their Retention and Hit rates were abnormally high that they had to shutdown for a while.

Overwhelming success is usually a result of poor planning, or premature exposure. When launching a website, it is advisable to keep track of Retention and Hit rates. These are good indicators, which determine when you should go on to the next stage.

Interaction
This is the stage at which a website begins to talk to its consumers, responding to their requests. This is done using tools like Feedback forms, and many others. In this stage, web consumers are very demanding in that they know that when you have given them a platform for interaction, they will do so – INTERACT. Feedback forms are a simple way to interact with web consumers yet underutilised. Often time’s enterprises do not reply or attend to web consumer requests. It is important that once in this stage, an enterprise can use eGroups; an interactive way to consolidating their presence.


Transaction
This is the stage at which a website has the ability to facilitate a transaction, between the consumer, and its owner (the enterprise). Once a website is past Interaction, the noble thing to do is transaction processing. It is advisable to start offering eCommerce facilities.

eCommerce in regards to Transaction Processing can be simplified into three levels.
 Enquiry Processing – At this level, the website only gives web consumers the ability to find out if the product or service they require is available.
 Order Processing – At this level, the website gives web consumers the ability send requests of enquiries, receiving confirmation and invoicing documents.
 Payment Processing – At this level, the website gives web consumers the ability to use their banking details to pay for invoices generated – a complete transaction.

Each of these levels of Transaction Processing has different system requirements, meaning that the website behaves differently and is structured differently.

All-In-One
There are yet many websites that ignore the stages and offer all at once. In a normal circumstance, this is not advisable, especially in our part of global commerce. The major cost on a website is the Transaction Processing aspects. Investing in such a tool may be irrelevant to an enterprise, which has barely retained a good number of web consumers. This is over capitalisation. The money spent in a Transaction Processing system could have been used to consolidate the enterprise’s Presence or Interaction.

Webcology: Types of Websites

Websites are different, derived from their purpose. There are informative, Transactional, Referral, Behavioural, and Mixed.

Informative Websites
These are websites whose sole purpose is to provide information, whether commercial or academic. Websites that offer information for Commercial purposes usually sell their information. These websites require you to join a community, having paid a subscription. Most of these use the credit processing systems available, such as VISA and MasterCard. Websites that offer information for Academic use usually give out information for free. These include Public Databases, Archives, Community Institutions (e.g. Churches), and Government Departments, just to name a few.

I came across an information website the other day, when I was looking for a template for a Shareholders Agreement. I visited the LawDepot.com website, which contains templates of legal documents. This website helps you build your desired Agreement. After filling in the template, the results will come out in another page, summarised. A bill will be displayed on that page, requiring you to pay for the template before it is emailed to you. Such websites are available topics like Shopping (Discounted), Auctioning, Education (Certification/Examination), and Consultancy, just to name a few.

Transactional Websites
These are websites whose sole purpose is to facilitate a transaction, between Businesses and Consumers, or Businesses and Businesses, or Consumers and Consumers, or with Public Bodies. The transactional aspect of the Internet is usually plugged into many websites, whose purpose may not be solely transactions. The transaction aspect is usually a background or conclusion of what the web consumer would have been offered. For example the Law Depot website first offers you information, and then bills you for it.

There are however, websites such as Supermarkets, and other Shop stores, who have shopping baskets on every page, enabling the web consumer to add items to their basket and check the balance, as they go.

Referral Websites
They are also called Advisory Websites. Their sole purpose is to link a consumer to the closest possible desired haven – whether product or service. The difference between an Informative website and a referral website is the commercial aspects. Most referral websites charge a commission for each reference, as opposed to informative websites which are usually free of charge.

The best example of such a website is an auction website. The most popular is eBay.com, which, in simple terms, refers the Seller to the Buyer, for a fee. The eBay.com phenomenon has revolutionised commodity broking in Europe. Whoever has an item to sell, posts it on eBay.com. eBay.com then finds a buy, who pays for the item. eBay.com then pays the seller, retaining a commission.

Other referral websites include Vehicles, Paintings, Crafts, Holiday Packages, and Insurance just to name a few.

Behavioural Websites
These are websites that change their behaviour (appearance, theme, subject, purpose), in accordance with a specified purpose, for example, just as a television channel. I believe this is a type of website that has not been explored. Imagine your website having the ability to completely change automatically just as a television channel. Glimpses of this type of website are seen in places like Microsoft’s ABC television, and AOL’s quest for MTV. These websites are used only to watch, not interact. Scale this thought to organisational level, and visualise how you can apply this. For example, a Restaurant can have their website change each day of the week, according to the Day’s Special. Lift this up to Hotel level, just to name a few.

Technically it is possible. Developers know what I mean here. It is merely a Time Manipulation issue. This does not change the Designer’s core business except adding more pages to the website. The enterprise, on the other hand has to come up with different ideas for this. Glimpses of behavioural websites at present also include interactive websites, which ask consumers to choose language and other things, and respond accordingly.

I am speaking of the future here. Coming is a time when websites can pick your computer logon identity restrictions, and customise its website to suite your profile, furthermore, use your profile for transactions, regardless of operating system – Windows, Linux, UNIX, or MAC OS.


Mixed Websites
There are many websites having more than one behaviour, being all or a combination of these – Informative, Transactional, Referral, and Behavioural. The transactional aspect often dominates in the mixtures, being the ultimate goal of enterprises who build websites – eCommerce as it is called.