ITE: Chapter 12: Digital transformation
customer service representatives
Despite the self-service nature of e-commerce, customers still want an accessible point of contact with retailers to handle complaints, assist with orders, or provide additional information. Phone- and chat-based representatives provide personalized interactions with customers. These employees might specialize in particular services, such as order processing or technical support, or they might offer more generalized support to address whatever concern the customer raises. The retailer relies heavily on high-quality customer support to earn positive ratings and reviews from customers.
resource pooling
Hardware that supports a cloud service is shared between all of that service's customers or users. A single server might run services for three or four different cloud subscribers at one time, or a single customer's database might be running on three different servers at the same time. In most cases, a cloud customer does not know where their resources are hosted geographically, only how to access those resources through the Internet.
dataset
Incoming information provided to an AI system.
online marketplace
Instead of building their own website, many retailers choose to join an online marketplace. In many cases, the online marketplace doesn't sell its own inventory at all but provides a virtual meeting place for buyers and sellers. Etsy, eBay, and Amazon are all online marketplaces.
market research analysts and marketing specialists
Not all e-commerce jobs are directly related to warehouse or distribution functions. Trained market analysts and specialists work to further evolve e-commerce marketing techniques. E-commerce opens expanded market opportunities that are no longer limited by geographical proximity.
Consumer-to-consumer (C2C)
Occurs when one consumer sells directly to another
Workday
best known for its ERP, HR, and other business solutions
Machine Learning (ML)
A branch of AI that uses statistics to help machines learn from data, identify patterns, and make decisions to progressively improve their performance without much human intervention.
rapid elasticity
A cloud resource can be scaled up or down on demand, even automatically. For example, if a website is suddenly receiving a lot of extra traffic due to a successful advertising campaign, the website's owner can add more hardware resources to the web server or add more web servers to help host the website traffic. The extra resources can be scaled down as soon as the traffic subsides.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
A collection of computer services that help companies customize their interactions with customers.
smart devices
A device that can communicate, locate, and predict; part of the Internet of Things (IoT).
chatbot
A feature on a website or app that uses AI technology to provide text-based support and communication services.
natural language processing (nlp)
A form of data input in which computers interpret and digitize spoken words or commands.
wake word
A key word that alerts an AI-powered personal assistant to record and interpret a spoken command.
omnichannel
A marketing strategy that relies on multiple types of contact per customer, such as targeted ads on social media, paid results on search engines, or contacts by email or phone.
Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs)
A mesh network of signals that apply multiple layers of processing to perform deep learning processes similarly to how the human brain functions.
online storefront
A retailer can create their own website or smartphone app for buying and selling products or services. The website or app includes a shopping cart and can receive payments of some kind. These online storefronts commonly incorporate existing e-commerce software (usually a PaaS offering, not SaaS) to provide the transaction processing components of the website instead of building these components from scratch. For example, Adobe-owned Magento is a free and very popular e-commerce solution incorporated into successful websites owned by companies such as Land Rover, Nike, Ford, and Coca-Cola.
Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)
A set of standards that applies to all merchants who use credit card services from any of the major credit card companies, such as Visa, Mastercard, Discover, and American Express.
unique selling proposition (USP)
A statement about how a company and its products are different and better than the competition's.
Turing Test
A test scenario posed by Alan Turing to determine when an AI system has become sufficiently advanced to sound as natural as a human.
supervised learning
A training dataset (such as videos of vehicles) is labeled so the machine learns what the "right" answers are. The machine learns from thousands of examples what a Honda Odyssey looks like, or a Ford Explorer, or a Jeep Wrangler, and how to tell the difference with increasing accuracy. From this practice, the machine can begin to make predictions based on historical data. For example, once a machine knows what patterns of historical behaviors resulted in customers canceling their subscriptions, the machine can then observe ongoing behavior to predict which customers are at risk of canceling.
general and operations managers
A warehouse manager and other management roles help in optimizing work schedules, overseeing operations processes, designing and enforcing policies, and generally supporting the on-site workforce.
PaaS and IaaS providers
Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, IBM Cloud, and China's Alibaba Cloud
Internet of Things (IoT)
An environment where processors are embedded in every product imaginable (things), and these things communicate with one another via the Internet or wireless networks.
e-business
Any kind of business activity conducted over a network of some kind, such as the Internet.
application and web developers
Application and web developers are also seeing dramatic job growth in the e-commerce sector, developing both customer-facing and internal solutions that support e-commerce business processes.
Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
Automatic processes running on servers that input or transfer data, such as transferring customer data from a call center system to a customer relationship management system.
e-commerce
Business transactions that occur over an electronic network such as the Internet.
broad network access
Cloud services are available from anywhere on the Internet and can be configured using almost any kind of device, such as a laptop, tablet, or smartphone.
public cloud
Cloud technology running on hardware used by many organizations.
private cloud
Cloud technology running on hardware used by only a single organization.
on-premises
Computer hardware in a local office or data center.
Business-to-business (B2B)
Consists of businesses providing goods and services to other businesses
unsupervised learning
With this model, the machine looks for patterns and relationships in the training data and then categorizes data according to those patterns. The machine cannot give the categories labels, but it can detect patterns that humans wouldn't necessarily think to look for. For example, unsupervised learning can be used to analyze large datasets of medical information to look for patterns that can indicate cause-and-effect relationships scientists have not yet considered.
Oracle
a pacesetter provider of database management services
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
a type of cloud service that allows customers to configure cloud-based networking infrastructure the way they want, such as routing, servers, operating systems, storage spaces, and security settings. While the customer can't configure the physical hardware that supports the cloud services, the customer does have much deeper control on how the cloud infrastructure is configured than with other cloud models; typically requires a lot more technical expertise than most other types of cloud services.
delivery and truck drivers
as consumers increasingly rely on e-commerce, delivery services must provide a more robust workforce to meet the rising demand. Some of the largest distributors or retailers are even developing their own delivery services, such as Amazon's last-mile delivery service and the emerging drone delivery technologies being explored by many retailers (see Figure 12-11).
shipping, receiving, and traffic clerks
distribution and fulfillment warehouses often require massive numbers of employees to process orders nearly 24 hours a day... help track shipments both into and out of the warehouse, checking for accuracy and ensuring timeliness.
Business-to-consumer (B2C)
involves the sale of goods and services to the general public
social media
n the past, social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter provided an opportunity for sellers to showcase their products or advertise their websites, with the actual sales transactions completed in some other way (through an e-commerce website or even in person). Today, many social media platforms, such as Facebook's Marketplace shown in Figure 12-9, include marketplace features that allow buyers and sellers to complete transactions directly within the social media site.
SAP
offers business software, including its popular enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
provides a platform from which cloud customers can run their own applications without having to manage underlying servers. For example, a company can run a website on a cloud service that does not require configuration of a Windows web server. This is especially helpful with complex websites, such as those that allow for buying and selling online.
Salesforce
provides customer relationship management (CRM) services to help companies customize their interactions with customers
freight, stock, and material movers
these workers help move large volumes of inventory as shipments arrive at or leave loading docks at the warehouse and as pallets of inventory need to be moved around within a distribution center. Forklift and other heavy machinery operators typically require special training and licensing.
hand pickers and packagers
Pickers often push carts throughout the warehouse, filling bins with items from the shelves to fill a few orders at a time. This process might be coordinated by a computer that intelligently determines which orders can be filled by a single picker while minimizing that person's travel time among the shelves. Amazon, for example, uses a random shelving system where items seem to be stored haphazardly throughout the warehouse instead of grouped by item or category (see Figure 12-10). However, the computer knows where every item is located and will select specific items for the order that are in close proximity to each other. Packagers then take each order's items and prepare them for shipping. Amazon's computers tell packagers which size box to use and even cut the needed length of tape for that box.
cloud computing
Providing and using computer tools, such as software, via the Internet (or the cloud).
SaaS providers
Salesforce, Oracle, SAP, and Workday
data analytics
The analysis of data to detect patterns that improve business processes and answer questions related to strategic planning.
on-demand self-service
The cloud customer can configure cloud services at any time.
artificial intelligence (AI)
The technological use of logic and prior experience to simulate human intelligence.
reinforcement learning
This model is best used when the "right" answer is not available but some answers are better than others. Like a player earning points in a video game, the machine attempts to optimize its performance given a certain set of standards. In fact, a machine trained to competitively play chess has likely used reinforcement learning to develop that skill. The machine experiments with its own game strategies based on the relative effectiveness of strategies it has tried in the past. Reinforcement learning might also be used to optimize traffic signaling at a busy intersection, evaluate credit applications to determine risk factors, or refine industrial automation at a manufacturing plant.
measured service
Usage of cloud resources is tracked at a granular level so customers can be accurately billed for the resources they use.
Software as a Service (SaaS)
cloud consumers most commonly interact with this software that is distributed online and sometimes costs a monthly subscription or an annual fee. Google Docs is an excellent example. Dropbox, an online file storage app, and Zoom, an online conference call app, are also popular examples
