E-commerce is the use of Internet and the web to transact business but when we focus on digitally enabled commercial

transactions between and among organizations and individuals involving information systems under the control of the firm it takes the form of e-business. Nowadays, 'e' is gaining momentum and most of the things if not everything is getting digitally enabled. Thus, it becomes very im ortant to clearly draw the line between different ty es of commerce or business integrated with the 'e' factor. There are mainly five ty es of e-commerce models! ". Business to Consumer (B2C) # $s the name suggests, it is the model involving businesses and consumers. This is the most common e-commerce segment. In this model, online businesses sell to individual consumers. %hen &'( started, it had a small share in the market but after "))* its growth was e+ onential. The basic conce t behind this ty e is that the online retailers and marketers can sell their roducts to the online consumer by using crystal clear data which is made available via various online marketing tools. The &'( model sells goods or services to the consumer, generally using online catalog and sho cart transaction systems. E.g. an online harmacy giving free medical consultation and selling medicines to atients is following &'( model. $mazon is an e+am le of one of the first and still one of the most successful &'( e-commerce com anies. ,ervices such as subscri tions to information sites or online data backu are also e+am les of &'( ecommerce. '. Business to Business (B2B) # It is the largest form of e-commerce involving business of trillions of dollars. In this form, the buyers and sellers are both business entities and do not involve an individual consumer. It is like the manufacturer su lying goods to the retailer or wholesaler. ing

The volume of &'& transactions is much higher than the volume of &'( transactions. Business-to-business -B2B. describes commerce transactions between businesses, such as between a manufacturer and a wholesaler, or between a wholesaler and a retailer. (ontrasting terms are businessto-consumer -&'(. and business-to-government -&'/..

The rimary reason for this is that in a ty ical su ly chain there will be many &'& transactions involving subcom onent or raw materials, and only one &'( transaction, s ecifically sale of the finished roduct to the end customer. 0or e+am le, an automobile manufacturer makes several &'& transactions such as buying tires, glass for windscreens, and rubber hoses for its vehicles. The final transaction, a finished vehicle sold to the consumer, is a single -&'(. transaction. (isco is an e+am le of one of the first &'& catalogs online. 1ther e+am les of &'& e-commerce are intranet services and %eb meetings. The term "business-to-business" was originally coined to describe the electronic communications between businesses or enter rises in order to distinguish it from the communications between businesses and consumers -&'(.. It eventually came to be used in marketing as well, initially describing only industrial or ca ital goods marketing. Today it is widely used to describe all roducts and services used by enter rises. 2any rofessional institutions and the trade ublications focus much more on &'( than &'&, although most sales and marketing ersonnel are in the &'& sector. 3. Consumer to Consumer (C2C) # It facilitates the online transaction of goods or services between two eo le. %here consumers can ost classified ads or offers to sell their ro erty to other consumers. This is the fastest growing segment of e-commerce thanks to the advent of social networking. The sites are only intermediaries, 4ust there to match consumers. They do not have to check 5uality of the roducts being offered. Though there is no visible intermediary involved but the arties cannot carry out the transactions without the latform which is rovided by the online market maker such as e&ay. 4. Consumer-to-business -C2B. is an electronic commerce business model in which consumers -individuals. offer roducts and services to com anies and the com anies ay them. This business model is a com lete reversal of traditional business model where com anies offer goods and services to consumers. This kind of economic relationshi is 5ualified as an inverted business ty e. The advent of the ('& scheme is due to ma4or changes!

(onnecting a large grou of eo le to a bidirectional network has made this sort of commercial relationshi ossible. The large traditional media outlets are one direction relationshi whereas the internet is bidirectional one. 6ecreased cost of technology ! Individuals now have access to technologies that were once only available to large com anies - digital rinting and ac5uisition technology, high erformance com uter, owerful software.

Elance is an e+am le of ('& where the consumer osts a ro4ect and businesses answer with bid ro osals. $nother e+am le of ('& is online loan brokers. 7. Peer to Peer (P2P) - Though it is an e-commerce model but it is more than that. It is a technology in itself which hel s eo le to directly share com uter files and com uter resources without having to go through a central web server. To use this, both sides need to install the re5uired software so that they can communicate on the common latform. This ty e of e-commerce has 5uite low revenue generation as from the beginning it has been inclined to the free usage due to which it sometimes got entangled in cyber laws. *. m-Commerce - It refers to the use of mobile devices for conducting the transactions. The mobile device holders can contact each other and can conduct the business. Even the web design and develo ment com anies o timize the websites to be viewed correctly on mobile devices. There are other ty es of e-commerce business models too like Business to Employee (B2E), electronic commerce uses an intrabusiness network which allows com anies to rovide roducts and8or services to their em loyees. Ty ically, com anies use &'E networks to automate em loyee-related cor orate rocesses. E+am les of &'E a lications include!

1nline insurance olicy management (or orate announcement dissemination 1nline su ly re5uests , ecial em loyee offers Em loyee benefits re orting 79"-k. 2anagement

Government-to-Business -abbreviated /'&. is the online non-commercial interaction between local and central government and the commercial business sector, rather than rivate individuals -/'(.. 0or e+am le htt !88www.dti.gov.uk is a government web site where businesses can get information and advice on e-business 'best ractice'. htt !88g'b. erm.ru is another e+am le. Government-to-Citizen -abbreviated /'(. is the communication link between a government and rivate individuals or residents. ,uch /'( communication most often refers to that which takes lace through Information (ommunication Technologies -or I(Ts., but can also include direct mail and media cam aigns. /'( can take lace at the federal, state, and local levels. /'( stands in contrast to /'&, or /overnment-to-&usiness networks. 1ne such 0ederal /'( network is :,$.gov! the :nited ,tates' official web ortal, though there are many other e+am les from governments around the world.;"< Business-to-government -&'/. is a derivative of &'& marketing and often referred to as a market definition of = ublic sector marketing= which encom asses marketing roducts and services to various government levels - including federal, state and local - through integrated marketing communications techni5ues such as strategic ublic relations, branding, marcom, advertising, and web-based communications.

&'/ networks rovide a latform for businesses to bid on government o ortunities which are resented as solicitations in the form of >0?s in a reverse auction fashion. ?ublic sector organizations -?,1's. ost tenders in the form of >0?'s, >0I's, >0@'s, ,ources ,ought, etc. and su liers res ond to them. but in essence they are similar to the above mentioned ty es. 2oreover, it is not necessary that these models are dedicatedly followed in all the online business ty es. It may be the case that a business is using all the models or only one of them or some of them as er its needs.