Case Studies of E-Commerce Models - EMall

E-Mall
This business model is very much like the physical mall and in its most basic form it is a collection of e-shops, usually enhanced by a common umbrella for example of well-known brand. It might be supported by a common infrastructure e.g. payment infrastructure which may enable consumers to pay for goods purchased at each particular E-shop or on a global basis i.e. when exiting the E-mall.

An example of an E-mall is 1 Internet Plaza (www.1internetplaza.com) which enables entry to individual E-shop. When the E-mall specialises on a certain market segment such malls become more of an industry marketplace, like Industry.Net (www.industry.net) which can add value by virtual community features (FAQ, discussion forums, closed user groups and etc). The E-mall operator may not be interested in the individual E-shops that is being hosted but may seek benefits from sales of supporting technologies and services.

Benefits for the customers are similar to E-shops with additional convenience of easy access to other e-shops and ease of use through a common user interface. When a brand name is used to host the E-mall, this should lead to more trust, and therefore increased readiness to buy.

Benefits for the E-mall members are lower cost due to joint marketing, hosting services and access to advanced technology provided by the E-mall operator and possibly additional traffic generated from other E-shops on the mall or from the attraction of the host brand.

Possible form of revenues for the E-mall operators could be from monthly hosting fees (which may include set-up cost), advertising fees, and possibly a fee on transactions (if the mall operator provides the payment infrastructure.)

When the E-mall first came out, it attempted to emulate the concept of the physical mall. This concept failed due to the fact that distance, which may be a barrier in the physical world, does not exist in the cyberworld where other E-shops are just a click away. This added with the increased user sophistication and demand to handle a variety of seller-buyer user interfaces provided by the many different forms of E-shops have caused many of the firsts E-malls to fail. An example in Malaysia would be Planet Asia, which was the first e-mall, which had a variety of E-shops, selling products from flowers to books. It failed after a year of extensive marketing and investment but more likely due to other factors e.g. trust, security and payment mechanism.