THE PERCEPTION OF MARKET AND E-COMMERCE

Abstract

The article discloses the perception of market, which is important talking about e-commerce. E-commerce is a phenomenon without borders. This global dimension of e-commerce proposes different themes such as taxation, jurisdiction, consumer protection, and market perception. One of them (the perception of market) is investigated from different perspectives in this paper and the perspective of e-commerce as well.

The analysis of economic scientific literature on e-commerce published by Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Harvard University Press, Springer, M. E. Sharpe, Routledge, etc. show that 35% of the authors (from 0,54 mln. in total) give attention to the issues of markets. Most of these authors investigate e-market (virtual market), business-to-consumer market and only some of them define the market.

In the literature on marketing published by leading world publishers 53% of the authors (from 0,9 mln. in total) analyse the issues of markets. Most of the authors discuss the issues of market segmentation, market potential, and market entry (by ranking order). From all of the authors only 0,17% of the authors investigate the perception of relevant market.

It is also interesting that topics about market are also popular between authors published books on trade: 49% of authors (from 1,62 mln. in total) give their attention to selling markets. From all of authors only some of authors (0,11% of authors) give the introduction to the terminology of market.

In the literature on competition (published by the same publishers) discussion about market is provided by 35% of authors (from 0,35 mln. in total) and the theoretic aspects of market – by 1,1% of them.

So, the results of such analysis show the importance of research, which combines both: the perception of market and e-commerce. This also shows that the perception of market is discussed more often in the literature on marketing, trade and competition than in the literature dedicated to e-commerce. The paper presents the results of investigations in such context.

The scientific problem can be formulated – there is the lack of perception about market in modern theories, theoretical generalisations and solutions on the theme of e-commerce.

The study presented in the paper contains three different aspects. First, the perception of market is disclosed. The terminology of market is investigated in different literature and the presentation of methods and main criteria, which are used for the comparison of markets, is provided. Second, the new model, which can be used for the comparison of export markets, is presented. Third, in the paper the developed profile is applied to case study looking up for practical evidence.

The article is based on comparative and multi criteria analysis. For the comparison of export markets, a set of criteria and the multi criteria evaluation method (COPRAS) is used. Several groups of criteria: the positive criteria and negative ones are defined and used for the comparison of export markets.

The results of the study can be used by on-line sellers when they choosing export markets, which are the most attractive for selling products in European Union.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.eis.0.5.1094