Objectives of knowledge management

participation, 
mashups
, 
content rating, use of 
widgets
and tagging.
 Customer‑ centric 
marketing
An approach to marketing 
based on detailed 
knowledge of customer 
behaviour within the 
target audience which 
seeks to fulfil the 
individual needs and 
wants of customers.
Customer insight
Knowledge about 
customers’ needs, 
characteristics, 
preferences and 
behaviours based on 
analysis of qualitative 
and quantitative data. 
Specific insights can be 
used to inform marketing 
tactics directed at groups 
of customers with shared 
characteristics.
Microformats
A simple set of formats 
based on XHTML 
for describing and 
exchanging information 
about objects including 
product and travel 
reviews, recipes and 
event information.
Mashups
Websites, pages or 
widgets that combine the 
content or functionality 
of one website or data 
source with another to 
create something offering 
a different type of value 
to web users from the 
separate types of content 
or functionality.
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Chapter 1
Introduction to digital business and e‑commerce
Figure 1.11 gives examples of different companies operating in the business-to-con-
sumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) spheres. Often companies such as BP or Dell 
Computer will have products that appeal to both consumers and businesses, so will have dif-
ferent parts of their site to appeal to these audiences.
Referring to the well- known online companies in Table 1.1 initially suggests that these com-
panies are mainly focussed on B2C markets. However, B2B communications are still important 
for many of these companies since business transactions can drive revenue, as for example eBay 
Business (http://business.ebay.com/), or the B2C service may need to be sustained through 
advertising provided through B2B transactions; for example, Google’s revenue is largely based 
on its B2B AdWords (http://adwords.google.com/) and advertising service, and advertising- 
based revenue is also important to sites such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook.
Figure 1.11 also presents two additional types of transaction, those where consumers transact 
directly with other consumers (