eBay Business System

eBay is an online business that provides a service for buyers and sellers to make transactions over the internet. As with all other businesses, business systems also apply to eBay. This paper explores how business systems of administration, human resources, Research & Development, Operations, Sales & Marketing, Accounting & Finance, Legal support, and Information Technology all apply to eBay. Firstly, there is a structured administration that is embedded in the company. eBay is an American owned company that is publicly listed on NASDAQ.

John Donahoe is its CEO and it has a very detailed organizational structured composed of managerial and technical departments (eBay Inc. , 2006). Research and development in the company is a continuous process. In its existence, the management behind eBay has acquired auxiliary products such as the payment methods Paypal and Skype that augment the effectiveness of their business while adding additional profit. eBay has also developed regional websites to cater to the needs of 30 different countries around the world (eBay Inc. , 2006). The company has a very structured operations system that starts with user creation of eBay accounts.

When users transact with their accounts, the sellers have to pay fees to eBay. These fees vary from country to country. eBay’s marketing strategy basically composes of making linkages with search engines such as Yahoo! and Google such that people trying to find products on such sites would be directed to products that are being sold on eBay. Furthermore, eBay’s marketing system relies on years of existence that has built a reliable database of sellers that have accumulated considerable feedback. Needless to say, the company has accounting & finance departments as well as legal departments that cater to the needs of the company as they arise.

For example, eBay’s legal department had to make contributions towards the apprehension of users who were fraudulently outbidding one another in order to get a real bidder to buy bad quality artwork (Rutter, 2007). eBay’s business relies on a virtual platform powered by the internet. Thus, information technology is clearly present in almost all aspects of the business. Despite its virtual nature, it is shown that eBay has all the qualities of a typical business where business systems are concerned.

Like a typical company, eBay relies on these systems in order to stay functional. This proves that business systems are existent even in ventures found on the internet.

References

Rutter, F. (2007). The safe eBay Scam! Retrieved April 19, 2008 from: http://www. dansdata. com/ebayscam. htm eBay Inc. (2006). eBay Fact Sheet. Retrieved April 18, 2008 from: http://pics. ebaystatic. com/aw/pics/au/new/eBayFactSheetApr06. pdf HappyNews. (2007). The History of eBay. Retrieved April 19, 2008 from: http://www. happynews. com/living/online/history-ebay. htm