Information Technology

Search technologies are changing the fortune of companies. From marketing to the customer data storage Search technologies has great importance. Search technologies support business organizations to provide the opportunity to their customers to search and find their desired information or products from huge databases (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). In this assignment information about the search technology of eBay Company is discussed in detail with the benefit and areas of improvement covered by this search technology.    

eBay

eBay is an international organization that operates in more than 100 countries in the world. The eBay organization was started in 1995 by Pierre Omidyar in America. The organization serves an e-commerce website that offers retailing services for all kinds of products including household products, electronic products, clothing products, and other fashion-oriented products (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). Basically, through the use of search technology organization cater to all kinds of information regarding products to its users from the global databases by utilizing the most effective search techniques.  

According to the annual reports, the company earned revenue of $8.97 billion through the sales of 2016 only. More than 14,100 employees are working on a permanent and regular basis to provide services for their customer. According to an estimation, total auction market covered by the eBay company in only 2000 was almost 80% of the whole market. The company is currently using consumer to consumer business model for its business operations (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). Somehow, the business model of eBay Company is also following B2B and B2C business model because the company provides the platform to even wholesalers, retailing shop, and small businesses owners to sell out their products directly to the customers.  

Search technology of eBay

eBay provides online search option to their customer to search their required products at the e-commerce website. From various search technologies, eBay is using Crawler Based search technology at its site. Ebay Company is also using Hypertext-Matching Analysis and PageRank technology (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). Through the use of these search technologies company help out their customers to get the most relevant search results on the top of the pages or page 1. Through the use of PageRank technology, eBay measure the importance of pages with relevance to the words searched in the search bar.  

Benefits of using this technology  

eBay is using this search technology at their website to provide the opportunity to their customer to search out their desired products from the database. eBay, provide thousands of products that cannot be displayed at the front or home page of the e-commerce website (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). Therefore, the company provides information about each product on a separate page. When customers search that product name or feature in the search box website direct them to that specific product page (Moneysavingexpert.com, 2019).

There are several benefits of using this search technology on the website of the company. At the first company can provide the most relevant products to their customer through this search technology. Highly relevant products with search results not only causes to increase customer satisfaction but also ensure more chances of sales (Ajayi & Elegbeleye, 2014).

When customers get a wide variety of products that meet their requirements, they purchase those products easily it increases their satisfaction level towards services offered by the company. For instance, if a customer searched for the Umbrella and get a list of different types of umbrellas with prices and other features definitely he/she will get high satisfaction from the services because now they can select the best product according to their requirements (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, Martin, & Perkins, 2011). Another significant benefit of this search technology is the increase in the profitability of the company as through an increase in customer satisfaction sales goes towards increase and automatically revenue increases that help out the company to deal with expense in a better way and support profit margin maximization. Thus, in low customer satisfaction not only increases the chances of sales but also sustain profitability.     

PageRank technology also facilitates the company to show a list of products by the preferences of the customers  (Moneysavingexpert.com, 2019). Because of the page rank technology, the most relevant product will show at the top of the page. Thus, other products will get positions in the page according to the level of relevancy. Moreover, crawler-based search technology also supports internet marketing and causes to increase the quality of traffic on the website (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, martin, & Perkins, 2011).      

Metrics to evaluate

There are several metrics to assess the performance of the search technology that eBay organization can use. For instance, eBay can measure performance from the number of subscribers, customer satisfaction level, and accuracy of results (Ajayi & Elegbeleye, 2014). Somehow, Company can also evaluate the performance through the use of benchmark technique as the company can determine by comparing their sales with the competitor sales in a fiscal year. 

Other than measuring the overall performance of this search technology, the company can also measure performance in the light of organizational objectives. How and at what extent this search technology is facilitating the corporate goals. In the eBay company, the main objectives of the company are to increase customer satisfaction. Therefore, the company will use a survey or feedback system at (e-commerce website) to get information about the customer satisfaction level. Thus through this company will measure whether the objective of desired customer satisfaction level is accomplished or not. If not then how much difference is there. (Brown, Dehayes, Hoffer, martin, & Perkins, 2011)Similarly, annual reports can describe whether the objective of increase in sales is achieved or not in the current fiscal year. If search technology is failed to accomplish the organizational goals, the company need to research the possible reasons to bring improvement in the performance or to select an alternative option. 

Area of improvement

Online search technology can support business to bring development and expand operations. Search history describes the demand tendency of product and specific requirements of customers about a product. Through using this information, the company can understand what is desired and required by the customer. Identification of customer needs help out the company in inventory management. Company stock the highly desired products to improve customer experiences. While search technology also reduces problems for the customer in searching for their desired products that work as a supportive factor for business expansion. In short, through using search technology company can improve business to promote profitability.     

Conclusion on Information Technology

The whole discussion concludes that eBay an American multinational organization is using search technology to facilitate their customers in searching for products at the e-commerce website. Because of this search technology customer experience and satisfaction levels can be improved. Improvement in customer satisfaction causes to increase sales and profitability of the organization. Thus, through the use of search technology company can earn a better reputation in the society and business expansion can be made possible.     

References of Information Technology

Ajayi, O. O., & Elegbeleye, D. M. (2014). Performance Evaluation of Selected Search Engines. IOSR Journal of Engineering (, 4(2), 1-12. Retrieved 02 15, 2019

Brown, C. V., Dehayes, D. W., Hoffer, J. A., Martin, E. W., & Perkins, W. C. (2011). Managing information technology. Pearson Prentice Hall. Retrieved 02 15, 2019

Moneysavingexpert.com. (2019). 41 eBay Buying Tips. Retrieved 02 15, 2019, from www.moneysavingexpert.com: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/ebay-protection/