Application process of Internet Marketing in Vietnamese small and medium enterprises

However, because of the theory of IM in the world is too new and has not been tauch formally in Vietnam, the spontaneous process in applying IM of Vietnamese enterprises does not bring g

INTRODUCTION

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1 The urgency of topic

Recognizing the popularity and role of the Internet, as well as the impact of

Internet to change the behavior and demand of customer, from the early 2000s, the

practical activists have studied and developed the way to apply Internet in Marketing

(MKT) activity, then the researchers summarize and generalize these ways of

application, since it appears a new branch of science of modern Marketing called as

Internet Marketing (or Online Marketing) Since its inception in the developed

countries, Internet Marketing (IM) has become a popular form of marketing and

brought huge profits for enterprises using it Because of the basic advantages of the

Internet to bring to business in general and marketing in particular - such as the ability

of updating, fast responsed speed and low cost, high efficiency - IM is proven in fact

and recognized as very effective

Vietnam is considered as a country with high potential in the development of

electronic commerce (EC) in general as well as online business activities in particular,

with over 31 million users - equivalent to 33.9% population Along with the investment

direction of the Government, it can certainly say that in a not too distant future,

Vietnamese consumer will be completely familiar with the using of Internet Besides,

the life, behavior and their demand are affected by the Internet that has been strongly

changed Adapting to this, Vietnamesse businesses also self-correct Marketing

activities follow the direction that they consider as appropriate

However, because of the theory of IM in the world is too new and has not been

tauch formally in Vietnam, the spontaneous process in applying IM of Vietnamese

enterprises does not bring good result, influenced by technical perspective of

information technology of companies providing IM service, so this process has a

number of characteristics:

- The businesses have many mistake conceptions about IM activity: for example

considering Internet as just a tool or media means, online sales, or IM acitivity is a

very difficult technique problem, to need specialized personnel in information

technology or outsource with the expensive cost

- Because of incorrect concept so the businesses applied incorrectedly about IM: They

usually think of some advertised tools on the Internet when have communication

demand; implementing very little and asynchronously the tools of IM and the MKT in

real environments; If implemented, outsourcing is often done once and then "leave it"

or do not know how to manage, Separating the management of IM operations from

activities of MKT strategy

- With such an application so actually causes a huge waste of resource of the

businesses, the effectiveness based on the cost of effective investment for IM is

very low because not promote the inherent potential of IM - which is considered

as efficient way of doing MKT, many benefits for businesses and society with low

investment costs

Meanwhile, in the world, many ways of application and various IM tools are

introduced; each method has its advantages, limitations and conditions for taking

effect Therefore, there is necessary to evaluate and choose whether any theory, how the application of IM is consistent with the conditions in Vietnam, especially with the possibility of applying of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) - accounted for over 90% of businesses in the country, but limitation about resource That's what inspires

author selected this research topic: "Application process of Internet Marketing in Vietnamese small and medium enterprises "

2 The research background

To be able to have objective, reasonable and feasible assessments, we must recognize the context of implementation of the subject, with the following contents:

- The IM application in the world is growing strongly, due to the IM brings many benefits for the enterprises

- In Vietnam, the Government has a clear direction for the development of e-commerce in general and business on the Internet in particular, creating a boom in recent years and continuing to maintain strong momentum of growth of these activities in the coming years

- Although the infrastructure conditions for the development of IM in Vietnam is not yet evaluated as good, completely meet for the application of IM activities of SMEs at a basic level At the same time, the enterprises need to overcome the difficulties caused by the conditions of this infrastructure that is not good

- Internet users in Vietnam have both the same characteristics as the Internet users in the world, and the different characteristics due to the impact of cultural, social, economic environment … and language These characteristics also promise that the application of

IM in Vietnam has opportunity, and businesses need to adapt when the application of

IM tools in the world in Vietnam - especially cultural characteristics in behavior of using Internet and consumer behavior

- The Vietnamese SMEs accounte for over 90% of the businesses in the country that have many restrictions on business resource, technological level, the scale of operation MKT activity of these enterprises is constrained by low investment costs, no MKT professional workforce that is usually done by salesman The activities of lacking the long-term strategy are often performed disjointedly and fragmentedly, only focused on activities that directly support and promote sales Due to the domination of all these conditions and characteristics so SMEs have difficulies to "keep" model or IM applications under models of the advanced countries

to apply, which need to have researches to buld the way of operating in accordance with the environmental condition and operational characteristic of Vietnamese SMEs

3 The objective of study 3.1 The overall objective

The thesis focuses on researching to suggest process and way of Internet marketing activity in accordance with the environmental condition and the applied ability of SMEs of Vietnam, is expressed as a brief modeling, helping businesses easy

to visualize and absorb, so that when they look at it, it will:

- There is the most appropriate and overall look about the IM activities: understanding the nature, role and task of the IM, as well as the relationship between IM with other strategic activities of businesses, understanding the process

and IM tools, the relationship between the tools themselves and with MKT tools of

real environment in coordinating in order to carry out a strategy of IM

- Using IM, process, steps and tools applied in each step of that process

3.2 Mission and the specific research questions

In order to achieve these overall objectives, the thesis will need to answer the

objectives and research questions such as the following:

(1) Analysing the way of typical IM activity as a theoretical basis for proposing the

IM application process in Vietnam:

- What is the applied way of typical IM activity in the world currently?

- How does each way of application during its operation reveal the strengths and

limitations?

- If applying in Vietnam is appropriate or not? What are difficulties and obstacles

when applying in Vietnam?

(2) Analysing of the actual conditions of Vietnam to make factual basis of proposing

IM application process for Vietnamese SMEs:

a The objective and external conditions of business:

- How are economic, social, technological, legal environment that have

characteristics affecting the implementation of IM solutionss?

- How do customer/consumer’s habit and behavior affect to use and contact to the

Internet?

b The subjective and inside conditions of business:

- How have businesses been doing IM?

- The businesses understand that how IM is, which solution of IM they applied and

how? Why do they do that? Effective or not? If not, why?

- What is characteristic in activity of Vietnamese SMEs in accessing the IM theory?

Which businesses do need the support in terms of rationale and what and how does

support them?

- Do SMEs only lack the awareness about the strategic process, or need the solution

of specific tools? Do they have the ability to make tools, which level?

- How do Vietnamese SMEs have ability in building strategy and implementing the

IM solutions: human, financial resources and other issues?

- Proposing the process of applying IM activity for Vietnamese SMEs:

- Proposing the process of applying IM suitably

- Proposing specific solutions follow applied conditions of Vietnamese SMEs

(specific content of each step in the model)

4 The object, objectivity and scope of research

- The object of research: Theory and practice of applied process of IM in enterprise

- The objectivity of research: Vietnamese SMEs identified by Decree 56/2009/NĐ-CP

- The scope of research:

Related to object of research:

• The thesis only focuses on IM, not its branches, these are connected devices and

data exchange on the Internet, such as mobile-internet MKT, MKT interactive

television

• The thesis approaches from the perspective of principle of IM applications, not to mention the problems of technology and engineering making IM, no research in a specialized field or specific branch as MKT to customer, MKT services…

• The thesis does not focus on introducing IM tools and techniques applied them in specific situations, such as marketing techniques through search engine - SEM (Search Engine Marketing), Marketing on social networks - SMM (Social Media Marketing) .; only focus on studying process of IM activity in general, from analysing information, planning, building strategy, selecting tool and implementing the plan and testing the correction

Related to respondents: Survey of SMEs, satisfying the conditions:

• Serving consumers; there are no elements of foreign investment

• Focusing on researching the moving online businesses, these are companies have operated in the real environment, only moving a part of MKT activities and business

on the Internet to meet the changes in consumer’s behavior

• Not the businesses specialize in communication, information technology, or have too much experience in this field

Reason for choosing this respondent: this is the group of businesses that have many limitations about business resources, have no or less condition to access to information about new and modern means, tools or forms of business These characteristics make the effectiveness of their business that is limited Thus, this thesis defines that these are group of businesses that need the support in terms of scientific to find a suitable way with the condition and available possibility, improve operational efficiency for developing At the same time, the thesis also removes from the sample those firms that do not have typical or representative characteristic for the other conventional businesses

Related to time and space of research and survey:

• In terms of space: the research focuses on Hanoi and expands to other businesses in another area, but not affect to the representativeness of the sample for overall study

• Time: Because of new subject so the author has many difficulties in the research process, which makes the whole process is prolonged in the period of 6 years from September 2006 to December 2012 However, the activity of sociological investigation of official sample is made within 7 months from April 2012 to November 2012 This ensures the time for result

5 The methodology of study 5.1 The methodology of approaching: Practical viewpoint, system viewpoint; historical

viewpoint

5.2 Data source of the thesis 5.2.1 Sources of secondary data

- The theory of IM: colleting from textbooks and reference materials of many major universities around the world

- Data on environmental business condition in Vietnam and applied condition of e-commerce in general, IM in particular: the editions are officially publiced by the prestige organizations and agencies in Vietnam and the world; the researches and dissertations are recognized

- Data on business resource and capability of enterprise: taking from published data of

Vietnam association of SMEs and business surveyed reports are officially announced

5.2.2 Sources of primary data

For have practical basis to propose IM process, the thesis applies sociological

investigated method in studying marketing that is used to model the applied behavior of IM of

Vietnamese SMEs made through 3 steps:

- Step 1: Synthesizing the sources of secondary data

- Step 2: Designing and implementing the qualitative research (in-depth personal

interview, semi-structured), with 28 leaders and business managers

- Step 3: Designing and implementing the quantitative research, the sample size is 491

units (satisfying condition ≥ 400 form element, based on deductive formula of sample

about rate and application of non-repeating selection, reliability of 95.44% and scope

of sampling error ≤ 5%); the method of non-random sampling (convenient method

combined with the cumulative sampling), the method of contacting with audience

directly or indirectly (sending cards for respondents filling)

5.3 Methods of processing and analyzing data

5.3.1 Analysing the secondary data

- Data is theory and IM application process, applying methods: (1) Analysing and

synthesizing theory, (2) classifying and systemizing the theory (3) modeling; (4)

thinking of scientific and inductive

- Data on environmental practice and condition for implementing IM of the enterprises,

applying methods: (1) scientific observation, (2) expert

5.3.2 Analysing the primary data

- Qualitative data: transcribing and processing manually (synthesizing comments,

counting the frequency of important words, building tree of idea )

- Quantitative data: the variables using scale of identifier and hierarchy that is processed

by the math of basic descriptive statistics (analyzing frequency, processing the group

split, calculating mode), with the variables using scale of distance that is handling some

maths on the arithmetic average and standard deviation Application of inference

statistics is the inspection of rate in order to test the result from the sample for overall

The software using is SPSS 20.0

6 The result and new contributions of thesis

6.1 The results of thesis

- Systemizing and contributing to clarify theoretical issues about the concept, nature

and benefit of IM

- Studying the models of IM application in the world for using in the construction

process of IM activity model in Vietnam

- Collecting, surveying, analyzing and systematic assessing about cognition, condition,

application capability and the status of the IM application in Vietnamese SMEs VN

- The thesis shows specific solutions, high feasibility for applying IM in Vietnamese

SMEs

6.2 The new contributions of thesis:

The new contributions of academic, theoretical and practical aspect:

- Collecting and identifying 4 processes of applying IM typically in the world today, includes (1) e-commerce marketing (2) Web 4S - marketing, (3) consumer behavior

on the Internet and marketing - mix; (4) IM strategy model In which, each process identified the steps, tools, major concerns, and analyzed the advantages and limitations

on the ability to deploy in applicating this process in Vietnam

- Basing on actual investigation, discovering the the most underlying causes that affect

to the restriction in applying IM in Vietnamese SMEs VN, including::

• Misunderstanding or incomplete about the nature, role, effectiveness, conditions of applying and the tools of IM

• Restriction on the ability to perform IM activity, as well as the ability of management in case of outsourcing

• The tendency to separate the management of IM from Marketing strategy and Marketing activities in the real environment

- From the result of investigation, the thesis finds that the more business understand what is right and enough about IM, the better application and result, thus more willing

to invest in this activity and vice versa

The new proposals drawn from research results

- The process of applying IM in accordance with peculiarities of SMEs and in the context of Vietnam, in which some new points compared to the existing process are:

• Applying the understanding about customer and consumer behavior at every step in the process

• Coordinating the steps and tools of traditional MKT with the steps and tools of MKT on the Internet

• Content strategy and managing the e-presence

- The way to build, organize, and exploit information systems of electronics MKT, with emphasizing on two important issues: (1) using the Internet to gather information about behavior at all exposure points, (2) using methods of studying MKT in Internet environment

7 The structure of thesis:

The thesis includes the following sections:

- Intrododuction

- Chapter 1: The overview of theoretical research findings about the process and way

of applying IM

- Chapter 2: Surveying the reality as a basis for proposing the IM process for Vietnamese SMEs

- Chapter 3: Proposing the process of applying IM in Vietnamese SMEs

- Conclusion

CHAPTER 1 THE OVERVIEW OF THEORETICAL RESEARCH FINDINGS ABOUT THE PROCESS AND WAY OF APPLYING INTERNET MARKETING

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1.1 The understandings and the scope of Internet Marketing

There are many ways to call and understand related to IM that introduced around the world, from the broad meanings as e-MKT, electronic MKT, MKT on Internet or MKT

online, e-commerce, e-business to the callings with a narrower meaning and very

short-sighted as MKT email, online advertising and marketing Like the misunderstanding about

MKT in Vietnam in the past, these ways of calling and understanding lead to different

applications, thus the efficiency and capability of applying form of MKT are very different

in the businesses

From this understanding, we can see that, first of all, in terms of form, although it

appears under many different names as IM, e-MKT, online MKT, digital MKT ., the

content mentions to the application of digital technologies that connect and exchange

the data on the Internet to make MKT, including computer, interactive TV, telephone,

digital devices However, as mentioned, the scope of this topic only focuses on the

Internet, not focusing on its branches arising, ie connected and data exchanged devices

on Internet, or in other words the thesis does not research on specific issues such as

MKT via mobile, MKT on interactive television or location based MKT

The nature and principles of MKT do not change, there is a process of exchanging

information and economic behavior, from identifying needs, planning to conducting

and supervising the use of appropriate tools of MKT to put product, service, and idea

to customer However, there are some fundamental differences:

- The mothod of conducting IM is different from MKT in real environment: on

procedure, tool, focused content of the strategy, the guiding principles

- The elements of the operating environment of MKT on the Internet are changed,

expanded, and there are changes about the ability that have influence to IM activities

of enterprise

- The market of current and potential buyers changes due to the accessibility of the

Internet, the mode and rule of dealing with customer also change

Besides, it is necessary to distinguish IM with related concepts:

- Electronic business (E-business) is the set of all operations of the business functions

of a business undertaken, related to attract and maintain the customers and business

partner for companies, that is performed in an electronic environment

- E-commerce is the exchange of information through electronic network, at any stages

of the supply chain, whether it is done within an organization, or between different

enterprises, between enterprises and customers, or between public sector and private

sector, whether it is paid or not

- Direct MKT, in terms of nature, is one of the tools of mixed promotion or MKT

media, which is a form of modern communication, it combines the traditional forms of

media such as advertising, sales promotion and personal selling, impact to customer,

the aim is to sell goods without intermediate distribution The goal of direct MKT is to

provide the information of product for customers that can meet their needs and desires

to create the reactions of purchasing directly and measureably in market

Thus, compared to the above concepts, IM has a partial interference but does not

match about the inner, scope, approach as well as tool

In addition, the thesis also collects the researches and perspectives on the role,

benefit and capability of applying of IM in business operation of the enterprises

1.2 The research of applying the process of typical Internet marketing in the

world

During the research, the author has not found any material that presents comprehensively and authoritatively on this issue, the types of process or the way of operating Internet marketing presented below that is the synthesis from the simalarity

of theories, guidelines and the way of applying in practice of the enterprises, with the name of each type of model is set by author that reflect the main content and spirit the

of every types succinctly

1.2.1 The model of e-marketing

This is the operational model of Internet marketing based on e-commerce, or in other words that is the way to do online marketing of companies to support the marketing activities in real environment, in order to consume goods produced, toward the customers who have a habit of using the Internet

Figure 1: The process of applying IM follow the model of e-commerce

This model is relatively simple and has been applied in many enterprises in the world, especially in the early period of e-commerce in general and IM in particular The advantage of it is easy to apply, does not require a lot of manpower with high level and the coordination between parts of enterprise, it’s suitable for both enterprises that its IM activity at the simplest level, relatively easy in applying to businesses operating

in both market of institution and individual

But the limitation of model is too simple, more operational rather than strategic, not cover the factors dominating the success or failure of an online MKT strategy, therefore it is only suitable for the commercial enterprises with small scale and limited scope of activities in a (few) line / type of certain product The other limitation is that it

is not useful in case of assessing to upgrade the electronic marketing activitiy to a new level or in case of responding to the changing of environment This model can be easily applied in Vietnamese SMEs that have similar conditions

1.4.2 The model of 4S web – marketing

This model was established in about 1997s, later developed by Dr Efthymios Constantinides (Netherlands) It is built on the spirit of perfect matching between the activities in the virtual environment into business strategies, real marketing plan and the organizing process of enterprise

Figure 2: The process of applying Internet Marketing follow the model of 4S-web

The advantage of this process of application is that it identified the strategic

issues, operation, organization and technology dominated the success of IM activity,

this method also introduces the approach to both strategic problems and operational

issues of the IM process

However, this applied process has some limitations or disadvantages The most

obvious thing is the complexity, difficulty in applying because it requires a very strong

knowledge of online consumer behavior, as well as specialized knowledge, marketing,

information technology and other media It will obstruct the applicability of the model,

because not always such knowledge is available, especially in Vietnamese SMEs

today An another disadvantage is that it is too focused on the factor of website without

mentioning the presence of electronic factors beyond the website and other IM tools, as

well as their content Therefore, applying this model is easy to fall into the

short-sighted and narrow about the IM, it is difficult to effectively promote with the

generation of interactive Web 2.0 today In addition, this model is developed for B2C

applications, so enterprises can operate separately or simultaneously on the field of

B2B that is difficult to apply to achieve optimal efficiency

1.4.3 The model of customer behaviour on Internet and marketing mix

This model is developed based on the spirit of taking target customer as the center

and the starting point of all marketing efforts This model is introduced by the U.S

researchers and is used the most in this country, with the authors of George E Belch,

Philip Kotlers, Judy Strauss and colleagues, This model is preferred by the

enterprises follow the school of traditional MKT, because it has the same philosophy

compared with strategy of MKT in real world environment And the reason why it is

called such by authors is that the focused content/core of model is about consumer

behavior on the Internet and to identify strategies of MKT mix to meed and exploit

them

The advantage of this model lies on its friendly, especially for those who follow

the traditional theory of MKT, and because of its friendly, it also becomes easy to

apply, especially when the model gives a formulaic process allowing user can easily apply through the implementation of sequential steps of the model, and easily reference the materials abundantly and diversely about the techniques to increase the efficiency

of applying Applying this model also allows for a review of the factors affecting to online MKT strategy, including both strategic and tactical elements Moreover, the starting point and core of the model is the understing of customer - Internet user, this can allow the business make more strategies and efforts of MKT and win the sympathy

of customer - the key to keep the loyal customer on Internet

However this model also has some limitations Firstly, it has not fully covered the factors that affect the IM strategy, such as the elements of technology, engineering, resources of enterprise especially human resource, issues of infrastructure and technology, design, implementation and management of website The feature of no detail of this model will require the application must have broad and deep knowledge, and further research and collect more additional knowledge In scientific terms, equating the CRM is one of the tools of MKT-mix that making the application does not see its strategy and importance affecting the entire MKT programs that tend to favor the "implementation" without seeing its strategy In addition, the attractiveness of electronic presence is only considered as a part of the media strategy of electronic MKT and MKT of online relationship, this have not made the application understands and applies effectively this content This is the fundamental reason for a lot of companies that only focus on website investment with superior software that overlooked the investment continuously for content strategy to maintain the attractiveness of the electronic presence - reality of many Vietnamese businesses when operating e-commerce in general and IM in particular An another limitation of this model is to separate the marketing activities on Internet with the MKT activities in real environment, thus not promote the efficiency of MKT operations as a whole, at the same time the application will feel confused in arranging and organizing staff The disadvantages would be hindered element that many Vietnamese SMEs applied model, because most of them are simultaneously online, offline and in real environment

Figure 3: The process of applying Internet Marketing follow the model of consumer

behavior on Internet and Marketing mix

1.4.4 The model of Internet marketing strategy

The quite popular model in all over the world is developed by famous

researcher of IM Dave Chaffey and his colleagues, this process has now been

widely popular in the U.S and Europe

The advantage of this model is similar to the advantage of the model 3, this is

friendly process with users, especially Vietnam Another advantage is that it studies

quite completely and details the factors that affect and influence to the marketing

strategy in internet of businesses, including strategic and tactical elements A finer

point of this model compared to the model 3 is that the important factors are seprated

in studying in detail, and showed the interaction and interplay between the elements of

the model, making the application both had detailed look and covered the strategic of

model

Figure 4: The strategic of model of Internet Marketing

Limitation of the model is to require the good knowledge of the application, both

general and detail knowledge In addition, although the model shows that the strategic

level but lacks practical guidance in details Therefore, with limited knowledge and

awareness of Vietnamese businesses about IM, to apply successfully it needs to be

detailed, but still ensure the simply In addition, it also makes reader easier to

understand that it is independent with marketing activity in real environments This

model does not emphasis on finding in detail the behavior of target customer that this

is only regarded as one of elements of the micro-environment This is difficult to

ensure the success of interactive activities and personalized IM An important

drawback is the electronic presence that is made after determining the IM strategy, as

well as selection of tools of marketing mix and customer relationship programs This

will lead the electronic presence is not oriented absolutely about location and content,

easily lead the enterprises create arbitrarily for their electronic appearance, so the brand

will lose the focus and/or cause unwanted effects to images

In summary, although the study of IM is not a new problem, due to its

characteristics (characteristics of the technology, fast changing, applied condition .)

so the research results both at home and abroad are still scattered, unfocused and

inconsistent The studies of IM application are gathered in 4 groups by the author,

according to process and way of applying, from that analysing the content and

circumstances of life, the advantages, limitations and conditions of application each group With all four groups, the author says that there is not a process or the way of application that suitable and easy to use in conditions of Vietnamese SMEs as analyzed

in the context of the topic This is due to the general limitations of this model, including: (1) not friendly, not suitable for this way of thinking, doing and managing the marketing activity of the current Vietnamese businesses; (2) not enough to generalize all the factors related to IM strategy, and not enough detail to guide implementation, (3) not focus on finding consumer behavior to provide strategies and tactics consistent with the behavioral characteristics of Vietnamese people - particularly in the electronic presence and content strategies associated with Internet users Therefore, it’s necessary for researching additional to be able to build process and the way of applying Internet Marketing suitably in Vietnam

CHAPTER 2 SURVEYING THE REALITY AS A BASIS FOR PROPOSING THE IM PROCESS

FOR VIETNAMESE SMEs

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2.1 Study Design

2.1.1 The frame of study content

2.1.1.1 The rationale as a basis for study design

With the author's experiences accumulated in working, and through exchanges and

contacts, discussions with experts, researchers as well as market activists, the author

discoveres that way of thinking, and doing marketing in general and IM in particular of

Vietnamese SMEs is now strongly influenced by school of theoretical Marketing and

principle of Marketing of Philip Kotlers - as well as theory of MKT is being taught

popularly in Vietnam Therefore, the author selects this theory as the leading rationale

for the research Accordingly, the logical framework of strategic marketing process

consists of 5 steps as shown in the figure below:

Figure 5: The model of theoretical frame used for study design about the reality and condition of

applying IM of Vietnamses SMEs

In addition, to evaluate the companies properly selects and applies the tools and

practices the principles IM or not, the author bases on studies and other theories about tool of

IM from typical researchers of IM as Judy Strauss and Raymond Frost, Dave Chaffey, Paul

2.1.1.2 The frame of content oriented research design

To learn about the perception, behavior and condition of applying IM of the

enterprises, the author design ands implements a marketing research on Vietnamses

SMEs Basic assumption for the study is: Behavior of applying IM of businesses is

dominated by two basic factors: (1) conditions of applying IM of the enterprises,

including resources on human, finance and computer - the Internet network, (2)

Awareness and understanding of IM of the enterprises, namely the leaders of

businesses and people in charge of marketing activity of the company, as these

awareness and understanding will affect their investment, budget allocation, direction

and implementation of IM These two factors can be seen as a necessary and sufficient

condition for the implementation of IM of the enterprises

With this assumption, the study is conducted on object of Vietnamese SMEs that

is designed follow 3 the basic contents: (1) IM application conditions, (2) Awareness and understanding of IM; (3 ) IM application behavior

Figure 6: The frame of study content about the reality and IM application condition of Vietnamese

SMEs

In this content, the description of the application condition, or assessing the readiness for IM of enterprises, including assessment of telecommunications infrastructure and Internet, the use of computers and IT,the training using IT and e-commerce, human resources have capable of applying interntet Marketing of companies All this information has suitable and reliable secondary data, so in part of surveying in companies, the author does not take this content to the questionnaire again

2.1.2 The process of implementation and method of study

The research is implemented through 3 main steps:

- Steps 1 Synthezing the secondary data sources Forming an overview picture about the

way that Vietnamese enterprises are understanding and applying IM, as well as the condition and the level of readiness for IM applications

- Step 2: A qualitative study to explore the perception and understanding of leaders and

managers in Internet Marketing – the applied method is in-depth personal interview directly based on interview guidelines These results help author get information to design the study and form the hypotheses that should be tested through quantitative research

- Step 3: Quantitative research is conducted for the purpose of describing the behavior

of process and the way of applying IM by Vietnamese SMEs, and to test the research hypothesis forming

The content of the steps in the survey process is shown in the figure:

Figure 7: The process of implementing the finding awareness, condition, and applied behaviour

IM of Vietnamese SMEs by the author

The research tool is defined as questionnaire, prepared in accordance to the respondent

can complete without assistance of interviewer The questionnaire consists of 14 major

questions, besides the fundamental information of enterprise this is divided into four main

contents: (1) The first section’s content focuses on testing the hypothesis of cognitive and

understanding about IM of the enterprises, (2) the second part’s content learns the reality of

IM activities and tools that enterprises are adopting; (3) the third part finds the process and

the way of conducting IM activity of enterprises; (4) the fourth part learns the assessment of

businesses about IM activity and investment intentions for the next activity

After building, the questionnaire is tested to examine their relevance to the research

objectives and the research subjects, as well as the form of contact with the study subjects

selected After collecting data, data has collected with 491 votes, sorting, coding and

entrying and processing by SPSS 20.0 software

2.2 The result of studying about the condition and reality of applying IM in

Vietnamese SMEs

2.2.1 The condition of applying IM of businesses

The reality of investment for IT and e-commerce of Vietnamese enterprises is

synthesized and evaluated in the thesis through the following basic operations:

- Computer and Internet connection

- The rate of applying the IT and e-commerce software

- Human resources in IT and commerce; staff training applying IT and

e-commerce

- Investing for website

In the reliable secondary data and collected and accumulated data over the years

by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, we can find that, although the rate is still low,

the Vietnamese companies gradually awares the importance of IT and e-commerce in

general However, it must be confirmed that, with the current investment possibility for

e-commerce in general and IM in particular, enterprises will still face many difficulties

if applying the too complex principle model, requiring the major investments, such as separate departments in charge of IM activity, businesses have to hire private servers to manage website

2.2.2 The awareness about IM of businesses

2.2.2.1 The results of qualitative research in order to detect awareness about IM of businesses

a The awareness about the benefit and possibility of Internet application and IT

in business in general and marketing in particular:

The managers have different perceptions about the Internet - IT and the ability of its application in business operation, including the vague and general or short understand However, managers do not understand all the effects of the Internet that can bring to the business This also reflects the behavior of using Internet of managers

- when they do not understand the Internet and IT so it is hard to use and have orientation in supporting and developing for using in the besinesses

b The awareness about the concept and nature of IM:

This content is done through collecting three open questions: (1) understand how the IM is; doing IM is doing what particular activities are, (2) how companies are in accordance with doing IM; (3) what can IM do for businesses, or in other words what are roles and functions of IM for the operation of a enterprise

The result shows that the managers have misconception about the nature of IM Thus, IM needs to be perceived as a tool to increase operational efficiency and competitiveness of businesses, then it is seen as an end (not true) for the businesses

"having problem" , or in other words, companies “having matter” in business in the real environment that apply IM From here, the author has formed the hypothesis that

the demand of proving through research sample surveys is: the social community exists

a lot of different interpretations of IM, in which there are many ways or misunderstand, or not enough about the nature of it

From these different perceptions, obviously they have different attitudes about investing using this form of marketing in businesses Due to misunderstanding or not full understanding, they will inevitably spend the level of attention undeservedly for the development and using IM, IM does not to promote its inherent efficiency This, in turn, leads to the companies think that the effectiveness of IM is low - ie contributing

to reinforce their misconceptions or incomplete This is a vicious circle coming from the misconception of society, there should be a "nudge from the outside" to help changing this misconception in the community

c The awarness about managing IM in businesses:

The awareness of this issue is explored through three open questions: (1) businesses need to prepare what conditions to apply IM; (2) When do companies need

to perform IM, outsource or not, IM activity is managed by what departments in business; (3) the next intention of the company to invest to IM

The results indicate that managers also have the inappropriate way of managing, as if implementing IM assigned to the departments out of Marketing charge, working with partner hired to perform IM activity also does not manage by the way aiming to serve the Marketing target, separating IM from marketing activities of the business

From here, the author also formes more hypotheses that need to verify through

quantitative surveys: the way of managing of enterprises to IM is inappropriate

d The awareness about process and tool of IM:

Due to the simple or false interpretation of IM that managers have

misunderstanding about the process and tool of IM

In terms of process, no one fully understands the process steps doing IM In terms

of the tools can be applied in IM, the majority, if not all, focus on email, website and

online advertisement (on the electronic media or social networking sites) From here,

the author establishes more hypotheses that should be tested through practical

quantitative investigation: the enterprises are adopting wrongly or incompletely about

process and tool of IM

In addition, in-depth interview about the process of applying IM also helps the

author reinforce the identify: way of thinking, and doing marketing in general and IM

in particular of Vietnamese SMEs are currently under strong influence of the theory of

Marketing of Philips Kotler, this theory is also being taught primarily in Vietnam This

is one of the important bases for the author chooses the logical framework of

quantitative research design

2.2.2.2 The results of quantitative study examine the hypotheses about awarness of

Internet Marketing for businesses

The test result says that the research hypothesis are formed after studying steps 1

and 2 that are accepted in terms of statistics when infering that the rate of enterprises

having awareness of IM bigger or equal to the proportion of firms in the sample, with

the testing rate is 60% With these assumptions having enough statistical evidence to

accept as above, it can be concluded that:

- Most of Vietnamese SMEs understand that IM is advertising on the network, or

the IM is to create a website and advertise on it

- Most of Vietnamese SMEs say that, activities of IM are technical, due to the

company / personnel have qualification of technology implemented rather than a

normal technology company

- Most of Vietnamese SMEs consider that if implementing IM activity should be

outsourced, but they embarrass in controlling the process of implementing of

partner that often depend on the partner's suggestion

- Most of Vietnamese SMEs tend to separate the management of IM activity from

the marketing strategy, not consider that it is a work of the Marketing function but

also this activity relates to IM (specifically relating to website) will be provided

by the administrative office or the technical department

- Most of Vietnamese SMEs when implementing the specific activities of IM that

do not follow the principle of "the 2Is" of IM, ie they do not seem to respect

personal opinion and haves no one to track interaction with customers

Besides, not enough statistical evidence or not strong statistical evidence to accept

the hypothesis including: (1) the companies tend to understand IM as doing the

traditional marketing in the network, ie no adaptation to the rules on the Internet, (2)

businesses tend to no need to develop strategy and manage the implementation of IM

activities under the strategy

Thus, it can be concluded that the majority of Vietnamese enterprised have misperceptions about the nature, benefit, procedure and guideline implementing IM; this dominates incorrect in principle and not enough behavioral process in their IM application

2.2.3 Behaviour of applying IM of businesses

The study results are classified, arranged and presented in 4 groups according to the level of applying IM of enterprises, including, the businesses that do not apply IM completely (83 firms, or 16.9% of the sample), the businesses use IM as a tool of online advertising (191 firms, equivalent to 38.9% of the sample), the businesses use

IM as a form/tool of direct IM marketing (152 firms or 30.96% of sample size), the businesses apply partial or relatively complete operating procedures of IM (65 firms, or 13:24% of the sample)

Four groups are described in detail on the way of understanding and using IM, including the known IM tools and the strategy in process and the way of applying The result indicates the level of applying IM increases in a positive direction from group 1

to group 4 If the application of IM in enterprise is more strategic, procedural, IM tools are applied as fully as they promote high efficiency, which in turn improves the positive perception of business about the role and the effect of IM, so companies will

be more interested in developing activities Conversely, if companies adopt it as a unsystematic, arbitrary way with nature of the situation it is less likely to promote efficiency and this can not improve the awareness of enterprises on IM, they will be less confident in the effectiveness of this method of doing marketing and no tendency

to develop it

In addition, the survey result in fact also shows that no companies fully comply with the procedures IM They also do not understand all of IM tools, the cases of using, and the steps in the process of implementing IM, the necessity to coordinate with each other and with the marketing activity in real environments The issue of managing electronic presence, creating the content associated with users/customers, maintaining the attractiveness and strategic rationality of e- presence are not also fully awared fully and done properly follow nature by businesses

Based on these findings after reviewing the theoretical model of IM, analyzing the condition of applying tham in Vietnam, and learn the way of thinking, doing as well as the condition of applying IM in Vietnam, the author proposes the IM application process in chapter 3

CHAPTER 3 PROPOSING THE PROCESS OF APPLYING IM IN VIETNAMESE SMEs

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3.1 The model of applied process of IM in business reality of Vietnamese SMEs

3.1.1 Overview of model

The applied process of IM that the author proposes for Vietnamese SMEs is

modelized as in Figure 7

Figure 8: The process of implementing IM for Vietnamses SMEs from the thesis

This model is built based on coordinating 2 models (1) consumer behavior on the

Internet, and (2) strategic model of IM (analyzed in chapter 1), combined with practical

development of IM activity, and adjusted to suit the specific conditions of the business

practices of Vietnam and limited the weaknesses of the two models when applying in

practice and also in accordance with the condition and reality of applying IM

(cognitive and applied behavior) of the companies

3.1.2 The main content of model

The model describes the way and process of applying IM, the starting point is the

analysis of marketing operating environment and understanding the behavior of

customer This understanding is not only applied in making strategic decisions, but

also it can be used to bring out the action of interaction and personalize with customer

in the entire chain of IM operation, in turn, these activities helped more profound

understanding of each individual client and help businesses make more accurate

decisions of Marketing When having business orientation with Internet environment,

these businesses must analyze not only the elements of real environment, but also the the Internet environment, both customer in real and Internet environmental, especially when IM towards target customers that are different from traditional objective customers of businesses

The next step is to build a common strategy of MKT (choosing target customer, positioning strategy, differentiation strategy, brand strategy .) with 2 major components as MKT strategy for real environment and Internet environment Meanwhile the enterprises need to identify the individual part of each strategy and the interference For example, with identifying the target market, it’s necessary to identify what is the objective customer in real environment, which customer that can reach and serve by the tools of IM, which customer only for the Internet environment

With MKT strategy in real environment, and the current MKT trend, we need to

be interested in the strategy of MKT mix tool, brand strategy with the brand's presence

on the point of contact with customer, and strategy of customer relationship management (CRM) With enterprises moving operation to the Internet environment (moving online), also need to identify strategies of MKT-mix online, manage the brand's presence on the online point of contact and online customer relationship management strategy For each component strategy, we should also determine what is private sector and interference For example, when managing the brand's presence to ensure the brand image goal, we need to ensure the consistency of image in real and Internet environments, as well as choose to coordinate the tools between 2 environments Especially, it’s noted that content strategy or content of electronic presence, it means that in addition to the unity of "appearance" image, then "inner part"

or depth of the electronic presence is very important This is to ensure the attractiveness and durable adhesion to the target customers of the product/brand, and this is a very important cultural characteristic or characteristics of Vietnamese consumer behavior- as the research context indicated Or such customer relationship management, the companies need to take note of information about customer on real environment resources and Internet resources, the customer portfolio management activities, experience management of customer, creating value for customer or customer lifecycle management (win, keep and develop customer) also require the coordination in two environments reasonably and consistently Also, we need to note the specific in activity in the Internet environment, especially problems "the 2Is" – the interactivity and personalization of each and every component strategy This means that, for each activity in the Internet environment, the enterprises need to care about the interaction with customer and use the deep understanding about customer to make

"material" for such interactive activities, and through that have better understanding about customer, from that having marketing activities with personalization for each customer, creating the long cohesion, converting them from potential customer into actual faithful customer These interactive and personalized activities will provide additional information for the sales and marketing department in real environment to optimize marketing activities of the entire enterprise, including activities in real and Internet environments