ADVERTISING

Hi,friends,by this post i would enable you to know about advertising,which is the most powerful tool in marketing,to create awreness about our brand or product in the market..
     some content has taken from wikepedia...

Advertising, direct marketing and trade promotion

English-language advertising in India is among the most creative in the world. TV advertising (especially in the Hindi language) has made major headway in the past 10 years, especially with the advent of satellite TV. Hindi TV channels - such as ZEE and Sony TV - have fashioned themselves on lines of Western channels, and most advertising on such channels is glitzy, smart and tailored for the middle classes. Such channels have forced the state-owned channel, Doordarshan, to add spice to their programmes which, earlier, were quite drab. The importance of the Hindi-speaking market (which is also fluent in English) is borne out from the fact that STAR TV, once an all-English channel, is now rich in Hindi programmes. Even the British Broadcasting Corporation is reportedly toying with the idea of airing Hindi programmes.

Most major international advertising firms have chosen local Indian partners for their work in this market. Mumbai (formerly Bombay) remains the centre of the advertising business in India.

India has a diverse and growing number of daily newspapers. Since 1991, the increase of business and financial news reports in English-language and vernacular dailies has paralleled the economic reform programme and the movements of the stock markets. Most leading publications have their circulation audited by the Audit Bureau of Circulation which has an India-dedicated office in Mumbai (formerly Bombay).

Leading business newspapers include Business Standard and  Economic Times. Magazines include India Today, Business India , Business Today, and Business World.

In addition to advertising, other kinds of trade promotion activities are also well-developed in India. A large of exhibitions are held all over India, the most prominent ones at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi. Conferences and seminars are also widespread. 

Direct marketing

The mail service in India is slow though generally reliable. Telephone service is poor, but rapidly improving.

While private courier services are growing strongly and the telecommunications sector is opening up for a range of modern services, until goods can be ordered conveniently and delivered with certainty, direct marketing will be limited to door-to-door sales. An inefficient state-owned banking system also prevents prompt transfers of funds from consumers to retailers. Credit card companies are increasingly targeting India's one million cardholders through directly-mailed offers of goods and services.

The most successful direct marketers in India today are the millions of door-to-door sales representatives who visit neighborhoods and villages across India. From ice cream vendors to carpet sellers, India 's residential neighbourhoods are frequently visited by merchants offering a variety of products. Some soft-drink companies have used beauty queens to make surprise knocks on the doors!

Advertising is a form of communication intended to persuade an audience (viewers, readers or listeners) to purchase or take some action upon products, ideals, or services. It includes the name of a product or service and how that product or service could benefit the consumer, to persuade a target market to purchase or to consume that particular brand. These brands are usually paid for or identified through sponsors and viewed via various media. Advertising can also serve to communicate an idea to a large number of people in an attempt to convince them to take a certain action.
Commercial advertisers often seek to generate increased consumption of their products or services through branding, which involves the repetition of an image or product name in an effort to associate related qualities with the brand in the minds of consumers. Non-commercial advertisers that spend money to advertise items other than a consumer product or service include political parties, interest groups, religious organizations and governmental agencies. Nonprofit organizations may rely on free modes of persuasion, such as a public service announcement.
Modern advertising developed with the rise of mass production in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Mass media can be defined as any media meant to reach a mass amount of people. Different types of media can be used to deliver these messages, including traditional media such as newspapers, magazines, television, radio, outdoor or direct mail; or new media such as websites and text messages. Advertising may be placed by an advertising agency on behalf of a company or other organization.
MARKETING MIX

The marketing mix has been the key concept to advertising. The marketing mix was suggested by Jeremy McCarthy, professor at Harvard Business School, in the 1960s. The marketing mix consists of four basic elements called the four P’s Product is the first P representing the actual product. Price represents the process of determining the value of a product. Place represents the variables of getting the product to the consumer like distribution channels, market coverage and movement organization. The last P stands for Promotion which is the process of reaching the target market and convincing them to go out and buy the product

 TYPES OF ADVERTISING

Virtually any medium can be used for advertising. Commercial advertising media can include wall paintings, billboards, street furniture components, printed flyers and rack cards, radio, cinema and television adverts, web banners, mobile telephone screens, shopping carts, web popups, skywriting, bus stop benches, human billboards, magazines, newspapers, town criers, sides of buses, banners attached to or sides of airplanes ("logojets"), in-flight advertisements on seatback tray tables or overhead storage bins, taxicab doors, roof mounts and passenger screens, musical stage shows, subway platforms and trains, elastic bands on disposable diapers,doors of bathroom stalls,stickers on apples in supermarkets, shopping cart handles (grabertising), the opening section of streaming audio and video, posters, and the backs of event tickets and supermarket receipts. Any place an "identified" sponsor pays to deliver their message through a medium is advertising.

  WE DISCUSS IN DETAIL IN FURTHER POSTS

SUPPLYCHAIN MANAGEMENT

HI, readers by this post iwould enable students to know a little about supplychaain management.For references searnch in WIKEPEDIA

 
Supply Chain Management (SCM) is the management of a network of interconnected  involved in the ultimate provision of product and service packages required by end customers (Harland, 1996). Supply Chain Management spans all movement and storage of rawmaterial  work-in-process inventory, and finished goods from point of origin to point of consumption (supply chain
Another definition is provided by the APICS Dictionary when it defines SCM as the "design, planning, execution, control, and monitoring of supply chain activities with the objective of creating net value, building a competitive infrastructure, leveraging worldwide logistics, synchronizing supply with demand, and measuring performance globally."

 Definitions

More common and accepted definitions of Supply Chain Management are:

• Supply Chain Management is the systemic, strategic coordination of the traditional business functions and the tactics across these business functions within a particular company and across businesses within the supply chain, for the purposes of improving the long-term performance of the individual companies and the supply chain as a whole (Mentzer et. al., 2001).^[2]

• A customer focused definition is given by Hines (2004:p76) "Supply chain strategies require a total systems view of the linkages in the chain that work together efficiently to create customer satisfaction at the end point of delivery to the consumer. As a consequence costs must be lowered throughout the chain by driving out unnecessary costs and focusing attention on adding value. Throughput efficiency must be increased, bottlenecks removed and performance measurement must focus on total systems efficiency and equitable reward distribution to those in the supply chain adding value. The supply chain system must be responsive to customer requirements." ^[3]

• Global Supply Chain Forum - Supply Chain Management is the integration of key business processes across the supply chain for the purpose of creating value for customers and stakeholders (Lambert, 2008)^[4].

• According to the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP), Supply chain management encompasses the planning and management of all activities involved in sourcing, procurement, conversion, and logistics management. It also includes the crucial components of coordination and collaboration with channel partners, which can be suppliers, intermediaries, third-party service providers, and customers. In essence, supply chain management integrates supply and demand management within and across companies. More recently, the loosely coupled, self-organizing network of businesses that cooperate to provide product and service offerings has been called the Extended Enterprise.

A supply chain, as opposed to supply chain management, is a set of organizations directly linked by one or more of the upstream and downstream flows of products, services, finances, and information from a source to a customer. Managing a supply chain is 'supply chain management' (Mentzer et. al., 2001).^[5]
Supply chain management software includes tools or modules used to execute supply chain transactions, manage supplier relationships and control associated business processes.
Supply chain event management (abbreviated as SCEM) is a consideration of all possible events and factors that can disrupt a supply chain. With SCEM possible scenarios can be created and solutions devised.

Problems addressed by Supply Chain Management

Supply chain management must address the following problems:

• Distribution Network Configuration: number, location and network missions of suppliers, production facilities, distribution centers, warehouses, cross-docks and customers.
• Distribution Strategy: questions of operating control (centralized, decentralized or shared); delivery scheme, e.g., direct shipment, pool point shipping, cross docking, DSD (direct store delivery), closed loop shipping; mode of transportation, e.g., motor carrier, including truckload, LTL, parcel; railroad; intermodal transport, including TOFC (trailer on flatcar) and COFC (container on flatcar); ocean freight; airfreight; replenishment strategy (e.g., pull, push or hybrid); and transportation control (e.g., owner-operated, private carrier, common carrier, contract carrier, or 3PL).
• Trade-Offs in Logistical Activities: The above activities must be well coordinated in order to achieve the lowest total logistics cost. Trade-offs may increase the total cost if only one of the activities is optimized. For example, full truckload (FTL) rates are more economical on a cost per pallet basis than less than truckload (LTL) shipments. If, however, a full truckload of a product is ordered to reduce transportation costs, there will be an increase in inventory holding costs which may increase total logistics costs. It is therefore imperative to take a systems approach when planning logistical activities. These trade-offs are key to developing the most efficient and effective Logistics and SCM strategy.
• Information: Integration of processes through the supply chain to share valuable information, including demand signals, forecasts, inventory, transportation, potential collaboration, etc.
• Inventory Management: Quantity and location of inventory, including raw materials, work-in-progress (WIP) and finished goods.
• Cash-Flow: Arranging the payment terms and methodologies for exchanging funds across entities within the supply chain.

Supply chain execution means managing and coordinating the movement of materials, information and funds across the supply chain. The flow is bi-directional.

Activities/functions

Supply chain management is a cross-function approach including managing the movement of raw materials into an organization, certain aspects of the internal processing of materials into finished goods, and the movement of finished goods out of the organization and toward the end-consumer. As organizations strive to focus on core competencies and becoming more flexible, they reduce their ownership of raw materials sources and distribution channels. These functions are increasingly being outsourced to other entities that can perform the activities better or more cost effectively. The effect is to increase the number of organizations involved in satisfying customer demand, while reducing management control of daily logistics operations. Less control and more supply chain partners led to the creation of supply chain management concepts. The purpose of supply chain management is to improve trust and collaboration among supply chain partners, thus improving inventory visibility and the velocity of inventory movement.
Several models have been proposed for understanding the activities required to manage material movements across organizational and functional boundaries. SCOR is a supply chain management model promoted by the Supply Chain Council. Another model is the SCM Model proposed by the Global Supply Chain Forum (GSCF). Supply chain activities can be grouped into strategic, tactical, and operational levels . The CSCMP has adopted The American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC) Process Classification Framework^SM a high-level, industry-neutral enterprise process model that allows organizations to see their business processes from a cross-industry viewpoint^[6].

 Strategic Level

• Strategic network optimization, including the number, location, and size of warehousing, distribution centers, and facilities.
• Strategic partnerships with suppliers, distributors, and customers, creating communication channels for critical information and operational improvements such as cross docking, direct shipping, and third-party logistics.
• Product life cycle management, so that new and existing products can be optimally integrated into the supply chain and capacity management activities.
• Information technology chain operations.
• Where-to-make and make-buy decisions.
• Aligning overall organizational strategy with supply strategy.
• It is for long term and needs resource commitment.

 Tactical Level

• Sourcing contracts and other purchasing decisions.
• Production decisions, including contracting, scheduling, and planning process definition.
• Inventory decisions, including quantity, location, and quality of inventory.
• Transportation strategy, including frequency, routes, and contracting.
• Benchmarking of all operations against competitors and implementation of best practices throughout the enterprise.
• Milestone payments.
• Focus on customer demand.

Operational Level

• Daily production and distribution planning, including all nodes in the supply chain.
• Production scheduling for each manufacturing facility in the supply chain (minute by minute).
• Demand planning and forecasting, coordinating the demand forecast of all customers and sharing the forecast with all suppliers.
• Sourcing planning, including current inventory and forecast demand, in collaboration with all suppliers.
• Inbound operations, including transportation from suppliers and receiving inventory.
• Production operations, including the consumption of materials and flow of finished goods.
• Outbound operations, including all fulfillment activities, warehousing and transportation to customers.
• Order promising, accounting for all constraints in the supply chain, including all suppliers, manufacturing facilities, distribution centers, and other customers.
• From production level to supply level accounting all transit damage cases & arrange to settlment at customer level by maintaining company loss through insurance company. ortance of Supply Chain Management

Organizations increasingly find that they must rely on effective supply chains, or networks, to compete in the global market and networked economy.^[7] In Peter Drucker's (1998) new management paradigms, this concept of business relationships extends beyond traditional enterprise boundaries and seeks to organize entire business processes throughout a value chain of multiple companies.
During the past decades, globalization, outsourcing and information technology have enabled many organizations, such as Dell and Hewlett Packard, to successfully operate solid collaborative supply networks in which each specialized business partner focuses on only a few key strategic activities (Scott, 1993). This inter-organizational supply network can be acknowledged as a new form of organization. However, with the complicated interactions among the players, the network structure fits neither "market" nor "hierarchy" categories (Powell, 1990). It is not clear what kind of performance impacts different supply network structures could have on firms, and little is known about the coordination conditions and trade-offs that may exist among the players. From a systems perspective, a complex network structure can be decomposed into individual component firms (Zhang and Dilts, 2004). Traditionally, companies in a supply network concentrate on the inputs and outputs of the processes, with little concern for the internal management working of other individual players. Therefore, the choice of an internal management control structure is known to impact local firm performance (Mintzberg, 1979).
In the 21st century, changes in the business environment have contributed to the development of supply chain networks. First, as an outcome of globalization and the proliferation of multinational companies, joint ventures, strategic alliances and business partnerships, significant success factors were identified, complementing the earlier "Just-In-Time", "Lean Manufacturing" and "Agile Manufacturing" practices.^[Second, technological changes, particularly the dramatic fall in information communication costs, which are a significant component of transaction costs, have led to changes in coordination among the members of the supply chain network (Coase, 1998).
Many researchers have recognized these kinds of supply network structures as a new organization form, using terms such as "Keiretsu", "Extended Enterprise", "Virtual Corporation", "Global Production Network", and "Next Generation Manufacturing System In general, such a structure can be defined as "a group of semi-independent organizations, each with their capabilities, which collaborate in ever-changing constellations to serve one or more markets in order to achieve some business goal specific to that collaboration" (Akkermans, 2001).
The security management system for supply chains is described in ISO/IEC 28000 and ISO/IEC 28001 and related standards published jointly by ISO and IEC.

Historical developments in Supply Chain Management

Six major movements can be observed in the evolution of supply chain management studies: Creation, Integration, and Globalization (Lavassani et al., 2008^a), Specialization Phases One and Two, and SCM 2.0.
1. Creation Era
The term supply chain management was first coined by a U.S. industry consultant in the early 1980s. However, the concept of a supply chain in management was of great importance long before, in the early 20th century, especially with the creation of the assembly line. The characteristics of this era of supply chain management include the need for large-scale changes, re-engineering, downsizing driven by cost reduction programs, and widespread attention to the Japanese practice of management.
2. Integration Era
This era of supply chain management studies was highlighted with the development of Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) systems in the 1960s and developed through the 1990s by the introduction of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. This era has continued to develop into the 21st century with the expansion of internet-based collaborative systems. This era of supply chain evolution is characterized by both increasing value-adding and cost reductions through integration.
3. Globalization Era
The third movement of supply chain management development, the globalization era, can be characterized by the attention given to global systems of supplier relationships and the expansion of supply chains over national boundaries and into other continents. Although the use of global sources in the supply chain of organizations can be traced back several decades (e.g., in the oil industry), it was not until the late 1980s that a considerable number of organizations started to integrate global sources into their core business. This era is characterized by the globalization of supply chain management in organizations with the goal of increasing their competitive advantage, value-adding, and reducing costs through global sourcing.
4. Specialization Era—Phase One: Outsourced Manufacturing and Distribution
In the 1990s industries began to focus on “core competencies” and adopted a specialization model. Companies abandoned vertical integration, sold off non-core operations, and outsourced those functions to other companies. This changed management requirements by extending the supply chain well beyond company walls and distributing management across specialized supply chain partnerships.
This transition also re-focused the fundamental perspectives of each respective organization. OEMs became brand owners that needed deep visibility into their supply base. They had to control the entire supply chain from above instead of from within. Contract manufacturers had to manage bills of material with different part numbering schemes from multiple OEMs and support customer requests for work -in-process visibility and vendor-managed inventory (VMI).
The specialization model creates manufacturing and distribution networks composed of multiple, individual supply chains specific to products, suppliers, and customers who work together to design, manufacture, distribute, market, sell, and service a product. The set of partners may change according to a given market, region, or channel, resulting in a proliferation of trading partner environments, each with its own unique characteristics and demands.
5. Specialization Era—Phase Two: Supply Chain Management as a Service
Specialization within the supply chain began in the 1980s with the inception of transportation brokerages, warehouse management, and non-asset-based carriers and has matured beyond transportation and logistics into aspects of supply planning, collaboration, execution and performance management.
At any given moment, market forces could demand changes from suppliers, logistics providers, locations and customers, and from any number of these specialized participants as components of supply chain networks. This variability has significant effects on the supply chain infrastructure, from the foundation layers of establishing and managing the electronic communication between the trading partners to more complex requirements including the configuration of the processes and work flows that are essential to the management of the network itself.
Supply chain specialization enables companies to improve their overall competencies in the same way that outsourced manufacturing and distribution has done; it allows them to focus on their core competencies and assemble networks of specific, best-in-class partners to contribute to the overall value chain itself, thereby increasing overall performance and efficiency. The ability to quickly obtain and deploy this domain-specific supply chain expertise without developing and maintaining an entirely unique and complex competency in house is the leading reason why supply chain specialization is gaining popularity.
Outsourced technology hosting for supply chain solutions debuted in the late 1990s and has taken root primarily in transportation and collaboration categories. This has progressed from the Application Service Provider (ASP) model from approximately 1998 through 2003 to the On-Demand model from approximately 2003-2006 to the Software as a Service (SaaS) model currently in focus today.
6. Supply Chain Management 2.0 (SCM 2.0)
Building on globalization and specialization, the term SCM 2.0 has been coined to describe both the changes within the supply chain itself as well as the evolution of the processes, methods and tools that manage it in this new "era".
Web 2.0 is defined as a trend in the use of the World Wide Web that is meant to increase creativity, information sharing, and collaboration among users. At its core, the common attribute that Web 2.0 brings is to help navigate the vast amount of information available on the Web in order to find what is being sought. It is the notion of a usable pathway. SCM 2.0 follows this notion into supply chain operations. It is the pathway to SCM results, a combination of the processes, methodologies, tools and delivery options to guide companies to their results quickly as the complexity and speed of the supply chain increase due to the effects of global competition, rapid price fluctuations, surging oil prices, short product life cycles, expanded specialization, near-/far- and off-shoring, and talent scarcity.

SCM 2.0 leverages proven solutions designed to rapidly deliver results with the agility to quickly manage future change for continuous flexibility, value and success. This is delivered through competency networks composed of best-of-breed supply chain domain expertise to understand which elements, both operationally and organizationally, are the critical few that deliver the results as well as through intimate understanding of how to manage these elements to achieve desired results. Finally, the solutions are delivered in a variety of options, such as no-touch via business process outsourcing, mid-touch via managed services and software as a service (SaaS), or high touch in the traditional software deployment model. Supply chain business process integration
Successful SCM requires a change from managing individual functions to integrating activities into key supply chain processes. An example scenario: the purchasing department places orders as requirements become known. The marketing department, responding to customer demand, communicates with several distributors and retailers as it attempts to determine ways to satisfy this demand. Information shared between supply chain partners can only be fully leveraged through process integration.
Supply chain business process integration involves collaborative work between buyers and suppliers, joint product development, common systems and shared information. According to Lambert and Cooper (2000), operating an integrated supply chain requires a continuous information flow. However, in many companies, management has reached the conclusion that optimizing the product flows cannot be accomplished without implementing a process approach to the business. The key supply chain processes stated by Lambert (2004)  are:

• Customer relationship management
• Customer service management
• Demand management
• Order fulfillment
• Manufacturing flow management
• Supplier relationship management
• Product development and commercialization
• Returns management

Much has been written about demand management. Best-in-Class companies have similar characteristics, which include the following: a) Internal and external collaboration b) Lead time reduction initiatives c) Tighter feedback from customer and market demand d) Customer level forecasting
One could suggest other key critical supply business processes which combine these processes stated by Lambert such as:

1. Customer service management
2. Procurement
3. Product development and commercialization
4. Manufacturing flow management/support
5. Physical distribution
6. Outsourcing/partnerships
7. Performance measurement

a) Customer service management process

Customer Relationship Management concerns the relationship between the organization and its customers. Customer service is the source of customer information. It also provides the customer with real-time information on scheduling and product availability through interfaces with the company's production and distribution operations. Successful organizations use the following steps to build customer relationships:

• determine mutually satisfying goals for organization and customers
• establish and maintain customer rapport
• produce positive feelings in the organization and the customers

b) Procurement process

Strategic plans are drawn up with suppliers to support the manufacturing flow management process and the development of new products. In firms where operations extend globally, sourcing should be managed on a global basis. The desired outcome is a win-win relationship where both parties benefit, and a reduction in time required for the design cycle and product development. Also, the purchasing function develops rapid communication systems, such as electronic data interchange (EDI) and Internet linkage to convey possible requirements more rapidly. Activities related to obtaining products and materials from outside suppliers involve resource planning, supply sourcing, negotiation, order placement, inbound transportation, storage, handling and quality assurance, many of which include the responsibility to coordinate with suppliers on matters of scheduling, supply continuity, hedging, and research into new sources or programs.

c) Product development and commercialization

Here, customers and suppliers must be integrated into the product development process in order to reduce time to market. As product life cycles shorten, the appropriate products must be developed and successfully launched with ever shorter time-schedules to remain competitive. According to Lambert and Cooper (2000), managers of the product development and commercialization process must:

1. coordinate with customer relationship management to identify customer-articulated needs;
2. select materials and suppliers in conjunction with procurement, and
3. develop production technology in manufacturing flow to manufacture and integrate into the best supply chain flow for the product/market combination.

d) Manufacturing flow management process

The manufacturing process produces and supplies products to the distribution channels based on past forecasts. Manufacturing processes must be flexible to respond to market changes and must accommodate mass customization. Orders are processes operating on a just-in-time (JIT) basis in minimum lot sizes. Also, changes in the manufacturing flow process lead to shorter cycle times, meaning improved responsiveness and efficiency in meeting customer demand. Activities related to planning, scheduling and supporting manufacturing operations, such as work-in-process storage, handling, transportation, and time phasing of components, inventory at manufacturing sites and maximum flexibility in the coordination of geographic and final assemblies postponement of physical distribution operations.

e) Physical distribution

This concerns movement of a finished product/service to customers. In physical distribution, the customer is the final destination of a marketing channel, and the availability of the product/service is a vital part of each channel participant's marketing effort. It is also through the physical distribution process that the time and space of customer service become an integral part of marketing, thus it links a marketing channel with its customers (e.g., links manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers).

f) Outsourcing/partnerships

This is not just outsourcing the procurement of materials and components, but also outsourcing of services that traditionally have been provided in-house. The logic of this trend is that the company will increasingly focus on those activities in the value chain where it has a distinctive advantage, and outsource everything else. This movement has been particularly evident in logistics where the provision of transport, warehousing and inventory control is increasingly subcontracted to specialists or logistics partners. Also, managing and controlling this network of partners and suppliers requires a blend of both central and local involvement. Hence, strategic decisions need to be taken centrally, with the monitoring and control of supplier performance and day-to-day liaison with logistics partners being best managed at a local level.

g) Performance measurement

Experts found a strong relationship from the largest arcs of supplier and customer integration to market share and profitability. Taking advantage of supplier capabilities and emphasizing a long-term supply chain perspective in customer relationships can both be correlated with firm performance. As logistics competency becomes a more critical factor in creating and maintaining competitive advantage, logistics measurement becomes increasingly important because the difference between profitable and unprofitable operations becomes more narrow. A.T. Kearney Consultants (1985) noted that firms engaging in comprehensive performance measurement realized improvements in overall productivity. According to experts, internal measures are generally collected and analyzed by the firm including

1. Cost
2. Customer Service
3. Productivity measures
4. Asset measurement, and
5. Quality.

External performance measurement is examined through customer perception measures and "best practice" benchmarking, and includes 1) customer perception measurement, and 2) best practice benchmarking.
h)Warehoising Management : As a case of reducing company cost & expenses, warehousing management is carrying the valuable role against operations. In case of perfect storing & office with all convenient facilities in company level, reducing manpower cost, dispatching authority with on time delivery, loading & unloading facilities with proper area, area for service station, stock management system etc.
Components of Supply Chain Management are as follows: 1. Standardization 2. Postponement 3. Customization

Theories of supply chain management

Currently there is a gap in the literature available on supply chain management studies: there is no theoretical support for explaining the existence and the boundaries of supply chain management. A few authors such as Halldorsson, et al. (2003), Ketchen and Hult (2006) and Lavassani, et al. (2008^b) have tried to provide theoretical foundations for different areas related to supply chain by employing organizational theories. These theories include:

• Resource-Based View (RBV)
• Transaction Cost Analysis (TCA)
• Knowledge-Based View (KBV)
• Strategic Choice Theory (SCT)
• Agency Theory (AT)
• Institutional theory (InT)
• Systems Theory (ST)
• Network Perspective (NP)

 Supply Chain Centroids

In the study of supply chain management, the concept of centroids has become an important economic consideration. A centroid is place that has a high proportion of a country’s population and a high proportion of its manufacturing, generally within 500 mi (805 km). In the U.S., two major supply chain centroids have been defined, one near Dayton, Ohio and a second near Riverside, California.
The centroid near Dayton is particularly important because it is closest to the population center of the US and Canada. Dayton is within 500 miles of 60% of the population and manufacturing capacity of the U.S., as well as 60 percent of Canada’s population^[. The region includes the Interstate 70/75 interchange, which is one of the busiest in the nation with 154,000 vehicles passing through in a day. Of those, anywhere between 30 percent and 35 percent are trucks hauling goods. In addition, the I-75 corridor is home to the busiest north-south rail route east of the Mississippi. ^[

[ Tax efficient supply chain management

Tax Efficient Supply Chain Management is a business model which consider the effect of Tax in design and implementation of supply chain management. As the consequence of Globalization, business which is cross-nation should pay different tax rates in different countries. Due to the differences, global players have the opportunity to calculate and optimize supply chain based on tax efficiency^[legally. It is used as a method of gaining more profit for company which owns global supply chain.

 Supply chain sustainability

Supply chain sustainability is a business issue affecting an organization’s supply chain or logistics network and is frequently quantified by comparison with SECH ratings. SECH ratings are defined as social, ethical, cultural and health footprints. Consumers have become more aware of the environmental impact of their purchases and companies’ SECH ratings and, along with non-governmental organizations ([NGO]s), are setting the agenda for transitions to organically-grown foods, anti-sweatshop labor codes and locally-produced goods that support independent and small businesses. Because supply chains frequently account for over 75% of a company’s carbon footprint^[14] many organizations are exploring how they can reduce this and thus improve their SECH rating.
For example, in July, 2009 the U.S. basedwalmart corporation announced its intentions to create a global  index that would rate products according to the environmental and social impact made while the products were manufactured and distributed. The sustainability rating index is intended to create environmental accountability in Wal-Mart's supply chain, and provide the motivation for infrASTRUCTURER for other retail industry companies to do the same.

 Components of supply chain management integration

The management components of SCM
The SCM components are the third element of the four-square circulation framework. The level of integration and management of a business process link is a function of the number and level, ranging from low to high, of components added to the link (Ellram and Cooper, 1990; Houlihan, 1985). Consequently, adding more management components or increasing the level of each component can increase the level of integration of the business process link. The literature on business process re-engineering^] buyer-supplier relationships and SCM^[suggests various possible components that must receive managerial attention when managing supply relationships. Lambert and Cooper (2000) identified the following components:

• Planning and control
• Work structure
• Organization structure
• Product flow facility structure
• Information flow facility structure
• Management methods
• Power and leadership structure
• Risk and reward structure
• Culture and attitude

However, a more careful examination of the existing  leads to a more comprehensive understanding of what should be the key critical supply chain components, the "branches" of the previous identified supply chain business processes, that is, what kind of relationship the components may have that are related to suppliers and customers. Bowersox and Closs states that the emphasis on cooperation represents the synergism leading to the highest level of joint achievement (Bowersox and Closs, 1996). A primary level channel participant is a business that is willing to participate in the inventory ownership responsibility or assume other aspects of financial risk, thus including primary level components (Bowersox and Closs, 1996). A secondary level participant (specialized) is a business that participates in channel relationships by performing essential services for primary participants, including secondary level components, which support primary participants. Third level channel participants and components that support the primary level channel participants and are the fundamental branches of the secondary level components may also be included.
Consequently, Lambert and Cooper's framework of supply chain components does not lead to any conclusion about what are the primary or secondary (specialized) level supply chain components (see Bowersox and Closs, 1996, p. 93). That is, what supply chain components should be viewed as primary or secondary, how should these components be structured in order to have a more comprehensive supply chain structure, and how to examine the supply chain as an integrative one (See above sections 2.1 and 3.1).
Reverse Supply Chain reverse logistics  is the process of managing the return of goods. Reverse logistics is also referred to as "Aftermarket Customer Services". In other words, any time money is taken from a company's warranty reserve or service logistics budget one can speak of a reverse logistics operation.

 Supply chain systems and value

Supply chain systems configure value for those that organise the networks. Value is the additional revenue over and above the costs of building the network. Co-creating value and sharing the benefits appropriately to encourage effective participation is a key challenge for any supply system. Tony Hines defines value as follows: “Ultimately it is the customer who pays the price for service delivered that confirms value and not the producer who simply adds cost until that point”

 Global supply chain management

Global supply chains pose challenges regarding both quantity and value:

Supply and Value Chain Trends

• Globalization
• Increased cross border sourcing
• Collaboration for parts of value chain with low-cost providers
• Shared service centers for logistical and administrative functions
• Increasingly global operations, which require increasingly global coordination and planning to achieve global optimums
• Complex problems involve also midsized companies to an increasing degree,

These trends have many benefits for manufacturers because they make possible larger lot sizes, lower taxes, and better environments (culture, infrastructure, special tax zones, sophisticated OEM) for their products. Meanwhile, on top of the problems recognized in supply chain management, there will be many more challenges when the scope of supply chains is global. This is because with a supply chain of a larger scope, the lead time is much longer. Furthermore, there are more issues involved such as multi-currencies, different policies and different laws. The consequent problems include:1. different currencies and valuations in different countries; 2. different tax laws tax efficient supply chain management); 3. different trading protocols; 4. lack of transparency of cost and profit.

e BUISINESS

HI,FRIENDS,
by this post let we know in brief about electronic buisiness,
Electronic business, commonly referred to as "eBusiness" or "e-business", may be defined as the application of information and communication technologies (ICT) in support of all the activities of business. Commerce constitutes the exchange of products and services between businesses, groups and individuals and can be seen as one of the essential activities of any business. Electronic commerce focuses on the use of ICT to enable the external activities and relationships of the business with individuals, groups and other businesses
Louis Gerstner, the former CEO of IBM, in his book, Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? attributes the term "e-Business" to IBMs marketing and Internet teams in 1996.
Electronic business methods enable companies to link their internal and external data processing systems more efficiently and flexibly, to work more closely with suppliers and partners, and to better satisfy the needs and expectations of their customers.
In practice, e-business is more than just e-commerce. While e-business refers to more strategic focus with an emphasis on the functions that occur using electronic capabilities, e-commerceis a subset of an overall e-business strategy. E-commerce seeks to add revenue streams using the World Wide Web or the Internet to build and enhance relationships with clients and partners and to improve efficiency using the Empty Vesselstrategy. Often, e-commerce involves the application of knowledge management systems.
E-business involves business processes spanning the entire value chain: electronic purchasing and supply chain management, processing orders electronically, handling customer service, and cooperating with business partners. Special technical standards for e-business facilitate the exchange of data between companies. E-business software solutions allow the integration of intra and inter firm business processes. E-business can be conducted using the Web, the Internet, intranet, extranet or some combination of these.
Basically, electronic commerce (EC) is the process of buying, transferring, or exchanging products, services, and/or information via computer networks, including the internet. EC can also be benifited from many perspective including business process, service, learning, collaborative, community. EC is often confused with e-business
Applications can be divided into three categories:
Internal business systems:
customer relationship management
enterprise resource planning
document management systems
human resources management
Enterprise communication and collaboration:
VoIP
content management system
e-mail
voice mail
Web conferencing
Digital work flows (or business process management)
electronic commerce - business-to-business electronic commerce (B2B) or business-to-consumer electronic commerce (B2C):
internet shop
supply chain management
online marketing
offline marketing
Models
When organizations go online, they have to decide which e-business models best suit their goals. A business model is defined as the organization of product, service and information flows, and the source of revenues and benefits for suppliers and customer. The concept of e-business model is the same but used in the online presence. The following is a list of the currently most adopted e-business models such as:
E-shops
E-commerce
E-procurement
E-malls
E-auctions
Virtual Communities
Collaboration Platforms
Third-party Marketplaces
Value-chain Integrators
Value-chain Service Providers
Information Brokerage
Telecommunication
Customer relationship
Classification by provider and consumer
Roughly dividing the world into providers/producers and consumers/clients one can classify e-businesses into the following categories:
business-to-business (B2B)
business-to-consumer (B2C)
business-to-employee (B2E)
business-to-government (B2G)
government-to-business (G2B)
government-to-government (G2G)
government-to-citizen (G2C)
consumer-to-consumer (C2C)
consumer-to-business (C2B)
It is notable that there are comparably less connections pointing "upwards" than "downwards" (few employee/consumer/citizen-to-X models)

CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

hi, friends as we all know that customer is treated as aking of any buisiness.
nowadays customer relationship management has been emerged as a more vital tool for any buisiness organisation.let we discuss about customer rtelationships

Customer relationship management (CRM) is a broadly recognized, widely-implemented strategy for managing a company’s interactions with customers, clients and sales prospects. It involves using technology to organize, automate, and synchronize business processes—principally sales activities, but also those for marketing, customer service, and technical support. The overall goals are to find, attract, and win new clients, nurture and retain those the company already has, entice former clients back into the fold, and reduce the costs of marketing and client service.Customer relationship management denotes a company-wide business strategy embracing all client-facing departments and even beyond. When an implementation is effective, people, processes, and technology work together to increase profitability, and reduce operational costs.
Related Trends
Many CRM vendors offer Web-based tools (cloud computing) and software as a service (SaaS), which are accessed via a secure Internet connection and displayed in a Web browser. These applications are sold as subscriptions, with customers not needing to invest in the acquisition and maintenance of IT hardware, and subscription fees are a fraction of the cost of purchasing software outright.
Phases of CRM
The three phases in which CRM help to support the relationship between a business and its customers are, to:
Acquire: a CRM can help a business in acquiring new customers through excellent contact management, direct marketing, selling and fulfillment
Enhance: a web-enabled CRM combined with customer service tools offers customers excellent service from a team of trained and skilled sales and service specialists, which offers customers the convenience of one-stop shopping.
Retain: CRM software and databases enable a business to identify and reward its loyal customers and further develop its targeted marketing and relationship marketing initiatives
Challenges
Tools and workflows can be complex to implement, especially for large enterprises. Previously these tools were generally limited to contact management: monitoring and recording interactions and communications. Software solutions then expanded to embrace deal tracking, territories, opportunities, and at the sales pipeline itself. Next came the advent of tools for other client-facing business functions, as described below. These technologies have been, and still are, offered as on-premises software that companies purchase and run on their own IT infrastructure.
Often, implementations are fragmented; isolated initiatives by individual departments to address their own needs. Systems that start disunited usually stay that way: siloed thinking and decision processes frequently lead to separate and incompatible systems, and dysfunctional processes.
] Types/variations
Sales force automation
Sales force automation (SFA) involves using software to streamline all phases of the sales process, minimizing the time that sales representatives need to spend on each phase. This allows sales representatives to pursue more clients in a shorter amount of time than would otherwise be possible. At the heart of SFA is a Contact management system for tracking and recording every stage in the sales process for each prospective client, from initial contact to final disposition. Many SFA applications also include insights into opportunities, territories, sales forecasts and workflow automation, quote generation, and product knowledge. Newly-emerged priorities are modules for Web 2.0 e-commerce and pricing.[1]
[eaeting
CRM systems for marketing help the enterprise identify and target potential clients and generate qualified leads for the sales team. A key marketing capability is tracking and measuring multichannel campaigns, including email, search, social media, telephone and direct mail. Metrics monitored include clicks, responses, leads, deals, and revenue. This has been superseded by marketing automation and Prospect Relationship Management (PRM) solutions which track customer behaviour and nurture them from first contact to sale, often cutting out the active sales process altogether.
Customer Service and Support
Recognizing that service is an important differentiator, organizations are increasingly turning to technology platforms to help them improve their clients’ experience while aiming to increase efficiency and minimize costs. Even so, a 2009 study revealed that only 39% of corporate executives believe their employees have the right tools and authority to solve client problems.“. The core for these applications has been and still is comprehensive call center solutions, including such features as intelligent call routing, computer telephone integration (CTI), and escalation capabilities.
Analytics
Relevant analytics capabilities are often interwoven into applications for sales, marketing, and service. These features can be complemented and augmented with links to separate, purpose-built applications for analytics and business intelligence. Sales analytics let companies monitor and understand client actions and preferences, through sales forecasting, data quality, and dashboards that graphically display
Marketing applications generally come with predictive analyticsto improve segmentation and targeting, and features for measuring the effectiveness of online, offline, and search marketing campaign. Web analytics have evolved significantly from their starting point of merely tracking mouse clicks on Web sites. By evaluating “buy signals,” marketers can see which prospects are most likely to transact and also identify those who are bogged down in a sales process and need assistance. Marketing and finance personnel also use analytics to assess the value of multi-faceted programs as a whole.
These types of analytics are increasing in popularity as companies demand greater visibility into the performance of call centers and other service and support channels, in order to correct problems before they affect satisfaction levels. Support-focused applications typically include dashboards similar to those for sales, plus capabilities to measure and analyze response times, service quality, agent performance, and the frequency of various issues.
Integrated/Collaborative
Departments within enterprises — especially large enterprises — tend to function with little collaboration.More recently, the development and adoption of these tools and services have fostered greater fluidity and cooperation among sales, service, and marketing. This finds expression in the concept of collaborative systems which uses technology to build bridges between departments. For example, feedback from a technical support center can enlighten marketers about specific services and product features clients are asking for. Reps, in their turn, want to be able to pursue these opportunities without the burden of re-entering records and contact data into a separate SFA system. Owing to these factors, many of the top-rated and most popular products come as integrated suites.
Small Business
Basic client service can be accomplished by a contact manager system, an integrated solution that lets organizations and individuals efficiently track and record interactions, including emails, documents, jobs, faxes, scheduling, and more. These tools usually focus on accounts rather than individual contacts. They also generally include opportunity insight for tracking sales pipelines plus added functionality for marketing and service. As with larger enterprises, small businesses are finding value in online solutions, especially for mobile and telecommuting workers.
Social Media
Social media sites like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are amplifying the voice of people in the marketplace and are having profound and far-reaching effects on the ways in which people buy. Customers can now research companies online and then ask for recommendations through social media channels, making their buying decision without contacting the company.
Details on companies are now also shared online. People are using social media to share opinions and experiences on companies, products and services. As social media is not as widely moderated or censored as mainstream media, individuals can say anything they want about a company or brand, whether pro or con.
Increasingly, companies are looking to gain access to these conversations and take part in the dialogue. More than a few systems are now integrating to social networking sites. Social media promoters cite a number of business advantages, such as using online communities as a source of high-quality leads and a vehicle for crowd sourcing solutions to client-support problems. Companies can also leverage client stated habits and preferences to personalize and even “hyper-target” their sales and marketing communications
Some analysts take the view that business-to-business marketers should proceed cautiously when weaving social media into their business processes. These observers recommend careful market research to determine if and where the phenomenon can provide measurable benefits for client interactions, sales and support.. It is often found that people feel that interaction is peer to peer between them and their contacts and resent the company involvement, responding with negatives about that company.
Non-profit and Membership-based
Systems for non-profit and membership-based organizations help track constituents and their involvement in the organization. Capabilities typically include tracking the following: fund-raising, demographics, membership levels, membership directories, volunteering and communications with individuals.
Many include tools for identifying potential donors based on previous donations and participation. In light of the growth of social networking tools, there may be some overlap between social/community driven tools and non-profit/membership tools.
Strategy
For larger-scale enterprises, a complete and detailed plan is required to obtain the funding, resources, and company-wide support that can make the initiative of choosing and implementing a system successful. Benefits must be defined, risks assessed, and cost quantified in three general areas:
Processes: Though these systems have many technological components, business processes lie at its core. It can be seen as a more client-centric way of doing business, enabled by technology that consolidates and intelligently distributes pertinent information about clients, sales, marketing effectiveness, responsiveness, and market trends. Therefore, a company must analyze its business workflows and processes before choosing a technology platform; some will likely need re-engineering to better serve the overall goal of winning and satisfying clients. Moreover, planners need to determine the types of client information that are most relevant, and how best to employ them.
People: For an initiative to be effective, an organization must convince its staff that the new technology and workflows will benefit employees as well as clients. Senior executives need to be strong and visible advocates who can clearly state and support the case for change. Collaboration, teamwork, and two-way communication should be encouraged across hierarchical boundaries, especially with respect to process improvement.
Technology: In evaluating technology, key factors include alignment with the company’s business process strategy and goals, including the ability to deliver the right data to the right employees and sufficient ease of adoption and use. Platform selection is best undertaken by a carefully chosen group of executives who understand the business processes to be automated as well as the software issues. Depending upon the size of the company and the breadth of data, choosing an application can take anywhere from a few weeks to a year or more.
Implementation
Implementation Issues
Increases in revenue, higher rates of client satisfaction, and significant savings in operating costs are some of the benefits to an enterprise. Proponents emphasize that technology should be implemented only in the context of careful strategic and operational planning.[Implementations almost invariably fall short when one or more facets of this prescription are ignored:
Poor planning: Initiatives can easily fail when efforts are limited to choosing and deploying software, without an accompanying rationale, context, and support for the workforce. In other instances, enterprises simply automate flawed client-facing processes rather than redesign them according to best practices.
Poor integration: For many companies, integrations are piecemeal initiatives that address a glaring need: improving a particular client-facing process or two or automating a favored sales or client support channel. Such “point solutions” offer little or no integration or alignment with a company’s overall strategy. They offer a less than complete client view and often lead to unsatisfactory user experiences.
Toward a solution: overcoming siloed thinking. Experts advise organizations to recognize the immense value of integrating their client-facing operations. In this view, internally-focused, department-centric views should be discarded in favor of reorienting processes toward information-sharing across marketing, sales, and service. For example, sales representatives need to know about current issues and relevant marketing promotions before attempting to cross-sell to a specific client. Marketing staff should be able to leverage client information from sales and service to better target campaigns and offers. And support agents require quick and complete access to a client’s sales and service history.
Adoption Issues
Historically, the landscape is littered with instances of low adoption rates. In 2003, a Gartner report estimated that more than $1 billion had been spent on software that was not being used. More recent research indicates that the problem, while perhaps less severe, is a long way from being solved. According to CSO Insights, less than 40 percent of 1,275 participating companies had end-user adoption rates above 90 percent.
In a 2007 survey from the U.K., four-fifths of senior executives reported that their biggest challenge is getting their staff to use the systems they had installed. Further, 43 percent of respondents said they use less than half the functionality of their existing system; 72 percent indicated they would trade functionality for ease of use; 51 percent cited data synchronization as a major issue; and 67 percent said that finding time to evaluate systems was a major problem.[15] With expenditures expected to exceed $11 billion in 2010, enterprises need to address and overcome persistent adoption challenges. Specialists offer these recommendations for boosting adoptions rates and coaxing users to blend these tools into their daily workflow:
Choose a system that is easy to use: All solutions are not created equal. Some vendors offer more user-friendly applications than others, and simplicity should be as important a decision factor as functionality.
Choose the right capabilities: Employees need to know that time invested in learning and usage will yield personal advantages. If not, they will work around or ignore the system.
Provide training: Changing the way people work is no small task, and help is usually a requirement. Even with today’s more usable systems, many staffers still need assistance with learning and adoption
Lead by example: Showing employees that upper management fully supports the use of a new application by using the application themselves may increase the likelihood that employees will adopt the application.
Privacy and data security system
One of the primary functions of these tools is to collect information about clients, thus a company must consider the desire for privacy and data security, as well as the legislative and cultural norms. Some clients prefer assurances that their data will not be shared with third parties without their prior consent and that safeguards are in place to prevent illegal access by third parties

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZAYION

Hi,friends,by this post i would like to discuss,a premier topic,
in these modern internet era all companies and individuals make available their websites on internet by overcoming internettraffic.
HERE ARE LIST OF ALL SEARCHENGINES

General
Ask.com (known as Ask Jeeves in the UK)
Baidu (Chinese, Japanese)
Bing (formerly MSN Search and Live Search)
Cuil
Duck Duck Go
Google
Kosmix
Sogou (Chinese)
Yodao (Chinese)
Yahoo! Search
Yandex (Russian)
Yebol
Geographical limited scope
Accoona, China/US
Alleba, Philippines
Ansearch, Australia/US/UK/NZ
Daum, Korea
Goo, Japan
Guruji.com, India
Leit.is, Iceland
Maktoob, Arab World
Onkosh, Arab World
Miner.hu, Hungary
Najdi.si, Slovenia
Naver, Korea
Rambler, Russia
Rediff, India
SAPO, Portugal/Angola/Cabo Verde/Mozambique
Search.ch, Switzerland
Sesam, Norway, Sweden
Seznam, Czech Republic
Walla!, Israel
Yandex, Russia
ZipLocal, Canada/US
Accountancy
IFACnet
Business
Business.com
GlobalSpec
Nexis (Lexis Nexis)
Thomasnet (United States)
GenieKnows (United States and Canada)
Enterprise
See also: Enterprise search
AskMeNow: S3 - Semantic Search Solution
Concept Searching Limited: concept search products
Dieselpoint: Search & Navigation
dtSearch: dtSearch Engine (SDK), dtSearch Web
Endeca: Information Access Platform
Exalead: exalead one:enterprise
Expert System S.p.A.: Cogito
Fast Search & Transfer: Enterprise Search Platform (ESP), RetrievalWare (formerly Convera)
Funnelback: Funnelback Search
IBM: OmniFind Enterprise Edition
ISYS Search Software: ISYS:web, ISYS:sdk
Jumper 2.0: Universal search powered by Enterprise bookmarking
Microsoft: SharePoint Search Services
Northern Light
Open Text: Hummingbird Search Server, Livelink Search
Oracle Corporation: Secure Enterprise Search 10g
SAP: TREX
TeraText: TeraText Suite
Vivisimo: Vivisimo Clustering Engine
X1 Technologies : X1 Enterprise Search
ZyLAB Technologies: ZyIMAGE Information Access Platform
Mobile/Handheld
Taptu: taptu mobile/social search
Job
Main article: Job search engine
Bixee.com (India)
CareerBuilder.com (USA)
Craigslist (by city)
Dice.com (USA)
Eluta.ca (Canada)
Hotjobs.com (USA)
Incruit (Korea)
Indeed.com (USA)
LinkUp.com (USA)
Monster.com (USA), (India)
Naukri.com (India)
Yahoo! HotJobs (Countrywise subdomains, International)
Legal
WestLaw
Lexis (Lexis Nexis)
Quicklaw
Manupatra
Medical
Bing Health
Bioinformatic Harvester
Entrez (includes Pubmed)
EB-eye EMBL-EBI's Search engine
GenieKnows
GoPubMed (knowledge-based: GO - GeneOntology and MeSH - Medical Subject Headings)
Healia
Searchmedica
WebMD
PubGene
Nextbio (Life Science Search Engine)
VADLO (Life Sciences Search Engine)
News
Bing News
Google News
Daylife
MagPortal
Newslookup
Nexis (Lexis Nexis)
Topix.net
Yahoo! News
People
PeekYou
Ex.plode.us
InfoSpace
Spock
Spokeo
Wink
Zabasearch.com
ZoomInfo
Real property
Fizber.com
Home.co.uk
HotPads.com
Rightmove
Zillow.com
Television
TV Genius
Video Games
Wazap (Japan)
By information type
Search engines dedicated to a specific kind of information
Forum
Omgili
Blog
Amatomu
Bloglines
BlogScope
IceRocket
Technorati
Multimedia
See also: Multimedia search
Bing Videos
blinkx
FindSounds
Google Video
Munax's PlayAudioVideo
Picsearch
Pixsta
Podscope
ScienceStage
Songza
SeeqPod
Veveo
TinEye
Yahoo! Video
YouTube
Source code
Google Code Search
JExamples
Koders
Krugle
BitTorrent
These search engines work across the BitTorrent protocol.
Btjunkie
FlixFlux
Isohunt
Mininova
The Pirate Bay
TorrentSpy
Torrentz
Email
TEK
Maps
Wiki Mapia
Bing Maps
Géoportail
Google Maps
MapQuest
Yahoo! Maps
Price
Bing Shopping
Google Product Search (formerly Froogle)
Kelkoo
MySimon
PriceGrabber
PriceRunner
PriceSCAN
Shopping.com
ShopWiki
Shopzilla (also operates Bizrate)
TheFind.com
Wishabi
Question and answer
Human answers
Answers.com
eHow
Uclue
Yahoo! Answers
Stack Overflow
DeeperWeb
Automatic answers
See also: Question answering
AskMeNow
BrainBoost
True Knowledge
Wolfram Alpha
Natural language
See also: Natural language search engine and Semantic search
Ask.com
Bing (Semantic ability is powered by Powerset)
BrainBoost
hakia
Lexxe
Powerset
By model
Open source search engines
DataparkSearch
Egothor
Grub
Ht://dig
Isearch
Lucene
Lemur Toolkit & Indri Search Engine
mnoGoSearch
Namazu
Nutch
OpenFTS
Sciencenet (for scientific knowledge, based on YaCy technology)
Sphinx
SWISH-E
Terrier Search Engine
Wikia Search
Xapian
YaCy
Zettair
Semantic browsing engines
Evri
Hakia
Yebol
Social search engines
See also: Social search, Relevance feedback, and Human search engine
ChaCha Search
Delver
EarthFrisk.org
Eurekster
Mahalo.com
OneRiot
Rollyo
Sproose
Trexy
Wikia search
Wink provides web search by analyzing user contributions such as bookmarks and feedback
Metasearch engines
See also: Metasearch engine
Brainboost
ChunkIt!
Clusty
Dogpile
Excite
Harvester42
HotBot
Info.com
Ixquick
Kayak
LeapFish
Mamma
Metacrawler
MetaLib
Mobissimo
Myriad Search
SideStep
Turbo10
WebCrawler
DeeperWeb
Visual search engines
ChunkIt!
Grokker
Pixsta
PubGene
Viewzi
Search appliances
Google: Google Search Appliance

SOME OF THE IMPORTANT ENGINES
Google
AOL Search
CompuServe Search
Groovle
MySpace Search
Netscape
Ripple
Yahoo!
AltaVista
AlltheWeb
Ecocho
Forestle (an ecologically motivated site supporting sustainable rain forests - formerly based on Google)
GoodSearch
Rectifi
Bing
A9.com
Alexa Internet
Ciao!
Facebook
Tafiti
Ms. Dewey
Ask.com
Hakia (semantic search)
iWon
Lycos


NOW WE LOOK INTO A BRIEF OF SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the visibility of a web site or a web page in search engines via the "natural" or un-paid ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results Other forms of search engine marketing (SEM) target paid listings. In general, the earlier (or higher on the page), and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search local search video search and industry-specific vertical search engines. This gives a web site web presence
As an Internet marketing strategy, SEO considers how search engines work and what people search for. Optimizing a website may involve editing its content and HTMLand associated coding to both increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines. Promoting a site to increase the number of backlinks or inbound links, is another SEO tactic.
The acronym "SEO" can refer to "search engine optimizers," a term adopted by an industry of consultants who carry out optimization projects on behalf of clients, and by employees who perform SEO services in-house. Search engine optimizers may offer SEO as a stand-alone service or as a part of a broader marketing campaign. Because effective SEO may require changes to the HTML source code of a site, SEO tactics may be incorporated into web site development and design The term "search engine friendly" may be used to describe web site designs, menus, content management systems images, videos, shopping carts and other elements that have been optimized for the purpose of search engine exposure.
Another class of techniques, known as black hat SEO or spamdexinG, uses methods such as link farms, keyword stuffing and article spinning that degrade both the relevance of search results and the user-experience of search engines. Search engines look for sites that employ these techniques in order to remove them from their indices.

AS A MARKETING STRATEGY
SEO is not necessarily an appropriate strategy for every website, and other Internet marketing strategies can be much more effective, depending on the site operator's goals. A successful Internet marketing campaign may drive organic traffic, achieved through optimization techniques and not paid advertising, to web pages, but it also may involve the use of paid advertising on search engines and other pages, building high quality web pages to engage and persuade, addressing technical issues that may keep search engines from crawling and indexing those sites, setting up analytics programs to enable site owners to measure their successes, and improving a site's conversion rate.
SEO may generate a return on investment.However, search engines are not paid for organic search traffic, their algorithms change, and there are no guarantees of continued referrals. (Some trading sites such as eBay can be a special case for this, it will announce how and when the ranking algorithm will change a few months before changing the algorithm). Due to this lack of guarantees and certainty, a business that relies heavily on search engine traffic can suffer major losses if the search engines stop sending visitors. It is considered wise business practice for website operators to liberate themselves from dependence on search engine traffic.A top-ranked SEO blog Seomoz.org has suggested, "Search marketers, in a twist of irony, receive a very small share of their traffic from search engines.." Instead, their main sources of traffic are links from other websites.