My part w/o citations -- Marketing370-Consumer Behavior

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Date Posted: 17:34:14 04/11/02 Thu
Author: Heather
Subject: My part w/o citations

I have the citations done, and will post them later on. But for now, here is what I came up with:
In 1999 bluelight.com was launched by the Kmart Corporation and SoftBank Venture Capital with an investment by Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. Bluelight.com is an independent company based in San Francisco that is majority owned by Kmart. The company was formed to leverage Kmart's assets. "Bluelight.com represents Kmart's Blue light brand online by rewarding customers with nationally recognized products at unprecedented values". The goal was to form a ground breaking e-commerce company for Kmart. Mark H Goldstein, former CEO of the e-commerce company felt that Kmart.com needed to grow from a fast paced start up to a structured solid business.
Bluelight.com's goal is to meet the online shopping needs of more than 30 million Americans who shop at Kmart every week. In light of Kmart's bankruptcy filing, bluelight.com is operating as usual. In addition bluelight.com's spokesman Dave Karraker said that the site is operating as usual and that he doesn't anticipate any problems with the consumer site or the internet service. "We are a key element in their retail strategy, and the internet is an important part of reaching out to customers," Karraker said, "We see ourselves as having a valuable spot in [the company's] strategy." [Lyman] The bluelight.com even contacted the 200,000 subscribers to the internet service to inform them that the service will continue.
According to Gartbner G2 research director Kevin Murphy, Kmart will have no choice but to cut the bluelight.com. Murphy says that the competitors are moving ahead and it would be very expensive for Kmart to catch up. As stated by the Nielsen/Net ratings senior analyst, the bluelight.com site has struggled against the online competition since the beginning. Uncertainty is nothing unusual for Kmart's online decision.
Some analysts believe that bluelight.com has a decent chance of surviving the troubles that Kmart has been experiencing. Bluelight.com has lowered its costs a lot in the recent months. However, Bluelight doesn't appear to be the company that Kmart had originally hoped for. This company was designed to be separate for Kmart, but has been folded back into Kmart. Most of the bluelight.com management duties are being handled by the parent company in Troy, Michigan. Karraker say that the company has lowered its operating costs by 75 % since August 1, 2001.
The main competitors for bluelight.com are Target.com and Walmart.com. All of these web sites are pretty self explanatory. The sites serve their purpose as online retailers, and are not difficult to navigate. Bluelight.com and Walmart.com both offer internet access for their customers. All of the sites offer the site search engine, and basic information related to the online shopping.
The main strength for bluelight.com is that the blue light specials for the day and the Martha Stewart everyday links are for the most part prominent on the home page. This is very important because these are two important features for Kmart's image being portrayed to the customer. The site also allows you to search for a product by an item number. This is good for repeat customers who enter the item number to get to the product as soon as possible. A major weakness of bluelight.com is the location and set up of the product categories. It would be helpful to new and returning customers to have more prominent links to the product categories. The biggest weakness on the bluelight.com web site is that the site lacks emphasis on the fact that the business is a subsidiary of Kmart, and is selling Kmart products. I is necessary to diminish any confusion a customer may have as to whose site is actually being visited. A person that is not familiar with the blue light special, may be confused about what web site they are browsing.
The Target.com web site home page is very organized. This site is by far the most organized out of the three main competitors. Every link seems to be in a very good location. All categories are easily accessible. The Target.com site seems to be about more than just shopping. There is a community link as well as links to other web sites. There are also many links to Spring related items and even items that Target recommends. The only weakness with Target.com as compared to the competition's, could possibly be that the site does not off internet access. However, this is not a big weakness because Target.com is a retailer, and may not have any desire to be in the internet service provider business.
The Walmart.com web site is also better organized than bluerlight.com. All the categories are right at the top of the home page an dare easily accessible. Walmart.com is the only of the three main competitors to have their slogan on the site. This is a strength because it allows for familiarity. The fact that the Wal-Mart. Com doesn't have to heavily promote sales, reminds a customer of how low the prices are on an every day basis. Another strength of Walmart.com is that there is a link at the top to the home page for new customer to click on for them to "get started". A difference between Walmart.com and the competitors would be the fact that there is no flyer available for viewing online.

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