Pre-conference workshop

Introduction to Internet Business Strategy

22/03/2007 (Thursday). Half day (am)

You can barely eavesdrop on a conversation about the Internet these days without hearing the word strategy. And yet, true business strategy creation that looks ahead 5-10 years and factors in social, economic, and technological dimensions is not that common. While a deep understanding of Internet business innovations would require in-depth study, we can quickly learn and start to use the fundamental ideas.

Internet practitioners and managers will benefit from understanding strategy when designing and selling their work. For example, we can justify major recommendations by going beyond user, market, and technology research to also align with business strategy, striving to be cost effective and creating a competitive advantage.

This workshop will introduce the topic of business strategy, illustrate through case studies how Internet strategy is practiced by online and traditional companies, and enable you to generate strategic ideas of your own that align with organizational goals. Here are some of the questions that we will address:

What is business strategy? How does it differ from a business model, a value proposition, or operational effectiveness?
What are the most popular strategic models and what language is used to describe them?
How does IA/UX contribute to my organization’s business strategy?
How do I combine business strategy with user research and IA/UX research?