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B2C ecommerce has been around for a while now. When compared to B2B ecommerce, B2C  ecommerce is by far the veteran, however according to research conducted by Forrester , by the end of 2013, B2B ecommerce sales will reach $559 billion. This amount is more than twice the amount of B2C ecommerce sales. With that said, it is clear that B2B ecommerce is growing at a rapid rate. What’s so appealing about B2B ecommerce? Providing a B2B shopping environment online for your customers greatly enhances convenience. Customers are able to browse and research products at their leisure any time of the day. Creating this 24/7/365 access is crucial for companies in the global market. How to make your B2B ecommerce web store a hit amongst customers Since B2C web stores have been around longer, many have mastered the art of creating a user-friendly environment that customers enjoy. Think Amazon, for example. Given this fact, it is no wonder why many B2B ecommerce websites mirror some of the more su...

The Lawrence Technological University, (LTU) Entrepreneurial Collaboratory will present a free program, “How to Start and Build a Business,” 9 to 11 a.m. Wednesday, June 5, in room M336 of the Buell Management Building at Lawrence Technological University, 21000 West 10 Mile Road, Southfield. The program, which is free and open to the public, will begin with coffee and conversation at 8:30 a.m. Participants should register at ltu.edu/startabusiness. LTU Associate Professor Jacqueline Stavros, the co-author of “SOAR: Building Strengths-Based Strategy,” and LTU Assistant Professor Matt Cole will discuss the SOAR (strengths, opportunities, aspirations and results) planning process. An overview of the commercialization process will be provided by Francis “Tex” Criqui, a principal of the consulting firm Technology Highway and the leader of the LTU Entrepreneurial Collaboratory. The program is sponsored by the City of Southfield, the Southfield Area Chamber of Commerce and LTU. For informati...

Josh Little,  senior security consultant of VioPoint, a  provider of IT security and compliance solutions will make a presentatio n during the conference, BSides Detroit 2013 on June 7.  BSides is a community driven event for and by information security professionals. It will be held on June 7-8 at the GM Renaissance Conference Center in Detroit.  Little’s presentation, “A Cascade of Pebbles: How Small Incident Response Mistakes Make for Big Compromise,” will focus on a penetration test that showed gaps in the target company’s incident response process. It will highlight how the incident response short-comings allowed the attacker to stay weeks, days, hours and minutes ahead of the responders. A penetration test is a technique of evaluating the IT security of a network by simulating an attack from external and internal threats. This process involves an active analysis of the system for any potential vulnerability that can come from poor configuration, ...

Streamlined Payment Processing The most recent deployment from Azox is both a business facing and customer facing ecommerce website built on Dynamics GP for BigFireworks . Big Fireworks uses these ecommerce sites to sell fireworks to both consumers and distributors. The different types of fireworks available include aerial assortment packs, firecrackers, fountains, roman candles, three inch finale repeaters and more. Big Fireworks needed a website that would allow potential customers to navigate their broad product portfolio, make purchases smoothly and securely and would have an overall positive impact in order to promote repeat business. Navigability From the homepage, shoppers are provided with a left side menu that separates the various fireworks alphabetically by type. From here, a consumer or distributor can select the type of firework they are interested in, for example bottle rockets. This will take them to a new screen where all variations of bottle rocks are displayed with mo...

Business owners and entrepreneurs who need assistance are encouraged to attend seminars offered by the Oakland County Business Center. The seminars will take place at the Oakland County Executive Office Building Conference Center, 2100 Pontiac Lake Road in Waterford Township. For registration, visit www.AdvantageOakland.com/expand or call 248-858-0783. Marketing Your Business is 6 to 9 p.m. Wednesday, June 5. The course presents practical applications of marketing concepts designed to help small businesses grow. It covers basic marketing tools including market analysis and research. The fee is $40 per person. Financial Management is 9 a.m. to noon, Thursday, June 6 . As an introductory seminar, the course covers the basics of financial management, including how to start an accounting system and how to apply the information from key financial statements to help you manage your business. The fee is $40 per person. Business Research - Feasibility to Expansion is 5:30 to 8:30 p...

Submitted by the American Institute of CPAs, www.aicpa.org/ New York  – Students go to college to get ahead, but many are falling behind in life’s next stages because of burgeoning school debt, according to a national telephone survey of student loan borrowers and their parents conducted for the American Institute of CPAs by Harris Interactive. Three quarters of those surveyed, 75 percent, said they or their children have made personal or financial sacrifices because of monthly student loan payments. While 41 percent have postponed contributions to retirement plans; 40 percent have delayed car purchases; 29 percent have put off buying a house and 15 percent have postponed marriage. Most did not anticipate the financial strain, according to the survey. Only 39 percent said they fully understood the burden student loan debt would place on the future, and 60 percent now have at least some regret over their choice of education financing. “They start out with an anchor th...

In the market for an ecommerce or epayment solution built on Microsoft Dynamics GP? Join Azox this month for a complimentary webinar to learn about our product offerings! Next week we will be hosting three webinars that will provide an overview of our products. The first will cover online bill pay, then secure credit card processing and the final webinar will be highlight our ecommerce solution. All products integrate with Microsoft Dynamics GP. Follow the links below to register. Advantages of Online Bill Payment forMicrosoft Dynamics GP Monday, May 20, 2013 12:00 – 12:30 p.m. EST Web stores that implement Azox Online Bill Pay are able to provide a portal that allows customers to log in and view, print and pay outstanding invoices online. This solution integrates seamlessly with your Microsoft Dynamics GP back office and allows payments to be accepted in a more timely manner. Secure Credit Card Processing in MicrosoftDynamics GP Tuesday, May 21, 2013 12:00 – 12:30 p.m. EST Accept cred...

TROY — The Wayne State University Physician Group will host the second annual Ladie's Night Out Health Crawl, 6 to 8 p.m., Tuesday, May 14 at the Somerset Inn, 2601 W. Big Beaver in Troy. Session topics will span a variety of women’s health issues, including cardiology, dermatology, gynecology, ophthalmology, family medicine, and facial plastic and reconstructive surgery. Hors d'oeuvres and refreshments will be served at 6 p.m., with lectures starting at 6:30 p.m. Registration is required for the free event at events.wayne.edu/rsvp/lno2.

TROY — Prime Office Innovations announces a Lunch and Learn event, “The Cost of Managing Paper: A Great Incentive to Go Paperless!” from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesday, May 14  at Automation Alley Headquarters, 2675 Bellingham Drive, Troy. “According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the average organization spends about $20 in labor to file each paper document, approximately $120 in labor searching for each misfiled document, and $220 in re-creation of a document.” Lunch will be provided and this seminar is free to attend.  Seating is limited.  RSVP to Rachel Kron at rkron@prime-office.com or by calling 586-992-1810. For more information, visit automationalley.com/.

If you are still on an earlier version of eSource, our ecommerce solution for Microsoft Dynamics GP, you are be missing out on features that can take your website to the next level. In addition to improving the code and vulnerability testing, which has enhanced the overall operation of eSource, many new features have been added. Adding and editing products is now easier than ever with built-in CMS and what you see is what you get (WYSIWYG) interface. These features allow you to see text and graphics onscreen while editing, rather than looking at hard code. This will give you an idea of what the final product will look like and is very user friendly. eSource has had filtering capabilities for some time now, but with the latest release these are even better. Now users are able to filter and sort product search results with multiple criteria in each category. This means, if you sell shoes for example, a potential customer would be able to search your web store for shoes that are Nine West...

The Royal Oak Association of Retailers (ROAR) is teaming up with the Royal Oak Restaurant Association to present “Ladies Night Out”, the first big outdoor event of the year of its kind in downtown Royal Oak, 6 to 10 p.m. Thursday, May 9. This event is expected to feature over 50 retailers, salons, and restaurants offering everything from prizes to demonstrations, discounted goods and services, food tastings, food specials and free shuttles. Of the many participants, Emagine Theatre is donating its trolley to shuttle women around the Downtown area from Lincoln and Woodward to 11 and Main; Noir Leather is offering foot massages by “sexy he-men” plus free new product demos and free product samples with a purchase; at Stella Boutique Ladies can make a free greeting card and enjoy free appetizers, desserts and beverages courtesy of Café Muse; Ariana Gallery will feature a psychic, make-up artist, and appetizers served by LA Fitness Musclemen; Wooden Hangers will have a health...

AUBURN HILLS — Oakland University presents "The Physician's Practice: Emerging Issues for Healthcare Providers" — a forum bringing industry practitioners and researchers together to discuss patient needs, practice management, care delivery and information technology support. The forum is 8 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. Thursday, May 9. In addition, a half-day post-forum workshop is scheduled for 8 a.m. to noon on Friday, May 10 at Thomas M. Cooley Law School, 2630 Featherstone Road, Auburn Hills. The cost to attend the forum is $150 and online registration is available. Participation in the Friday workshop is free. For more information, visit oakland.edu/cibre and click on the Health Care Transformation Forum link. For more information, call 248-370-2957 or email tanniru@oakland.edu.

FENTON — The marketing agency 3Sixty Interactive hosted their second webinar in their Digital Lunch Break webinar series “CEO’s Guide to Digital Marketing,” recently.This webinar focused on what CEO’s, business owners and marketers need to know about the digital world. 3Sixty Interactive webinar host, Dale Keipert, explained the steps necessary to decide to plan and execute a successful digital campaign. He stressed the need for a strategy, understanding Return on Effort, market segmentation and more. “We understand that CEO’s, business owners and marketers are feeling frustrated with their digital marketing results. They’ve been told that by simply being online, their business would see results,” stated Dale Keipert, Chief Strategist at 3Sixty Interactive. The webinar, “CEO’s Guide to Digital Marketing,” video and slides is available on their website. View the “CEO’s Guide to Digital Marketing” webinar. 3Sixty has also made their white paper about the “CEO’s Guide to Di...

Azox has recently completed new ecommerce sites built on Microsoft Dynamics GP for two different customers, Panama Jack and Pakedge. The ecommerce websites developed for Panama Jack include a business-to-business site and a business-to-consumer site with a mobile friendly version. Panama Jack sells sun care products including sunglasses, hats, casual apparel for men and women, shoes, bags and totes, beach chairs and umbrellas along with bikes and skateboards. The company also sells indoor and outdoor furniture and décor. For their web store, Panama Jack elected to use several add-on features of our ecommerce solution to make browsing easy for users and also to cross sell products. These features include dimension group and related products. Dimension group is a feature that allows similar items to be grouped together based on defined characteristics, such as size, color, brand or manufacturer. This makes it easier to present a large number of SKUs. The other feature, related products,...