Executive summary
Online marketing has with time become the most convenient way of buying and selling merchandise. The online methods of payment are the most lucrative methods to earn cash fast with great ease. This is made possible by the several card companies including Visa and MasterCard. In the modern world, all needed is one to give the card number to the online store upon which funds are deducted, and hence payments made. This method of payment had become the most popular payment method up until other systems, where emails make payments we’re introduced. In the latter system, one needs to create an account with companies such as PayPal. PayPal then handles your payments and receipts of payments after, of course your authorization.
Problem statement
PayPal system has become of so much help to many online shoppers. It is not only because of its easy to use interface but also due to its convenience. For this reason, online stores have enabled their systems in such a way as to accept PayPal payments. For this reason, many people have since registered for PayPal accounts thereby increasing the client base for the payment methods company. From this reasoning, it is in order to conclude that the online stores are not at all independent of PayPal. Both firms rely on each other, and one would not work as efficiently in the absence of the other. This theory brought me to the will to conduct a research on the proposed PayPal spin off of eBay.
Background information
EBay is one of the largest online stores in the world. So being the case, the number of shoppers who use eBay and PayPal is also large. The store, therefore, formed a good case study to use for research on how dependent the PayPal system and online stores are. For this reason, a hypothesis was formulated to guide through the experiment and also to form a framework for what would be researched. The hypothesis was based on the topic of study which is the issue of PayPal spinoff from eBay. The questions to ask here was what people felt about the spinoff. The people that would form a good sample of study would be the people directly involved with either of the two or both companies. The hypothesis formulated was “the PayPal spinoff is uncalled for”.
Method of data collection and sampling design and data collection
It was agreed that interviews would be the best method of collecting this information. For this reason, it was decided that a small sample would be the best due to convenience and would also save time. The sample would include people that would in one way or another be affected by the spin off if it were to happen. These included eBay users, PayPal users, and employees to either or both of the companies and shareholders to both or either of the companies. A sample size of 25 people was deemed as the most convenient, and hence the sample was decided to be25. The materials for conducting the experiment included pens and books on which to record the tally results. Questions for use in the interviews were also formulated. Armed with the guidelines to the interviews and the required tools, the group set out to conduct the experiment.
Data collection
For the qualification to be interviewed, one had to be affiliated to either of the two companies. The experiment was to come to a halt once 25 people affiliated to the companies. By the end of the experiment, 5 employees, 5 PayPal users, 4 eBay users, 7 users of both eBay and PayPal, and 4 stakeholders, had been interviewed. From the interview, 9 of the total people interviewed agreed with the idea of a spinoff, 5 disagreed while the rest 11 did not have a clue about the spin off. When asked whether they would use PayPal without eBay, 12 said they would while 6 said they would not use PayPal in absence of eBay. 7 said that they were not sure whether they would use one without the other.
Data analysis and conclusion
