Apart from manufacturing cars, Mercedes-Benz is also manufacturing buses, coaches, limousines, vans and trucks. It has many assembly factories around the globe. Mercedes-Benz comes to Malaysia in 1st January 2003. It was a joint venture between two parties which are Daimler GAG and Cycle & Carriage Banging Bertha which created Demolisher’s Malaysia Sad Bad, now known as Mercedes-Benz Malaysia Sad Bad. The headquarters in Malaysia is located at Meaner TM in Koala Lump where it currently employees over 230 employees serves in administration and sales office.
Their production plant located is located in Pecan, Pang. Mercedes-Benz Malaysia has made a total investment of REARM Million in their production plant and with he collaboration between them and DRY-Which Bertha has made the local assembly in Malaysia possible as it assemble some of the world’s most coveted passenger cars namely the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, E-Class and C-Class as well as the Mercedes-Benz and Mediumistic Fuss commercial vehicles.
The number of cars sold by Mercedes-Benz Malaysia has been increasing every years especially among the corporate people where they put Mercedes-Benz as a benchmark to display their luxuries lifestyle Elements of Customer Interface and print screen If an organization wants to create a website, they need to consider some elements before they created it as it will ease the end-user in the future.
The elements that need be considered are the sac’s of Customer Interface which are: a) Context b) Content c) Community d) Customization e) Communication f) Connection g) Commerce Customer Interface is very important because it provides a platform for the end- user to interact with the organization. Context Basically, the context is about the website layout and design. Context can be divided into three which are Function Design, Hybrid Design and Aesthetic Design. A. Function Design Focus on section breakdown, linking structure and navigation tools b.
Aesthetic Design Focus on colors, graphics, pictures and fonts c. Hybrid Design Balance the output of giving out information in organize manner while putting up interesting pictures, graphics, colors and fonts. As for the Mercedes-Benz Malaysia website context, it falls under the Hybrid Design. Below are the pictures of Mercedes- Benz Malaysia website context: The red circle in the picture above indicate the function design of the website where the end-user can search information that they need such as Newsflash, Financial Promotion, Finance & Insurance Tools and so on.
With these, the end- users will find it useful as it aid them in searching information that they need. As for the yellow circle, it shows the aesthetic design where it combines the elements of curses, pictures, graphics and font. As we can see that, the font color used is black where it is contrast with background color of the pictures. The font says that “Next lead of excellence” where it might attract or create an impression in the mind of the end-users.
Thus, the right combination of those elements is important if we want to create an impact in the mind of the end- users. The picture showed above indicate the integration of both elements of context which are the Aesthetic Design and Function Design where it created the Hybrid Design. In Hybrid Design, not only the end-users are able to obtain the information that they search, they also getting to know what are the things that the organization is really offering to them. This particular picture will appear after we have clicked the red circle.
It doesn’t matter in what pages you are in, if you click the red circle which is specify for C-class model. This picture will appear showing the latest model for the C-class model. In the blue box is the function design where it has the extension of information for C-class model. For example, if we click the facts and figures, another set of information will list out and we can choose what type of information we want to know about. Overall, the layout of Mercedes-Benz Malaysia is organized, friendly user and sophisticated type of website.
Moreover, it does not cluttered because the number of pictures or graphics in it is not overload where it might confuse the end-user about the information that they are searching. Content Content here refer to all digital information in the websites. It can be divided into four dimensions which are: a) Offering Mix Focusing on products, information and services b) Appeal Mix Can be categorize into two which are cognitive and emotional c) Multimedia Mix Inserting the text, audio, image, video, and graphics. ) Content Mix Putting the current sensitive news or less sensitive news Offering Mix Below are some examples of Mercedes-Benz Malaysia Offering Mix: The two pictures showed about the products and information that the end-users can obtained from the websites. The red arrow indicates all the latest categories f Mercedes-Benz car models. If we click on the specific category such as Torture, all the latest car model of Torture will be shown. The pictures above showed about the services that available with Mercedes-Benz Malaysia.
For example, if we click Service & Workshop, we will be redirected to the respective pages of it. The picture above showed the pages that we been redirected after we click the Service & Workshop button. Appeal Mix We can see that Mercedes-Benz Malaysia is using the cognitive approach which is more functional where it indicates reliability and satisfaction. The red arrow is minting to the word ‘Vision Accomplished” where they try to creating perception in the mind of the consumers when they bought the brand new S-Class it means we have fulfill one of goals.
Multimedia Mix The picture above showed the elements of multimedia that the website has. As we can see that, they are various elements of multimedia available in the website such as videos, music, images and text are combined. Community The picture above showed the online communities that Mercedes-Benz Malaysia has. The red arrow shows about the Pinsetters which is one of the social networking communities. If we point out our mouse to it, automatically the things in the yellow circle will shows up where it is a link to go to the Pinsetters online community.
Any event or activities will be updated there so the consumers will know the company activities. Customization Customization is about how the company website in customize the needs and wants for each of their consumers. Customization can be divided into two categories which are: a) Personalization When the user have the authority to customize the information that they want to give such as filling up form, cookies, giving an e-mail account and so on b) Tailoring When the website is customized based on the past behavior of the end-users such as purchased history of the end-users.
The pictures above showed the type of customization that the Mercedes-Benz Malaysia has. It combined both elements of customization. The highlighted yellow box shows the tailoring categories of customization where the consumers can use the model finder to customize the type of car model and payment that they want. The red circle and blue box shows the cookies which fall under personalization category. The function of cookies is to keep all the records of the ND-users activities on the websites and gather data about the user’s behavior.
Communication Communication in customer interface means that how the websites communicate with the users via site-to-user. The highlighted red box shows the email of Mercedes-Benz Malaysia where the users can email out their concern or question to them directly and they will received newsletter if the user engage with them. Whereas the highlighted blue circle and yellow box, show the interactive way of communication for the Mercedes-Benz Malaysia where their consumers can call their customer service via the toll-free number,
Finance & Insurance Customer Service (1-800-22-6237) and Customer Care Centre (1-800-88-1133) if they have any question regarding the things such as finance, insurance, products, services and so on. Connection Connection here means the degree on how the website is linked to other sites. Below are some examples of type of connection used by Mercedes-Benz Malaysia website: The two pictures above showed the connection of the website via Home Site Background. It means that the link will link the user to another new sites but the home site is still in the background.
After the user click on the highlighted red box, they will be directed to the new site as shown in the second pictures. The two pictures above showed the connection of the website via Links. It means that it will take user completely outside of the home site. If the user clicks on the highlighted red box, a small pop up window will come out where it takes the user too completely new site which is outside the home site. Commerce Unfortunately, Mercedes-Benz Malaysia did not have online payment. Thus, there is no e-commerce for it.
The end-users who wish to buy their products deed to locate their authorize dealer and bought it from them. But Mercedes- Benz Malaysia provide an online test drive request, below is the examples of test drive request: After we have filled the form, they will send details information to us regarding our test drive request. Conclusion In a nutshell, Mercedes-Benz Malaysia website provided a good customer interface where they managed to fulfill almost all the criteria for an excellent customer interface where the criteria are Context, Content, Community, Customization, Communication, and connection.
Their website is friendly user ND has sophisticated design which eases their user to use it in searching information that they need. But there are a lot of things that need to be done by Mercedes-Benz Malaysia in improving their website such as giving out adequate information about all their products and services. Therefore, I have a suggestion on how to improve their website. First, need to update all their information regarding their activities such as news about their corporate responsibilities to the social, environment and not what.
So, the consumers will be aware about it. Second, is about their commerce system. Although, we know usually when people want to buy cars, definitely they will find an authorized dealer of the brand they want to buy. Maybe they can introduce new kind of system where the consumers who might have intention to buy their products need to pay a deposit of 3%-5% online so that Mercedes-Benz Malaysia can customize their products properly but if the consumers lost interest in buying their products. They can give back only 1% of the deposit money that has been paid.
