A Web Based Intelligent Training System for SMEs

Roisin Mullins¹, Yanqing Duan², David Hamblin³, Phillip Burrell⁴, Huan Jin¹, Goluchowski Jerzy⁵, Ziemba Ewa⁵, Billewicz Aleksander<sup>5

1</sup>University of Wales Lampeter, UK.
²University of Bedfordshire, UK.
³University of Lancashire, UK.
⁴South Bank University, London, UK.
⁵University of Economics, Poland.

It is widely accepted that employees in small businesses suffer from a lack of knowledge and skills. This lack of skills means that small companies will miss out on new business opportunities. This is even more evident with respect to the adoption of Internet marketing in Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). This paper reports a pilot research project TRIMAR, which aims to develop a web-based intelligent training system to aid small business employees in their learning and decision-making regarding the use of the Internet as a new marketing medium. TRIMAR attempts to contribute to the wider debate on the content and style of training most suitable to small businesses. It aims to identify the training needs of small businesses for Internet marketing at a pan-European level and to seek the most effective ways to address training and support needs with web-based systems. Based on training needs analysis carried out within five European countries: UK, Germany, Poland, Slovak Republic and Portugal, a web b ased system for gaining Internet marketing knowledge and skills was constructed. The system consists of three major subsystems: Self Assessment Tool (SAT), Training Modules (TM), and a Case Retrieval System (CRS). The self assessment tool aims to test the users’ prior knowledge on Internet marketing and directs them to the appropriate level of training. The training module provides two levels of training: basic and advanced. The advanced level of training is supported with a case base, which contains about seventy case studies on small business Internet marketing implementation. The case retrieval subsystem adopts a case based reasoning approach to help managers to learn and to find solutions from similar cases in previous contexts. The system was tested by various users through an online questionnaire. The initial feedback revealed that the case base training approach delivered on the Internet provided a highly appropriate training medium for SMEs.

Keywords: intelligent web-based training, Internet marketing, SMEs, training needs analysis, case based reasoning

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