Don't skip it. It's focused on how e-commerce activities will affect banking, the channel and the role of new content aggregators. Since nearly every business uses a bank, or is a bank itself, the author's observations on how the financial infrastructure is changing and how new players are emerging to perform activities formerly reserved for banks, are vitally important for planning an e-commerce system. The authors' arguments, of course, may lend themselves to portions of other businesses. But if you're going to disintermediate your channel partners and deal with your customers directly, the authors caution, be sure to learn how to deal with end customers.
Many Web sites are hard to use, and without metrics it's difficult to know where the problems lie.
Remember that on the Web, as the book repeats often, your competitors are only a click away. The book stresses good design principles, and includes a list of 20 tests for evaluating site usability. Even if you're not in one of those markets, there may be common factors that apply to your business. Considering that IBM has been one of the most successful vendors in this area, it's worth a few dollars to spend some virtual time with two of its experts. Craig Fellenstein and Ron Wood.