E-Commerce
E-commerce or Electronic commerce is the trade of products and services by way of the Internet or other computer networks. E-commerce pursues the same basic principles as traditional commerce i.e. buyers and sellers come together to exchange commodities for money. But rather than carrying out business in the traditional way in shopping stores or through telephone operators or mail order catalogs, in e-commerce buyers and sellers carry out business over networked computers.
E-commerce is helpful in providing the buyers maximum convenience. They can visit the Websites of numerous vendors round the clock of the day to evaluate prices and make purchases, without having to leave their offices or home from around the world. In few cases, consumers can directly acquire a product or service, such as a music file, an electronic book or computer software, by downloading it on the Internet.
For sellers, e-commerce offers a means to cut their costs and expand their markets. They are not required to build staff or maintain a physical print or store and distribute mail order catalogs. Automatic billing and order tracking systems cut additional labor costs and if the product or service can be easily downloaded, then e-commerce firms consist of no distribution costs involved.
As the products can be sold over the worldwide Internet, sellers have the potential to market their services or products universally and are not restricted by the physical location of a store. Internet technologies also allow sellers to track the preferences and interests of their customers with the permission of the customer and then use this information to develop constant relationship with customers by customizing services and products to meet the needs of the customers.
However, e-commerce also possesses some drawbacks. Consumers are hesitant to purchase some products online. For e.g. online furniture businesses have failed for the most part as customers want to check the comfort of costly item like a sofa before they buy it. Many people also believe that shopping is a social experience.
For instance, they may get pleasure by going to a shopping mall or a store with their family or friends, an experience which cannot be provided online. Consumers are also required to be reassured that their credit card transactions are safe and that their privacy is valued.
In the existence of these few drawbacks, e-commerce has now opened new horizons to versatile the modern age. It sets aside the time, labor, energies and money.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008 at 8:59 am and is filed under Online Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.