E-commerce, as representing “electronic commerce”, takes advantage of electronic systems like the internet, or world wide web, in order to promote and sell products or services. Electronic commerce comprises almost everything from the purchase of digital goods, products such as eBooks and software that basically only exist on a computer, that can be consumed immediately by the purchaser, to more conventional types of services and physical goods.
There are many significant advantages for a business to consider e-commerce. They include:
- No Geographic Limitations
- New Customers can be Gained Simply Through Search Engine Results
- Considerably Lower Costs Involved in Marketing Goods and Services
- Customers can Locate the Desired Product in a Shorter Period of Time
- Customers can Save Money from Shopping Time and Travel Expenses
- Customers can Easily Comparison Shop
- A Customer can more Easily Take Advantage of Discounts, Coupons and other Deals
- An Increased Amount of Product Information can be Made Available to Customers
- Customer Information can More Easily be Attained
- Businesses can Remain Open 24/7/365 – No Store Closing Time
With an e-commerce web site, the entire world is in effect a prospective customer base. Customers located all across the globe simply have to type a reference to the product or service they are looking to buy into a search engine and, if a business’ e-commerce site shows up in the search results, there is a good probability that the prospective customer will follow the link to the e-commerce store.
A business is bound to experience significantly reduced over-head when they become involved with e-commerce. Along with savings in advertising and marketing costs, there is a savings in that fewer employees are required to maintain an e-commerce business and the exorbitant cost of a prominent physical location for a store is not necessary.
A big advantage for the e-commerce shopper is that the desired product or service can be located in a shorter period of time. There is no need for a physical shopping cart or to roam endless aisles in search what is wanted. There are no travel and time expenses incurred by the shopper. Shopping takes place from the comfort of their own home. Also, a prospective buyer can easily comparison shop by visiting several or more e-commerce businesses for the preferred product or service simply by employing a few clicks of a mouse. And since there are little to no costs involved for travel, or the limitations that can be experienced from the necessity of traveling to physical store locations, customers can more easily take advantage of discounts, coupons and other deals that may be available on multiple sites for multiple products.
With regard to the gathering and distributing of information, e-commerce makes it possible for a business to easily collect customer information to expedite sales or for the purpose of follow-up. Further, an abundance of product information can be made available to the customer for their perusal where it would entail consuming a lot of employee time to deliver the same amount of information to the customer in a physical store.
Probably one of the biggest advantages of a business engaging in electronic commerce is that there are no store closing hours. Prospective customers can shop online 24 hour a day, 7 days a week, 365 days per year. This great search engine driven convenience leads to more sales and the e-commerce operator can reap the benefits simply by making his products or services available online.
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