Articles - eCommerce

eCommerce - What is eCommerce?

eCommerce is the buzz word for electronic commerce or electronic marketing, typically associated with business done over the internet. Most of this commerce is done through virtual servers, providing access to view items through web content. From the website, selections can be made, order information obtained and payments processed all from a series of clicks by the customer. This type of business operation is considered business to consumer processing, like what Amazon does. Some businesses provide business to business solutions, but that is a small portion of the type of commerce on the internet done today.

With business to consumer processing, once a business has a website, managing the orders coming from the website can easily be handled by existing processes and are generally less time intensive than face to face or phone methods of business. All the “sales” portion of the orders has been done by the website, with the customer viewing products at their own pace while providing all the order processing data. The end result is the business only need process the payment then supply the end product through shipping. The advantage eCommerce has over the store front operation is fewer people are needed to manage the business.

Many established businesses find adding eCommerce to their business strategy is an easy process. The fulfilment of orders can be handled by existing staff and the online presence, once established, doesn’t require much up-keep. When they analyse their marketing strategies, they will distinguish between sales done over the internet verses other forms as the selling and marketing is very different. Web shoppers are different than in-store shoppers, so the marketing approach has to be different. Web shoppers rely heavily on search engines to find the products and services they want or need. A business which is ranked highly by the search engines will subsequently get more shoppers than one which might offer better services, but is ranked much lower.

eCommerce has become a huge part of the internet and the business world. By making existing products and services available online, a business can reach customers they couldn’t before, not only locally, but nationally and internationally. Not only does the website provide a potential revenue stream, but it is also advertising at the same time. Even if a customer doesn’t purchase something, they have been exposed to the business. If, in the future, they decide they need that product or service they can always return to the website.