Ecommerce

Electronic commerce, or Ecommerce as it is widely known, literally refers to business trading using the Internet. It has been inexistence since mid-90s however in the recent few years Ecommerce has gathered much attention from both entrepreneurs and customers owing to the success stories of the business model.

E commerce has proved its importance and has changed the business environment owing to the following factors that play crucial part in buying and selling:

a) Where time is of essence/convenience/ 24* 7: In today’s world time is of paramount importance, it plays a crucial role for both the business and consumers. With ecommerce coming in consumers will save a lot of time during their transactions. With ecommerce a transaction or order

Also the business which could not remain open 24 *7 can now remain open 24*7 and not loose on any customers. It has broken the shackles of a 10 am to 8 pm business hours.

b) Cost effective:

Ecommerce had proved to be more cost effective for businesses as compared to traditional commerce methodologies. This is because, through Ecommerce, the expenses required in involving various middle man to sell the products can be avoided and the money can then be diverted to other more revenue generating aspects of business. For example computer giant Dell run’s most of their business via the internet without involving much of third parties.

Apart from this for ecommerce the total overhead expenses required in running the business is significantly less. For example one can just have a head office from where one can run his ecommerce business as compared to a head offices and a number of other branches which was traditionally required in the businesses for trading in various cities. So the entire cost of rental, staff, and maintenance, required for physical presence gets replaced by a single web hosting cost for the Ecommerce

Ecommerce has made the markets more competitive by destroying geographical obstacles, leading to an urgent need to differentiate, which has made the sellers make products which are more are more customer centric and customized to be aimed at a specific target segment .Also heavy competition has resulted in huge discounts given buy a number of online sites to attract more buyers.

f) Propeller to development:

In global market scenario, Ecommerce has pioneered in opening up various avenues of opportunities for a number of other companies and investors. For example, owing to the boom of Ecommerce, there has been an increase in resources that are being directed into electronic securities, internet facilities, telephonic service centers, business plans and new technologies. As a result of this phenomenon, a wide range of new businesses/ markets have evolved from Ecommerce itself giving a boost to the global market and developing the overall business scenario.

Given if there is not any abrupt obstacle, Ecommerce will certainly continue to mature in the global market and will eventually become not only a launch platform for various new and budding business but an integral part of the business plan of existing business looking to compete in the global market