3 Myths About Ecommerce
One of the clearest advantages of an electronic channel, represented by e-commerce sites, is the ability for the company to get in touch with their end-customers without an intermediary.
Therefore the capability to recognize and treat each customer individually in a personalized way (mass customization). Many bank sites ask to their customers to specify their needs or interests; for example, a customer could be serious about financing services, others in asset management services and so on. The result is a customer "profile", which produces a corresponding profile for the commercial offer: consequently the website reconfigures itself on the foundation of the interests declared by the customer and shows only offers which are presumed to be compatible with his needs.
Direct contact with the market also allows companies to provide better technical details about the product. This relieves sellers from having to reply to to customer's questions and permits the product's features and functionalities to be properly presented to customers, something that was not absolutely assured when product illustration is done through intermediaries, due to wholesalers and shop assistants.
Through e-commerce, sites marketing messages are presented correctly, the strengths of the products are clearly highlighted to customers and different features in comparison to competing products may be adequately emphasized.
A significant advantage of direct contact with the customer is that the company can receive real-time feedback from the market.
By studying online purchases made by customers, the website pages most frequently accessed by users or email messages sent by customers, the company will immediately realize how the market has seen a new product. They may react with a whole new advertise campaign. The collection of these facts can be used to quickly correct any errors in marketing. Rather than using the old information channels, companies should expect to have more opportunities to catch weak but worrying signals.
Through e-commerce Sites trading operations may also be performed more quickly and effectively.
A price change, if approved, may be seen by all at once, avoiding sales clerks or sellers mistakes. A commercial campaign, published on a website, becomes immediately operational for the entire market, without spending time for you to align the sales forces to the new directives.
In the matter of digital products, the electronic channel ensures the immediate delivery of goods with no need to produce a physical copy of the product sent to the customer. Even in the matter of physical products sellers can achieve considerable benefits if you take orders using the net. Requests online arrive in real time to sales management, which alleviates the need for one or even more central warehouses, saving within the storage of goods in periphery warehouses.
An extreme effect of electronic commerce can be represented through the reorganization of the commercial sector, with the disappearance of some figures like commercial intermediaries and also the restructuring of the supply chain upstream from the producer.
A computer company that receives orders from customers only by an e-commerce website could easily get replenishment orders of computer components to its suppliers and taking delivery of what is only necessary to meet its commitments to customers. This would generate a really efficient supply chain by reducing inventory and work-in-process.
A digital commercial network allows for greater flexibility with respect to a physical network. A crowded shop can not attract other customers, whom shall keep away from it.
The Net sites, if properly dimensioned, can handle spikes of visitors without visible degradation of response times (web sites for visit your url example Microsoft or Yahoo handle several million hits a day).
The e-shops also can stay open twenty four hours a day, seven days per week, answering questions from all over the world without worry or timetables or holidays. Flexibility can also be in terms of ability to respond to marketplace. Using information gathered in real time through its websites, the company can modify its proposals, promoting products which have difficulties, making more attractive deals if users indicate weakness in respect to competition. When compared with a conventional commercial network through which the company proposes more products than the market's demand, for e-commerce it really is the opposite. The market "pulls" and also the company follows, trying to stimulate demand, but only from the inclinations observed within the market.
The e-commerce also brings new business opportunities
The ability to sell directly online to a wide audience of customers may generate new areas of business. It's, by way of example, the situation of financial information within the evolution of financial markets (stock exchanges, foreign exchange, etc.). You can find several Internet providers who joined this business that sell quotes, financial news in real time, or offer possibilities to work online throughout the stock exchange. In general it's possible to create many information selling services, which customers are disposed to pay. Currently you can subscribe to a market research firm in order to receive studies and research reports from their Internet sites. One area where new services are developing rapidly is tourism. In this area, you can find numerous Information Providers that enable you to get information about tourist destinations and make reservations at hotels. By way of example, the subsector for skiing holidays is developing a really strong competition on the internet between French regions, Swiss cantons and Italian valleys, with very interesting opportunities from tourist perspective.
