eCommerce

As internet has grown over the past years, businesses have adapted to it for the better. Sites such as eBay and PayPal would have never existed without the internet. In this blog post I will talk about brick and click, online banking and finally online auction websites.

Brick and Click

Brick and click means that a company operates in store being the brick part, and also online retailing being the click part. A popular case of it is where a customer can order in store and get it delivered directly to their home address or with the opposite of ordering online and getting it delivered directly to the store.  There are many advantages of brick and clicking for both customer and business, firstly I will talk about the advantages that there are too customers.

Advantages for the customer

• One of the main advantages of online shopping is that you can search through thousands of ecommerce sites for one particular item, and you can find the best possible deals for that item without going to a dozen different stores.
• Not only can you save money by ordering online, you could even save petrol costs because big companies like amazon usually offer free shipping, this is saving you postage costs and also petrol costs.
• Feedback and reviews. Most sites have a product feedback/review engine built in, this is a great advantage to see how other people have got on with a particular product and inform you of its pros and cons. A typical feedback/review system usually looks like this; 

Screen shot from www.amazon.co.uk from item Apple iPod touch 8Gb – 4^th Generation

As you can see, you also have to share your own thoughts about the product with others.

•    Without having to plan a shopping trip out with the family at a specific time you can simply go onto the website and order whenever, any time of the day. A companies online store is always open.
• Normally a store in the shops will have a limited range of products, but when it comes to online they usually tend to list all of their current product ranges and all sorts, this is good for people who cant find something nice in store!

Disadvantages for the customer

• Some smaller companies tend to make you pay for postage and packing, this can be a downside if your just putting in a small order and have to pay a ridiculous price for it to be delivered to you.
•  If you order online you usually have no direct contact with the product, so you cant feel what the build quality is like or even try it on to see if it will fit!
• Online has to be done with your debit/credit card, some people do not feel secure about entering the details so this usually deters potential trade.
• Have to wait for it to be delivered to you, this can be very quick but also a very lengthy process.

Advantages for the business

• Online stores are considerately cheaper to run and host compared to renting a shop floor. This helps raise the businesses profits and its why we can get such awesome deals online because they can afford to lower their prices!
• Businesses can get a lot of site traffic from search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing. This is great because I personally use a search engine about 40-100 times a day!
• You never have to close shop doors, you can always stay open without even hiring evening staff.
• Words spread like wild fire on social networking sites, you can see why in my previous blog entrys.

Disadvantages for the Business

• Lots and lots of businesses competing for advertising space to entice new customers!
• Have to constantly update your website for new smartphones, tablets and other gadgets.
• Instead of being able to help a person directly you have to do this over a helpline instead, customers can get frustrated by these. I know I can.

Online Banking

Most high street branch banks such as NatWest and HSBC offer online banking for their account holders. These are called Brick and Click banks. How ever there are banks that operate entirely online such as egg, which started back in 1998 and has grown since. I will talk about the advantages and disadvantages of using online banking.

Advantages for the customer

•  You can get your latest online statement, because yet again online banking is open all day round, anytime of the year unlike high street banks, this makes online banking very convenient for a busy person working 9-5.
•  With online banking you can make instant transfers to anywhere in the world within a couple of clicks, unlike high street banks it usually would take 3-5 working days for the funds to be transferred.
•  Most banks have developers working behind the scenes to develop banking applications for popular platforms such as iOS and android, this is a great advantage because it means you do not even have to be on a computer to make a transfer.
• There is usually no paper! You receive all statements to your email address. This saves paper which is an added bonus.
•  If your bank details get intercepted banks usually offer a compensation scheme. The banks are that confident nothing will happen to your information.

Disadvantages for the customer

• Banks tend to have a very complex security procedure, although people will always try and access your information. This can be very time consuming.
• No in person contact with bank staff, if you do it all online you have no human interaction.

Advantages for the bank

• Banks such as egg operate just online, this saves paying for a shop floor/premises, this saves them a lot of money, and they can then invest that money into security for their site.
• Adapting their system to use online banking will attract a lot of new customers as in this day and age a lot of people are now on the move and do not have time to go to a bank, they would prefer to do it online.

Disadvantages for the bank

• They invest a lot of money into their security system. This can be very expensive, but also pays off after a while.

Online auction sites

Auctions used to be done with a hammer, now its done with a click. Online auction site eBay was founded in 1995 and ever since then it has been growing and growing. eBay works by listing an item you want to go up for auction, then other people search for a particular item that they are interested in and then can place an electronic bid for that item.

eBay has a very unique attraction to it, its called feedback. There are typically 3 different types of feedback that you can receive, Positive, Neutral and Negative. The feedback that you receive can affect your seller % rating, this could be the difference between someone buying your item or not, because realistically you will want would to go with someone who has got 100% seller rating rather than 90.7%. There are many different advantages and disadvantages for both buyer and seller. I will also talk about PayPal, which acts as a middleman.

PayPal is a good feature that is integrated into eBay. Here is a diagram I created to show how PayPal works.

During this process, the buyers bank details are kept safe and the seller does not get to see them, a lot of ecommerce sites now let you pay via PayPal since its just so easy to use, I know id rather give my details to 1 trusted company rather than pay 50 companies that I don’t know how legit they are.

Advantages of online auction sites for buyers

• Find anything you want for a great price!
• Can see how trustworthy a seller is via their seller % rating.
• If you have a broken item you can find broken products that are sold for spares and repairs.
• You are protected by PayPal.

Disadvantages of online auction sites for buyers

• Can get carried away in the last few seconds of an auction and end up paying to much for an item.
• Don’t have a guarantee of getting a specific item unless it has a ‘Buy it Now’ feature enabled.
• Can get caught out in customs if buying items from abroad.

Advantages of online auction sites for sellers

• Can make a business out of selling other peoples items on eBay for them and taking a small commission of the sale price.
• If you’re a good seller, you can become a ‘Power Seller’ and have your own shop on eBay.

Disadvantages of online auction sites for sellers

• You don’t get the full amount that you list it for, I think eBay take a 10% commission on the item, and PayPal also takes 3%.
• It can be very time consuming listing items and packaging them up.