19-07-2011, 03:46 PM
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What is online-shopping?
Online shopping is the process whereby consumers directly buy goods or services from a seller in real-time, without an intermediary service, over the Internet.
We can say that online shopping is nothing but shopping virtually on the go, in one click.
It is a form of “electronic commerce”. other words used interchangeably are like online shop, eshop, e-store, internet shop, webshop, webstore, online store, or virtual store
Online shopping evokes the physical analogy of buying products or services at any kind of platforms on net. The process is called Business-to-Consumer (B2C) online shopping. Here the retailer or the owner of the online store decides all the constrains about selling.
When a business buys from another business it is called Business-to-Business (B2B) online shopping.
Current scenario
Online shopping has had a rather slow journey in India, it has not picked up as much as it should have primarily due to the fact that internet penetration itself is quite low and secondly (and importantly) the online shopping experience has been bad to say the least.
Although there are grass root problems, I still believe that “Online Shopping in India” is evolving fast and has the potential to grow exponentially in the times to come, as the internet penetration reaches far and wide across the rural area.
Most of us are also a witness to the recent “mall culture” where all the products are available under a single roof and at competitive price points
Online store is also concept like shopping mall where all the products are made available to the customers at single site and with the help of shopping cart customer can customize his products.
Advantages of online stores
Convenience: 24 * 7 availability makes convenient option for user and reaching global market is convenience for store holders.
Information and reviews
ease of making global availability of current stock products and newly available products at one snapshot
faster purchasing
transaction systems like PayPal gives more accurate money transfer to reduce threats
real time sharing of products available and which are just new in the store where in physical store customer cant able to know new arrived products in the store until s/he actually visits the store.
they can also give options of shopping cart which manages list of product that to be purchased by the customer and its all other details including its price details
Disadvantage
Fraud and security concerns: Given the lack of ability to inspect merchandise before purchase, consumers are at higher risk of fraud on the part of the merchant than in a physical store. Merchants also risk fraudulent purchases using stolen credit cards or fraudulent repudiation of the online purchase. With a warehouse instead of a retail storefront, merchants face less risk from physical theft.
Lack of full cost disclosure: additional fees such as shipping are often not be visible until the final step in the checkout process.
Privacy concerns: Privacy of personal information is a significant issue for some consumers. Different legal jurisdictions have different laws concerning consumer privacy, and different levels of enforcement. Many consumers wish to avoid spam and telemarketing which could result from supplying contact information to an online merchant. In response, many merchants promise not to use consumer information for these purposes, or provide a mechanism to opt-out of such contacts.
