Ecommerce is the process of selling and buying products and services via the internet or online payment gateways. According to some surveys, more than 50 percent of Americans nowadays prefer shopping online, so it doesn’t come as a surprise why ecommerce has been evolving so much in the recent years.
Furthermore, it has been predicted that the overall ecommerce sales will reach more than 4 trillion USD in the next few years. So, what is it exactly that makes ecommerce so successful? In this article, we will be focusing on a few reasons that will give you an insight into why this industry is flourishing at such a rapid rate.
- Great advertising options
When it comes to advertising an ecommerce business, it has never been easier thanks to various different options offered online such as paid advertising on Google, and numerous social media platforms, Facebook being one of the most successful ones.
What is great about this kind of advertising is that you have an ability to choose which particular audience will be seeing your online ad, instead of targeting everyone, including people who aren’t interested in what your business has to offer.
Also, through this type of advertising, you will be able to monitor just how effective your ads are since you can easily find out how many customers have purchased your products through each specific ad. In addition, you can identify how many of your customers and leads have actually visited your website, as well as which exact pages they have seen and how many times.
When you have a clear insight into these details, you will easily design your marketing campaigns, target the right audience, and make any changes if necessary. What is more, this online paid advertising is much cheaper and much more effective than the TV ads, magazine ads, direct mail, billboards, and other methods of traditional marketing.
- Low costs
Rent, warehouse, staffing, transport and inventory costs can be quite high. Luckily, in ecommerce, that is not the case and the owners of online businesses save loads of money on these things.
For instance, while the traditional brick and mortar businesses are required to have a warehouse on a location which is dictated by the market and can be very expensive, ecommerce businesses can choose their warehouse based on the affordability, not the location.
Moreover, businesses in the e-commerce industry have lowered the prices of their inventory items by using automotive management inventory and stockpiling techniques such as web algorithm.
When the overall costs can be decreased this way, ecommerce businesses have the privilege to lower the prices of their products and services and thus attract more customers and stay ahead of their competitors.
- Discounts and rewards for customers
Since having a website for your ecommerce business means some additional profit apart from your sales, owners of such businesses can afford to motivate their most loyal customers by providing them with all sorts of discounts and rewards.
For instance, a lot of successful online shops give away vouchers and special gifts to the customers who purchase often from them, in order to keep them engaged and show them that they really appreciate them. This helps in building trustworthiness and establishing strong long-term relationships which bring significant profits along the way.
- Advancements in technology
While technological advancements are influencing practically all aspects of our lives, ecommerce is one of the industries that might have been positively affected the most. On one hand, customers can benefit from many technological tools available online to help them find better prices, look for alternatives, get discounts and find the stores that best fit their personal preferences.
On the other hand, business owners themselves enjoy major benefits since technology can enable them to establish stronger and more personal relationships with their customers and achieve an exponential brand growth and greater profits.
Intelligent automation such as the one offered by WorkFusion, for instance, helps in streamlining all business processes, facilitates everyone’s job, and improves the overall efficiency and productivity. WorkFusion provides businesses with products that bring the automation which is nowadays crucial for achieving success.
When your employees no longer have to waste their valuable time on tedious manual tasks, they will have enough room to focus more on what really matters the most – customer satisfaction.
To sum up, by taking these reasons into consideration, it is understandable why more and more people with entrepreneurial spirit choose to venture into ecommerce. Starting any kind of business can be a struggle in the beginning, but ecommerce comes with a significantly lower number of risks business owners can encounter.