E-commerce and Shopping Online

A retail shop on the high street or in a retail park has to pay a premium for rent and rates. As a retail shop they are expected and need to display the goods they have for sale as well as provide the staff that can answer customer questions. As there are customers that walk in and out of the shop there are numerous other costs associated in providing the goods for purchase such as, sufficient staff to open and run the store, security systems, insurance, lighting and heating, shop fittings for display, flooring, lost goods through shop lifting, and cleaning to mention just a few, and of course not to forget the cost of buying in the stock. All these costs need to be met through the sale of the products plus that little extra so the shop owners can make a living.

In contrast an on-line retail store does not need the same resources as those on the high street. Either a pure on-line store can operate from an isolated warehouse to ship the boxes of products, or even the shed in a backyard and use fulfilment companies to supply the ordered goods. The effect of being able to box shift products with less overheads means that the goods can be provided at significantly lower prices, although the goods are purchased in at the same price and in some instances the sale is reliant on the customer already seeing the product in a high street store.

It easy to see that over a short period of time a price war occurs and the high street store has to reduce their prices to remain competitive if they wish to stay in business. The shopper may say this is a good thing but the cost price squeeze on an item has only one inevitable conclusion, and that is premature product degradation. As retailers are price squeezed from supplying a product the choice for a consumer to purchase an item is reduced more to the internet.

As the internet competition increases to the point that the on-line retailers are no longer making a realistic margin, pressure is placed back on the wholesalers or manufacturers to reduce their costs. In turn if the manufacturer wants to continue with the product then costs are reduced by reducing their margins, reducing quality of materials and build, by reducing the number of options or variants an item may have and by reducing the level of service.

Ultimately though the life of a product has been dramatically shortened with its degradation being quickened by the way we shop.

One of the most overlooked tools in the e-commerce industry is the reporting feature that is designed into the payment page administration area of e-commerce websites. The vast majority of online vendors generally overlook the capabilities and the advantage of the tools at their finger tips. With the numerous e-commerce service providers in the industry, there are just as many variations of control panel features. The trick is to better understand some of the more popular features that are included as part of the service you can anticipate from your e-commerce service provider.

As mentioned, the reporting option is one function of the administration features that is overlooked. There is an enormous amount of information that the tool provides that can virtually control the success or even the failure of online businesses. Well designed online reporting will give the vendor advanced notice of stock shortages, key license management issues, conversion rates, and many more points of interest that are extremely important to the daily operation of the e-shop.

For example; for an online vendor that is selling software online and relies on the key license management feature, the capability of the advanced online reporting is crucial to his business. The reporter tracks the sales, distribution and the amount of key licenses that are remaining for sale through the payment page. If this feature fails to notify the vendor, lost sales will mount up and the conversion rate will drop. Most online vendors cannot afford to miss sales due to inadequate reporting abilities or not having this feature at all.

The statistics that are gathered by the advanced online reporting has proven to be very resourceful for both large and small businesses alike. Reports that are generated from these systems allow the vendor to effectively manage stock, services, seasonal sales periods, and even effectiveness of any promotional success. The convenience of Immediate, real-time alerts and notifications alone provides security and comfort of staying up to date with your business. Direct merchant notification is another fantastic feature of online reporting, this is a real time server-to-server communication for each transaction, no matter if it is successful or not.

Although individually these online reporting features may be commonly offered by many companies, as a part of a comprehensive reporting system should be included as used on a regular basis. The features listed above are only but a small part of the total “e-commerce reporting solution” but they represent the importance of the reports a vendor needs to specifically target customers and sales.