With its broad reach and flexibility, e-commerce is becoming an increasingly important selling channel for today's businesses. Even many firms that have always relied on face-to-face customer interaction are launching or planning e-commerce Web sites. If you're working on a strategy for selling products or providing service over the Internet, a phased approach to e-commerce offers numerous benefits. You can test the market with new products and services modify your site quickly to meet changing customer needs, and integrate your online activities into your traditional operations. This guide examines e-commerce solutions, their benefits, and the steps for launching your company's e-commerce site.

What Is E-Commerce?

E-commerce, also known as electronic commerce, refers to selling your products and services over the Web. E-commerce transactions fall into three categories: business-to-business (B2B); business-to-consumer (B2C); or less commonly consumer-to-consumer (C2C). This guide discusses B2B and B2C transactions.

An e-commerce transaction may begin when a buyer views an online catalog and retrieves product or service information; places an order; and provides credit and shipping information. The seller verifies the credit information, processes the order and payment, and schedules fulfillment and shipping.

It's usually a good idea to deploy e-commerce capabilities in phases, although you can move through the phases in quick succession. Be sure to consider how you will integrate your online business into your existing business strategy and how you will promote your site to attract traffic. The four phases of an e-commerce site are:

Brochureware - Your company's earliest e-commerce efforts may be confined to brochureware or a location for general information about your company and its products and services. While many sites may be considered online brochures ,your site will be more effective if it takes advantage of the Internet's interactive capabilities. Rather than simply promote your business online, you can encourage customers to send questions, provide feedback, and inquire about products. You can turn these contacts into valuable leads to complement your company's sales channel, or test-market specific products or services online.

Web Storefront - The Web storefront expands your site's functions to include online buying and selling. This allows a customer to visit your site and purchase goods or services. Web storefronts generate demand, acquire customer information, fulfill orders, and process payment.

One-to-One Relationships with Customers - At this phase, you use customer data acquired from past interactions to personalize your site's content, products, and services to the customer's needs and preferences. You can also create Internet marketing campaigns that better address your customers' needs. This can increase customer satisfaction and retention and result in higher sales.

Communities of Interest - In the communities of interest phase, you use customer data to identify and engage an online community with personalized products and services tailored to the community. These communities may already be established and accessible through a third-party site an e-marketplace or exchange. An e-marketplace is a Web-based intermediary that brings together buyers, sellers, and brokers with similar trading needs. By ensuring your systems and standards mesh with those of the exchange, you'll be able to streamline transactions with a multitude of new customers, suppliers, and purchasers.

Benefits and Examples

Revenue Enhancement commerce gives you an additional sales channel and the opportunity to diversify your revenue streams to include new Web-based products and services. This may include advertising fees from ads on your online community pages and partnership revenues from new alliances. E-commerce also helps you generate sales leads for your channel partners, boosting your own revenues.

For example, a small publisher of travel books decided to publish some of its editorial content on a Web site. Through word of mouth, thousands of travelers began using the site for travel information and updates. With a growing number of site visitors each day, the publishing company decided to launch an advertising campaign to promote the site. Commercial vacation vendors noticed and bought ad space on the site. The publishers began earning advertising revenues and the vendors gained access to an active online community.

Market Expansion commerce can enable you to sell your products and services and extend your name and brand awareness beyond your current market at a lower cost than other traditional alternatives, such as building new stores or launching ad campaigns.

For example, a specialty culinary store added a wedding registry to its site. Soon, couples were creating online wish lists from which guests across the country could purchase items. Without the registry, the retailer would have remained confined to its local markets.

Access to Customer Information commerce gives you important information about your customers' buying behavior. Some e-commerce applications provide tools to create detailed user profiles, which can be used to deliver offers targeted for internal corporate analysis or customer service use. Moreover, you can create and preserve strong relationships with your customers, resulting in a key competitive advantage increased customer loyalty.

For example, a popular local restaurant allowed customers to book reservations and receive driving directions online. When customers booked reservations, the site captured the time and date the reservation was made, demographic information, and customer feedback. The restaurant then compiled and analyzed this data to better serve its customers and increase customer loyalty.

Cost Reduction commerce expands your sales efforts and streamlines the flow of information among your company's departments. This functionality can enable you to increase the effectiveness and productivity of sales representatives and support personnel.

For example, a chain of coffee and tea retail stores added a feature to its site that allowed visitors to locate nearby stores in addition to buying online. Visitors typed in addresses into a form, and the site delivered a customized list of stores on a map. This reduced the number of calls store personnel received asking for directions, and it increased the store's brand presence in both the online and offline community.

Summary

E-commerce activities can help you boost revenues, reduce costs, gain valuable customer information, create and maintain customer loyalty, and expand your markets. By using e-commerce solutions, you can offer customers a convenient shopping method, maintain strong customer relationships, and stay competitive. Use success measurements before and after you launch your e-commerce solution and you can measure your success and tailor the solution to meet your future needs.

VEXCOM will assist,guide and help your Company develop the following:

Strategic Business Assessment and Strategy Development
Catalog Creation and Content Management
Order and Payment Gateway processing
Delivery Fulfillment
Test & Launch
Success Measurements