There is a new buzzword in the retailing sector – electronic retailing or e-tailing or internet retailing. It has gained traction in recent years for B2C organisations. You can say that mega giants such as Dell and Amazon are the precursors of this e-tailing world. They have made the entire process of choosing, adding to cart and placing an order extremely efficient and easy for customers across the world.

You may be surprised to know that this concept had been in discussion since 1995! The term was an addition to the other clusters like e-commerce and e-mail. E-retailing posits to be an independent business model that comprises certain constituents like:

• Trust model
• Electronic transactions

In reality, it is also a subset of e-commerce by nature.

What is e-retailing? Essential aspects to know

Emerging as one of the most powerful techniques of marketing, electronic retailing procures the right message for the right product. It is the procedure of selling goods and services via electronic media, majorly the web.

In simple terms, the selling of products online is e-retailing.

It follows the BCB model for enterprises where the businesses interact directly with the consumers without any intermediaries’ involvement.

E-retailers are of 2 kinds

1. Pure play retailers: For example, Amazon who emerged first as an online bookseller. It now has a presence not only on the internet as online sellers but also have physical outlets for customers.
2. Brick & Click: Dell sells computers both via internet and physical stores, set across the globe.

Electronic retailing can be seen as the direct selling of products, service and information via the virtual stores on the internet. These stores are designed surrounding an electronic product catalogue format. Thousands of existing retailers have their e-commerce websites on the web as an extension of their current franchise.

The prolific rise of the web and penetration of computers have resulted in the rise of newer business forms like e-retailing.

Specific constituents of electronic retailing that can make a business highly successful are:

• Accurate revenue model
• Appealing portal for B2C e-commerce
• Internet penetration

This kind of business needs the right support services which help in its successful operations. The services work towards supporting the business both online and offline through the whole transaction processing stage. Some crucial support services needed for e-tailing include:

1. Logistics
2. Order fulfilment
3. Mechanism for payment
4. Communication backbone

E-retailing is growing at an exponential rate where online sales account for at least one-quarter of the entire retail market. The retailers who neglect e-commerce often see their trade reducing because customers are shifting towards ordering online products.

Check out the top 10 e-retailers of the global market

European as well as American companies dominate in the world as some of the largest retailers. Majority of them are global organisations having colossal distribution networks and numerous retail locations throughout the world.

Here are some of the best e-retailers:

1. Walmart

It is the largest brick and mortar retail business in the world reporting revenue of $485.7 billion in 2015. Every year, it sees a 2% increase in its revenues. It operates about 12,000 stores across 27 countries, and about 60% of its total revenue gets attributed to the business works in the United States. Most of its stores work under its brand name while others operate with other retail chains. These are ASDA stores in the UK, Seiyu stores in Japan and Bodega Aurrera stores in Mexico.

1. Costco

Costco Wholesale Corporation emerged as a membership-only warehouse retail franchise operating in 9 countries. The organisation reported global revenue of $112.6 billion for the year 2014. It sees year-on-year revenue growth of 7.1%. The company operates with 671 warehouse locations across the world in which 474 are in the United States. Costco comes with a market capitalization of $73.6 billion.

• Alibaba

It first started its operation online in the year 1999 when it launched Alibaba.com and 1688.com. It has flagship websites which operate as global retail marketplace. On the other hand, 1688.com handles transactions within China. Alibaba’s core business comprises Taobao, Tmall and AliExpress. Alibaba emerges as a giant in comparison to other market competitors. It has a growing global presence which is anchored by AliExpress and its other investments in retail make it so far the biggest e-retailer.

1. Amazon

This is the biggest online retailer in the U.S. Amazon started as an e-bookstore but soon expanded to a diversified range of verticals which included electronics, household products and fashion.

Till date, Amazon’s most successful contribution to e-retail is Amazon Prime. This is a subscription service which offers shoppers with unlimited two-day shipping from Amazon. The brand adds new perks like video and music streaming, early access to books, exclusive access to premium items and unlimited cloud storage for images. Today, Amazon has over 100 million members of its Prime brand.

1. JD.com

JD.com is quite similar to Amazon. It operates in China and has built an unparalleled network for logistics that has more than 500 warehouses and 7,000 delivery locations. JD.com conducts its entire logistics operations. This ensures that it ships about 90% of its orders to customers by the next day. JD.com works as a first-party retail segment and is also partnered with global brands such as Walmart to reach its Chinese customers. It operates almost like an online mall. Walmart has a 5% stake in JD.com.

1. Target Corporation

Target had reported revenue of $72.6 billion for the year 2014 which has increased by 1.9% every year henceforth. It acts like a big box retailer having 1790 stores across the United States along with 8 CityTarget stores which are still in an ongoing marketing trial and test phase. These stores have been designed as small format stores suited especially for densely populated urban hubs. The brand works with a market capitalization of $45.3 billion as per the report of 2015.

• eBay

This brand started as an online auction company back in the 90s for clients who wished to sell collectables. At present, 80% of the products sold on its e-platform are brand new, and 89% of them get sold at a fixed price. The company is currently undertaking steps so that its platform operates more like global giants such as Amazon. It is encouraging sellers to proffer guaranteed 3-day shipping perks free of charge. eBay is merging product listings from diverse sellers with the same item, and thus, enabling clients to find the best price easily. The brand launched Best Price guarantee perk which offers customers a 110% rebate in case a difference in price is found between its own product price and that on a competitor’s website.

The brand has the desire of handling all its payments in-house by the year 2021. It also wishes to provide some value to sellers on its platform which can result in higher profits.

• Shopify

Shopify is quite different from the ones mentioned above. Rather than working as a centralized workplace, it offers a platform for every small merchant out there to sell items on their website and also on third-party marketplaces like eBay and Amazon. It offers an easy way of managing a retail business from one particular location, track sales and inventory and helps fulfil orders. It also helps the customers to create their websites.

Shopify currently houses about 600,000 merchants who range from individual entrepreneurs with single product lines to multi-billion global brands having thousands of products.

1. Rakuten

This Japanese e-commerce organisation is based in Tokyo and was founded in 1997 by Hiroshi Mikitani. The brand’s name means optimism and is compared to Amazon as it offers a vast variety of products online. It provides digital content, fin-tech solutions and other e-commerce services to more than 1 billion members across the globe.

Rakuten has a total strength of 15,000 employees, and it grows its operations majorly through joint venture and client acquisition. The company has invested in Pinterest, Lyft, AHA Life and Acorns. Moreover, it has an online marketing business known as Rakuten Marketing. It was one of the first companies to start accepting bitcoins for payment transactions.

1. Asos

This British online store of fashion targets youngsters who have a fad for popular brands. Founded by Quentin Griffiths and Nick Robertson back in 2000, it is headquartered in Camden Town. Asos markets more than 80,000 brands and also has its own clothing line. It ships the products across 140 countries via its several warehouses located in China, Europe, the UK and the US. They recently initiated a marketing campaign that intends to take complete advantage of Instagram stories so that users of the brand are inspired to upload pictures.

Why is e-retailing booming? Read to know!  

Shopping habits have somewhat changed dramatically in the last decade. Shoppers today prefer to ‘click and buy’ rather than actually visiting the store. They find it comforting and easy.

The rise in online shopping has made the retail market adapt and evolve into an electronic market today known as e-retailing. They are investing more in e-commerce chores and pulling back in store spending. Millennials having grown in a digital age make the most of online purchase group.

Earlier, the main reason why customers preferred in-store purchases was due to the advantage of ‘try and buy’. Nowadays, online retailers have also started offering this same perk where customer can return their product if it does not fit their purpose. Therefore, e- retailing gains ground owing to its fast adaptation to the virtual world.

Another cause of its rise is social media. The many channels such as Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube contain global brand pages where regular updates on products, especially fashion wear, have engulfed the youth generation of the 21^st century. Customers can post about their purchase on their profile and encourage their peers to go for a brand!

• E-retail brands that are currently winning are those which understand the interplay between the transactional and the experiential. If you were to believe that retail is falling behind, then you are absolutely wrong.
• E-retailers are taking the help of social influencers and content marketers. The power of their website content caters to the mass desire which means serving whatever the public wants. They are curating content which galvanized the audience, intrigue them and tell them a consistent story.
• E-retail follows a data-driven approach which incurs statistical data. It helps a retailer to know a customer’s need and makes necessary suggestions so that s/he can deploy the right business plan. Proper market analysis leads to a humongous profit margin and massive customer engagement. It drives sales and boosts the online business highly.
• Mobile services are another key reason for which e-retailing is gaining such prominence. People love to shop from diverse e-stores via their smartphones mostly. You can see most of today’s shoppers randomly scrolling down a product catalogue on their mobile app. Thus, having a mobile-friendly website makes the online retail store’s appeal gain momentum.

Electronic media seems to grow at an extremely fast pace every day. The retail sector is one such arena that has become a versatile zone embracing both online and offline mode of marketing.

E-retailing, therefore, posits to be a winner as it sure makes the customer journey a seamless experience.

A Comprehensive Guide to the World of E-Retailing

There is a new buzzword in the retailing sector – electronic retailing or e-tailing or internet retailing.

It has gained traction in recent years for B2C organisations. You can say that mega giants such as Dell and Amazon are the precursors of this e-tailing world. They have made the entire process of choosing, adding to cart and placing an order extremely efficient and easy for customers across the world.

You may be surprised to know that this concept had been in discussion since 1995! The term was an addition to the other clusters like e-commerce and e-mail. E-retailing posits to be an independent business model that comprises certain constituents like:

• Trust model
• Electronic transactions

In reality, it is also a subset of e-commerce by nature.

What is e-retailing? Essential aspects to know

Emerging as one of the most powerful techniques of marketing, electronic retailing procures the right message for the right product. It is the procedure of selling goods and services via electronic media, majorly the web.

In simple terms, the selling of products online is e-retailing.

It follows the BCB model for enterprises where the businesses interact directly with the consumers without any intermediaries’ involvement.

E-retailers are of 2 kinds

1. Pure play retailers: For example, Amazon who emerged first as an online bookseller. It now has a presence not only on the internet as online sellers but also have physical outlets for customers.
2. Brick & Click: Dell sells computers both via internet and physical stores, set across the globe.

Electronic retailing can be seen as the direct selling of products, service and information via the virtual stores on the internet. These stores are designed surrounding an electronic product catalogue format. Thousands of existing retailers have their e-commerce websites on the web as an extension of their current franchise.

The prolific rise of the web and penetration of computers have resulted in the rise of newer business forms like e-retailing.

Specific constituents of electronic retailing that can make a business highly successful are:

• Accurate revenue model
• Appealing portal for B2C e-commerce
• Internet penetration

This kind of business needs the right support services which help in its successful operations. The services work towards supporting the business both online and offline through the whole transaction processing stage. Some crucial support services needed for e-tailing include:

1. Logistics
2. Order fulfilment
3. Mechanism for payment
4. Communication backbone

E-retailing is growing at an exponential rate where online sales account for at least one-quarter of the entire retail market. The retailers who neglect e-commerce often see their trade reducing because customers are shifting towards ordering online products.

Check out the top 10 e-retailers of the global market

European as well as American companies dominate in the world as some of the largest retailers. Majority of them are global organisations having colossal distribution networks and numerous retail locations throughout the world.

Here are some of the best e-retailers:

1. Walmart

It is the largest brick and mortar retail business in the world reporting revenue of $485.7 billion in 2015. Every year, it sees a 2% increase in its revenues. It operates about 12,000 stores across 27 countries, and about 60% of its total revenue gets attributed to the business works in the United States. Most of its stores work under its brand name while others operate with other retail chains. These are ASDA stores in the UK, Seiyu stores in Japan and Bodega Aurrera stores in Mexico.

1. Costco

Costco Wholesale Corporation emerged as a membership-only warehouse retail franchise operating in 9 countries. The organisation reported global revenue of $112.6 billion for the year 2014. It sees year-on-year revenue growth of 7.1%. The company operates with 671 warehouse locations across the world in which 474 are in the United States. Costco comes with a market capitalization of $73.6 billion.

• Alibaba

It first started its operation online in the year 1999 when it launched Alibaba.com and 1688.com. It has flagship websites which operate as global retail marketplace. On the other hand, 1688.com handles transactions within China. Alibaba’s core business comprises Taobao, Tmall and AliExpress. Alibaba emerges as a giant in comparison to other market competitors. It has a growing global presence which is anchored by AliExpress and its other investments in retail make it so far the biggest e-retailer.

1. Amazon

This is the biggest online retailer in the U.S. Amazon started as an e-bookstore but soon expanded to a diversified range of verticals which included electronics, household products and fashion.

Till date, Amazon’s most successful contribution to e-retail is Amazon Prime. This is a subscription service which offers shoppers with unlimited two-day shipping from Amazon. The brand adds new perks like video and music streaming, early access to books, exclusive access to premium items and unlimited cloud storage for images. Today, Amazon has over 100 million members of its Prime brand.

1. JD.com

JD.com is quite similar to Amazon. It operates in China and has built an unparalleled network for logistics that has more than 500 warehouses and 7,000 delivery locations. JD.com conducts its entire logistics operations. This ensures that it ships about 90% of its orders to customers by the next day. JD.com works as a first-party retail segment and is also partnered with global brands such as Walmart to reach its Chinese customers. It operates almost like an online mall. Walmart has a 5% stake in JD.com.

1. Target Corporation

Target had reported revenue of $72.6 billion for the year 2014 which has increased by 1.9% every year henceforth. It acts like a big box retailer having 1790 stores across the United States along with 8 CityTarget stores which are still in an ongoing marketing trial and test phase. These stores have been designed as small format stores suited especially for densely populated urban hubs. The brand works with a market capitalization of $45.3 billion as per the report of 2015.

• eBay

This brand started as an online auction company back in the 90s for clients who wished to sell collectables. At present, 80% of the products sold on its e-platform are brand new, and 89% of them get sold at a fixed price. The company is currently undertaking steps so that its platform operates more like global giants such as Amazon. It is encouraging sellers to proffer guaranteed 3-day shipping perks free of charge. eBay is merging product listings from diverse sellers with the same item, and thus, enabling clients to find the best price easily. The brand launched Best Price guarantee perk which offers customers a 110% rebate in case a difference in price is found between its own product price and that on a competitor’s website.

The brand has the desire of handling all its payments in-house by the year 2021. It also wishes to provide some value to sellers on its platform which can result in higher profits.

• Shopify

Shopify is quite different from the ones mentioned above. Rather than working as a centralized workplace, it offers a platform for every small merchant out there to sell items on their website and also on third-party marketplaces like eBay and Amazon. It offers an easy way of managing a retail business from one particular location, track sales and inventory and helps fulfil orders. It also helps the customers to create their websites.

Shopify currently houses about 600,000 merchants who range from individual entrepreneurs with single product lines to multi-billion global brands having thousands of products.

1. Rakuten

This Japanese e-commerce organisation is based in Tokyo and was founded in 1997 by Hiroshi Mikitani. The brand’s name means optimism and is compared to Amazon as it offers a vast variety of products online. It provides digital content, fin-tech solutions and other e-commerce services to more than 1 billion members across the globe.

Rakuten has a total strength of 15,000 employees, and it grows its operations majorly through joint venture and client acquisition. The company has invested in Pinterest, Lyft, AHA Life and Acorns. Moreover, it has an online marketing business known as Rakuten Marketing. It was one of the first companies to start accepting bitcoins for payment transactions.

1. Asos

This British online store of fashion targets youngsters who have a fad for popular brands. Founded by Quentin Griffiths and Nick Robertson back in 2000, it is headquartered in Camden Town. Asos markets more than 80,000 brands and also has its own clothing line. It ships the products across 140 countries via its several warehouses located in China, Europe, the UK and the US. They recently initiated a marketing campaign that intends to take complete advantage of Instagram stories so that users of the brand are inspired to upload pictures.

Why is e-retailing booming? Read to know!  

Shopping habits have somewhat changed dramatically in the last decade. Shoppers today prefer to ‘click and buy’ rather than actually visiting the store. They find it comforting and easy.

The rise in online shopping has made the retail market adapt and evolve into an electronic market today known as e-retailing. They are investing more in e-commerce chores and pulling back in store spending. Millennials having grown in a digital age make the most of online purchase group.

Earlier, the main reason why customers preferred in-store purchases was due to the advantage of ‘try and buy’. Nowadays, online retailers have also started offering this same perk where customer can return their product if it does not fit their purpose. Therefore, e- retailing gains ground owing to its fast adaptation to the virtual world.

Another cause of its rise is social media. The many channels such as Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube contain global brand pages where regular updates on products, especially fashion wear, have engulfed the youth generation of the 21^st century. Customers can post about their purchase on their profile and encourage their peers to go for a brand!

• E-retail brands that are currently winning are those which understand the interplay between the transactional and the experiential. If you were to believe that retail is falling behind, then you are absolutely wrong.
• E-retailers are taking the help of social influencers and content marketers. The power of their website content caters to the mass desire which means serving whatever the public wants. They are curating content which galvanized the audience, intrigue them and tell them a consistent story.
• E-retail follows a data-driven approach which incurs statistical data. It helps a retailer to know a customer’s need and makes necessary suggestions so that s/he can deploy the right business plan. Proper market analysis leads to a humongous profit margin and massive customer engagement. It drives sales and boosts the online business highly.
• Mobile services are another key reason for which e-retailing is gaining such prominence. People love to shop from diverse e-stores via their smartphones mostly. You can see most of today’s shoppers randomly scrolling down a product catalogue on their mobile app. Thus, having a mobile-friendly website makes the online retail store’s appeal gain momentum.

Electronic media seems to grow at an extremely fast pace every day. The retail sector is one such arena that has become a versatile zone embracing both online and offline mode of marketing.

E-retailing, therefore, posits to be a winner as it sure makes the customer journey a seamless experience.