Module 7

MODULE 7

INTRODUCTION TO E-COMMERCE: MEANING AND BENEFITS OF E-
COMMERCE

7.1.OVERVIEW

The term “e-commerce” has only been in existence since 1994. Economists and capital
market analysts use the term loosely to describe anything- from the amount of sales generated
by an online bookstore to explanations regarding the fluctuations in the global market. What
they fail to do is, clearly define the term “e-commerce”. E-commerce is simply the use of the
Internet to conduct business transactions locally, nationally, or internationally. The rise of e-
commerce is based on the revolution of the Internet and technology. The development of the
Internet has evolved from a tool of communication to one of economic utilization. Electronic
Commerce provides a new way of conducting commercial transactions. The opportunities
emerging from e-commerce will have far-reaching economic and social implications. It
dramatically reduces the economic distance between producers and consumers. The benefits
of improved information, lower transaction costs, and hence, lower prices, multiple choices,
and instant delivery present global access to the marketplace with relative ease. India cannot
remain aloof to the challenges of globalisation, as it has to knit itself into the global economy.
For this, it is essential for India to maintain an environment in which the potential of e-
commerce can be realised. Achieving this, requires co-operation on key issues, between
public and private sectors, on principles to guide the development and implementation of e-
commerce policies and on policy approaches to major issues. The role of international
organisations like WTO, the OECD, etc., is relevant in addressing questions of where and
how principles and approaches might best be formulated.1

7.1.1. What is e-commerce?

The term ‘Electronic Commerce’ (e-commerce) refers generally to commercial transactions,
involving both- organisations and individuals, that are based upon processing and
transmission of digitised data, including text, sound, and images, and that are carried over

1 Saini B., E-Commerce in India, THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF BUSINESS & MANAGEMENT, Vol. 2(2), pp.
1-5 (2014).

open networks (like the internet) or closed networks (like AOL) that have a gateway into an
open network. E-commerce is the application of communication and information-sharing
technologies among trading partners in the pursuit of business. According to the definition by
WTO, “e-commerce is understood to mean the production, distribution, marketing, sale or
delivery of goods and services by electronic means”. The Alliance for Global Businesses
(AGB) defines ‘Electronic Commerce’ more broadly to mean that it “incorporates all value
transactions involving transfer of information, products, services or payments via electronic
networks. This includes the use of electronic communications as the medium through which
goods and services of electronic value are designed, placed, advertised, catalogued,
inventoried, purchased or delivered.”2

7.1.1.1. Going back in Time

E-commerce dramatically reduces the economic distance between producers and the
consumers by eliminating the roles of traditional retailers, wholesalers, and in some cases,
distributors. The consumers benefit from improved information, lower transaction costs, and
thus, lower prices. They further enjoy enhanced choices of customised products and instant
delivery for intangible services and products in digital form. For sellers, e-commerce presents
many advantages e.g., access to the global marketplace with relative ease. Inventory system
can be managed more efficiently, with considerable labour cost savings, etc. However, just as
in new market opportunities, it will also intensify competition. E-commerce is an
Information Technology (IT)-driven trend where impetus comes from the Internet. The IT
revolution is the fastest emerging revolution by the human race,and the Internet surpasses all.
Electricity was first introduced in 1873 and it took 46 years for its mass scale use. Telephone
was introduced in 1876 and took 35 years for mass use. Television, introduced in 1926, took
26 years for mass use. PC was introduced in 1975, took 16 years; mobile phone, in 1983,
took 13 for mass use, while the Web, introduced in 1994, took only 4 years for mass use.3

Broadly speaking, e-commerce is the business of buying and selling goods and services on
the Internet. It is also associated with conducting any transaction involving the transfer of
ownership or rights to use goods or services through a computer mediated network. Driven

2 Hariharaputhiran, S. Challenges and opportunities of E-commerce, INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF MARKETING,
FINANCIAL, SERVICES & MANAGEMENT RESEARCH, Vol. 1(3), pp. 98-108 (2012).
3 Jain, S., & Kapoor, Ecommerce in India-Boom and the Real Challenges, VSRD INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF
BUSINESS & MANAGEMENT, 2(2), pp. 47-53 (2012).

by a young demographic profile and increasing Internet penetration, the growth in e-
commerce has been phenomenal. According to a joint ASSOCHAM-Forrester Study Paper,
India’s e-commerce revenue is expected to jump from $30 billion in 2016 to $120 billion in
2020, at the annual growth rate of 51%.

Starting with a traditional ‘stock and sell’ model, the e-commerce companies have
transformed themselves into a multi-model platform. Therefore, today it can be said that e-
commerce means “use of electronic communication and digital information processing
technology in business to create, transform, and redefine relationship for value creation
between or among organisations, and between organisations and individuals”.

Indian e-commerce industry is unique because of its sheer number of transactions,
complexity and the employability of the unorganised sector. E-commerce keeps evolving
itself in various new formats for different types of transactions. There are many models for
making supplies through e-commerce.

Some of the important models are briefly discussed below:

• Direct Sales Model: This model is adopted by the entities which were already
doing business through physical stores. They now sell their goods directly
through their portals (e-commerce route). Direct Sale Portals of Titan, Nike, etc.
fall in this category.

• Inventory Model: In this model, the e-commerce operator acts like a mega
retailer. He buys the goods form the seller, manages the inventory on his
premises, and sells it to the end-buyers. e.g. Jabong.

• Marketplace Model: A popular model is the ‘Marketplace Model’ where the e-
commerce companies provide a meeting point for the sellers and buyers through
their portal. In this model, the end customer in Business-to-Consumer (B2C)
transactions can book an item, order for it, and then cancel it as well, or even
return the goods through an online Portal or App. In a pure marketplace model,
the e-commerce operator would not be involved in any activity other than
providing a platform to the sellers to display their goods and facilitating buyers to

view and place orders to buy those goods. E.g. Naaptol, E-bay etc.

• Managed Marketplace Model: In the Marketplace Model, the supply of the goods
is dependent on the efficiency of the seller, over which the e-commerce operator
does not have direct control. In the Inventory Model, the operator can fulfil the
supply commitments at his own level of efficiency, but the operator will have to
invest in the inventory. The Managed Marketplace Model attempts to get the best
of both these models. Here, the operator not only creates a marketplace, but also
gets involved in other aspects of the sale contract, and handles parts of the supply
chain of goods as well e.g. Amazon India.

• Fulfilment Model: This model is a particular type of Managed Marketplace
Model where the goods are shipped and stored by the sellers in warehouses of the
e-commerce operators even before the sale takes place. Once purchase orders are
received, the goods are packed and dispatched by the e-commerce operator under
intimation to the seller. The e-commerce operator neither makes payment to the
seller, nor owns the inventory. Although, he does not invest in inventory, he has
to invest in storage, transport and logistics. Thus, he cuts down capital
investment, and has better control over supply of goods. Today, most of the e-
commerce operators have adopted this mode. E.g. Flipkart, Snapdeal, etc.

• Hybrid Model: It is becoming increasingly difficult for the large e-commerce
operators to have a single model for all the sellers and all types of goods because
of the sheer volume and variety. This compels the large operators to adopt a mix
of aforesaid models for different sellers and different types of goods. e.g.
Myntra.4

7.2. TRENDS DRIVING E-COMMERCE IN INDIA

The key trends driving e-commerce in India have been explained in a CII Deloitte Report.
The first trend has been reported to be the Government initiatives in embracing and
leveraging e-commerce digital platforms. Besides launching of e-market platform to connect

4 Jahanshahi, A. A., Mirzaie, A., Asadollahi, “Mobile Commerce Beyond Electronic Commerce: Issue and
Challenges”, ASIAN JOURNAL OF BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT SCIENCES, 1(2), pp- 119-129, (2012).

farmers with the mandis of different states to sell agro commodities, the other flagship
initiatives from the Government include Digital India, Start-up India, Make in India, Skill
India, etc. The second trend is the phenomenal increase in internet penetration owing to major
improvements in the telecom infrastructure. This has facilitated the fast growth of e-
commerce. The third trend has been the widespread adoption of smartphones which turned
out to be the most favoured medium of e-commerce. Almost 70-75% of their online traffic
comes from mobile applications of smartphones. Evolution of new digital payment solutions
has been reported to be the fourth trend. Some such initiatives are the launch of e-wallets,
different digital payment products, Unified Payments Interface (UPI) by the Reserve Bank of
India, etc. The fifth trend has been an increasing incidence of partnership of ecommerce
operators with the Third Party Logistics Service Providers (3PLS) like India Post in order to
reach the hinterlands of the country. Last but not the least, the e-commerce operators’ expect
that GST would enhance their growth because of its structure and operational efficiency;
Logistics Service providers can leverage seamless ‘hub-and-spoke’ models for delivery,
resulting in lower costs and fewer bottlenecks.5

7.3. GST’S TREATMENT OF E-COMMERCE

7.3.1. Current Indirect Tax System for E-commerce

The current indirect taxation system comprising of Service Tax on provision of services,
State VAT on sale of goods, and Central Sales Tax on inter-state sale of goods is not geared
to recognize and accommodate the evolving business models of e-commerce. The Central
Government has been collecting the Service Tax on the services provided by various e-
commerce operators. During the 2015-16 Budget, the tax base was further widened by
bringing in the concept of ‘aggregator’ and taxing the services provided by him. An
aggregator has been defined as a person who owns and manages a web-based software
application. By means of the application and a communication device, he enables a potential
customer to connect with the persons providing services of a particular kind under the brand
name or trade name of the aggregator. Soon thereafter, the liability for collecting and
depositing Service Tax was shifted to the Aggregator, thus, enabling a reverse charge
mechanism, which allows charging Service Tax from the receiver instead of the provider of

5 Stead, B. A., & Gilbert, Ethical issues in electronic commerce, JOURNAL OF BUSINESS ETHICS, VOL. 34(2), pp.
75-85, (2001).

service. In the existing indirect taxes, there are no specific provisions for e-commerce
operators to pay taxes on sale of goods, or make any tax deductions from the payments made
by them to the actual sellers of the goods. But, many States have started prescribing Returns
to be filed by the e-commerce operators with information relating to supplies made through
their portal. Attempts by some States to equate e-commerce companies operating through the
‘Marketplace Model’ as dealers, and collect State VAT from them have not succeeded; this
was in reference in the Kerala High Court judgment in Flipkart Internet (P) Ltd. v. State of
Kerala6’.

Currently, the e-commerce sector faces many difficulties, particularly in the following issues
of indirect taxation. On classification issues, the challenge is a categorization of the offerings
in e-commerce as ‘goods’ - inviting the payment of VAT/CST, or as ‘services’ - inviting the
payment of Service Tax. Both, State VAT/CST authorities and Service Tax authorities want
to exercise their right over digital transactions like downloads of software, music, e-books,
etc., leading to disputes and endless litigation. On the issue of compliance costs, the
difficulties arise particularly in inter-state movement of the offerings of e-commerce
operators. These relate to compliance of the requirements of statutory forms, way-bills, road-
permits, registration of e-commerce market place entity for entry/sale of their offerings into a
State etc. There are many challenges in the management of supply chains. The shipments and
returns across the country involve a lot of paperwork and other compliance costs. Further, at
present, the sourcing, distribution, and warehousing strategies are designed by the companies
from the perspective of minimizing the tax liability. Besides, in view of non-uniform tax
(VAT, Entry Tax, etc.) structure across the States, the pricing of the goods and calculation of
margins are a challenge at present. Further, there is a lack of clarity on taxation and
documentation management for typical e-commerce sector transactions such as e-wallet
(advance deposits by the consumers), cash-on-delivery (payment collected at the doorstep of
the consumer), gift vouchers, drop-shipment (direct delivery of goods from the e-commerce
company vendor to the e-commerce company customer), etc. Conventionally, indirect
taxation revolves around the physical presence and the physical movement of goods across
jurisdictions. But, e-commerce models are different because the supply of goods is happening
across internet networks. Since, it is difficult to establish and track the physical movement of
goods and the millions of transactions, the possibility of pilferage and revenue leakages is
high. However, problems in taxation are faced mostly in models wherein the e-commerce

6 Flipkart Internet (P) Ltd. v. State of Kerala, 2011 (19) KTR 182 (Kar).

operator does not buy or sell the goods directly from the sellers but claims to only facilitate
the sale. In these cases, the sale is being claimed to have happened between the seller and
purchaser with the e-commerce operator being only a service provider to the seller. The
operator charges a commission from the seller for each sale. In these cases, the seller is
declaring the sale of goods in his returns while the E-commerce company only declares the
total amount of ‘services’ provided to the seller and pays tax on it. Thus, the e-commerce
company completely dissociates itself from the act of sale of goods. However, as mentioned
before, some States have prescribed filing of information return by the e-Commerce
companies operating on the marketplace or managed marketplace model, thereby, receiving
information about sales which have taken place through their portal.

7.3.2. GST Legislation On E-Commerce

From a taxation point of view, it is important that the online ordering and subsequent delivery
of goods and services are taxed consistently and fairly. It is also important that the small
traders not be adversely affected because of inconsistency in taxation practices. In the GST
era, the challenge is tracking and taxing inter-state sales. The matter of incidence of CST on
inter-state trade through e-commerce is already in litigation in a number of Indian states.
While the first draft Model GST Laws (MGL) of June, 2016 had retained the concept of
aggregators, it has been dispensed with by the Revised Model GST Law published in
November, 2016. Chapter XIV of the Revised MGL deals with e-commerce. Certain
definitions relating to e-commerce have been given in Section 2 of the Revised MGL. The
term ‘electronic commerce’ has been defined as the ‘supply of goods and/or services
including digital products over digital or electronic network’.7

The term ‘electronic commerce operator’ has been defined as “any person who owns,
operates or manages digital or electronic facility or platform for electronic commerce.” In the
first draft MGL, the definition of ‘e-commerce operator’ covered only the platform players. It
had separately provided for an ‘aggregator’ in similar lines with the existing Service Tax
provisions. Companies like Uber, Ola, OYO Rooms, etc. could fall under this category. As
mentioned, the concept of aggregator has been dropped in the Revised MGL, and instead, the
definition of e-commerce operator has been expanded to cover all kinds of e-commerce
operators that include: Providers of a platform where supply and invoicing are done by the
actual supplier (e.g. Amazon), Suppliers of their own goods/services online (e.g. Fabindia),

7 Turban, J. Lee, D. King and H. M. Chung, ‘Electronic Commerce: A Managerial Perspective’, Prentice Hall,
1999.

and Entities which raise invoices for supply of others’ services (e.g. Google Play.) There is
only one section, i.e. Section 56 in the revised MGL which deals with Tax Collection at
Source (TCS). It has twelve clauses. Every e-commerce operator providing a platform to
facilitate the supply of goods and/ or services is required to collect tax at source while making
payments to vendors, and file a statement giving details of the transactions. The vendors
would then be eligible to utilize this tax amount to pay their output tax liability. Monitoring
the businesses that supply goods and services via e-commerce operators appears to be the
basic intention of the GST Council.8

The most critical concern is that every vendor on the e-commerce platform will need to
register, regardless of threshold, in every state where he supplies a good or service. The
scheme of one central registration valid for the entire country is absent in the structure of
GST. This will pose a great obstacle for small and occasional dealers who otherwise wish to
increase their sales through e-commerce. The platform players would also be impacted since
such dealers may decide to refrain from availing their services for effecting sales of the
supplies. Further, it is not clear whether, for the purposes of depositing tax collected at
source, the e-commerce operators would also be required to obtain registration in every state
where the suppliers using their platform are situated. Under the current indirect tax
provisions, the vendors selling goods via e-commerce can not avail credit on Service Tax.
The revised MGL has been provided in Section 56(5)9, that the supplier using the facility
provided by the e-commerce operator will be entitled to claim credit. Naturally, this will
entail following the procedure of registering at each state of supply, and complying with the
provisions relating to ‘place of supply’ in the cases of inter-state supplies. The issue of
multiple registrations depending upon the ‘places’ (read as States) of supply will be relevant
for overseas suppliers as well. Currently, they discharge Service Tax through centralized
registration either by themselves or through a representative.

7.3. ECOMMERCE IN THE INTERNATIONAL MARKET

The Internet facilitates electronic business transactions both nationally and internationally by
permitting businesses to have easy access to large consumer bases at lower costs. The
Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) created a working
definition of, and guidelines for, e-commerce. The various uses of the Internet by business

8 Zwass, ‘Structure and macro-level impacts of electronic commerce: from technological infrastructure to
electronic marketplaces’, May 2001, http://www.mhhe.com/business/mis/zwass/ecpaper.html.
9 s.56, CGST Act, 2017.

entities include the ability to advertise, generate, or otherwise perform regular business
functions. According to OECD, e-commerce transactions can be used for both- business to
business and direct consumer marketing. Through the use of the Internet, either business
transaction is considered e-commerce. OECD has developed specific guidelines for
international e-commerce. They expound eight central principles of e-commerce. First, the
guidelines call for fair business dealings, advertising, and marketing practices in e-commerce
transactions. Second, the guidelines propose that companies conducting ecommerce
transactions give consumers sufficient information necessary to make an informed decision in
their online purchases.10

Third, the guidelines ask that companies establish a clear procedure for the confirmation of
purchase and sale orders online. Fourth, the guidelines recommend that websites are secured
for consumer protection. Fifth, the OECD guidelines suggest that the companies have in
place a way to conduct timely and affordable dispute resolutions. Sixth, the guidelines
propose that customers are given protection of their privacy of information provided to the
company. Seventh, the guidelines call for companies to conduct both consumer and business
education. Finally, the guidelines suggest that governments internationally should cooperate
to implement these guidelines. Since, OECD is not a global governing body; the guidelines
developed by OECD are not binding regulations on any country. The guidelines act merely as
suggestions as to what would be considered fair business practices in international e-
commerce transactions. Yet, the guidelines serve two central purposes. The guidelines act as
a regulatory scheme, which governments may model in their creation and implementation of
consumer protection laws regarding e-commerce and for private companies to emulate in
their development of self-regulatory practices. Furthermore, the guidelines assist private
companies in their goal of educating consumers about business practices on the Internet.

However, since OECD lacks the jurisdictional predicate to enforce these guidelines, they are
merely ideals of the organization. Jurisdictional questions arise when discussing international
use of ecommerce. Response to such questions, as the amount of sales generated over the
Internet, has gotten the attention of the World Trade Organization (WTO) regarding possible
regulation of e-commerce. The WTO asserts that electronic commerce transactions fall within
the scope of authority of the WTO/GATT. The WTO divides e-commerce transactions into
three distinctive stages. The first stage of e-commerce is what the WTO defines as the

10 P. Timmers, ‘Electronic Commerce – Strategies and Models for Business-to-Business Trading’, John Wiley &
Sons, 2000.

‘searching stage’, where the market producers and market consumers first interact with each
other with the purpose of gathering information from one another. Once a transaction has
been agreed upon, the second stage, ordering and payment of the desired product, takes place.
Finally, the last stage is the delivery of the goods or contracted services. The use of the
Internet to conduct business is not without problems. Internationally, there exist some
concerns as to who should govern the flow of ecommerce income. Yet, the current debate
does not look like it will be resolved any time soon.11

7.4. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE INTERNET

The modern structure of the Internet developed from a United States Army experiment more
than thirty years ago. Today, the Internet exists in no physical or tangible realm. Instead, it is
a “giant network which interconnects innumerable smaller groups of linked computer
networks.” This network is referred to as the World Wide Web (www). The current
capabilities of the Internet for business transactions are enormous. The Internet has the ability
to disseminate information to a large number of people quickly and with minimum costs.
Because of the inexpensive nature of the Internet, the start-up cost to a company desiring to
have a place on the Internet is minimal. The Internet, unlike other forms of communication,
has the ability to allow persons to interactively communicate with one another. Consumers
access the World Wide Web by either an Internet Service Provider (ISPs) or Internet Content
Providers (ICPs). ISPs and ICPs should not be confused with Internet portals. Internet portals
are website interfaces that attract people to utilize the site. Similar to television stations, the
portals do not in and of themselves sell anything. Instead, the portals entice consumers to
hyperlink to other sites that may provide advice or sell consumers various products. In
addition to direct communication, anonymous communication is also available on the
Internet, permitting consumers and purchasers to conduct transactions in private. The
flexibility, the low cost of maintaining a website, the ability to quickly disseminate
information, and the instantaneous communication to a large population of consumers, makes
the Internet an ideal environment for business transactions.12

11 Walid Mougayar, ‘E-commerce? E-business? Who E-cares?’, COMPUTER WORLD, 2 November 1998;
http://www.cybermanagement.com/cw7.html.
12 David Whitley, ‘E-Commerce’, TATA MCGRAW HILL PUBLICATION, New Delhi (2004).

7.5. BENEFITS OF E-COMMERCE
Ø Convenience and Easiness:

For some people on the planet, e-Commerce has become one of the preferred methods
for shopping because of its easiness and convenience. They are allowed to purchase
items or services from their homeat any preferred time. The best thing about it is
purchasing alternatives that are fast, convenient and user-friendly with the capacity to
transfer finances online. Because of its convenience, consumers can save their time
and money by searching their items easily and buying them online.

Ø Offer Product Datasheets:
Consumers can get description and details from an online item index. This data
enables the customer to acquire more knowledge of the product he/she intends to buy.

Ø Attract New Customers with Search Engine Visibility:
As we all realize that physical retail is controlled by marking and relationships;
whereas, online retail is additionally driven by traffic that comes from search engines.

Ø Comprises Warranty Information:
Regardless of whether you are hoping to choose incorporating guarantee data with
item descriptions and datasheets or giving it from inside an ecommerce shopping
basket, you need to make sure that customers are aware of significant terms and
conditions that are associated with their purchase.

Ø Decreasing cost of inventory Management:
With e-commerce business, the suppliers can decrease the expenses of dealing with
their inventory of merchandise that they can automate by utilizing web-based
management system. Indirectly, they can save their operational expenses.

Ø Keeping an Eye on Consumers’ Buying Habits:
The best thing is- e-commerce retailers can easily keep a consistent eye on
consumers’ purchasing propensities and interests to tailors their offer to suit the
consumers’ requirements. By fulfilling their needs continually, one can improve their
progressing relationship with the customers and construct durable relationships.

Ø Competence:
For effective business exchanges, e-commerce is an efficient and competent method.
Setting-up cost is extremely low as compared to expanding your business
geographically. Very few licenses and permits are required to fire up an online
business than a physical store.

Ø Allow Happy Customers to Sell Your Products:
With bunches of customers’ reviews and item evaluations, one can easily increase
sales as new customers find that the items are acceptable and effective.

Ø Selling Products Across the World:
In the event that you are running a physical store, it will be limited by the
geographical area that you can service, yet with an e-Commerce website, you can sell
your items and services over the world. The entire world is your play area, where you
can sell your complete range of items with no geographical cutoff points. Moreover,
the remaining constraint of geography has dissolved by mcommerce that is otherwise
called mobile commerce.

Ø Stay open 24*7/365:
One of the most significant benefits that ecommerce merchants can enjoy is that store
timings are presently day in and day out/365 as they can run e-commerce websites
constantly. Along these lines, they can increase their sales by boosting their number
of orders. However, it is additionally beneficial for customers as they can purchase
items whenever they need, regardless of whether it is early morning or mid-night.

Ø Economy:
Presently, you don’t have to invest your money in the physical store, insurance or
infrastructure, as all you need is a wonderful idea, unique items and well-designed
website to reach your precious customers to sell your items and services. We can say
that this makes e-commerce significantly more economical and reasonable.

Ø Boost Brand Awareness:
Like e-commerce business can help B2B associations to get new customers, so it will
be helpful for e-commerce businesses to support their image awareness in the market.
Developing pages that can be indexed via search engines; crawlers is one of the best
approaches to enhance your website’ search engine improvement and enhance the
target audience on your site.

Ø Decrease Costs:
One of the best things about eCommerce is that you can decrease the expenses of your
business. Below are some of the costs that you can reduce in ecommerce:

§ Advertising and Marketing Cost: If you decide on ecommerce, you
don’t have to spend your money on advertising and marketing.
However, natural search engine traffic, web based life traffic and pay-
per-click are some of the advertising channels that are financially
savvy.

§ Personnel: A complete robotization of check-out, charging, inventory
management, payments and other type of operational costs lower the
total number of employees that you require to maintain your
ecommerce business.

§ Eliminate Travel Cost: Now, customers don’t have to travel long
distances to reach their desired stores as ecommerce permits them to
visit the e-store anytime without traveling. With few mouse clicks,
customers can make their purchase and have a wonderful shopping
experience.

Ø Offer Huge Information:
One of the best benefits of ecommerce for customers is they can get huge data that
isn’t possible in a physical store. We all realize that it is quite hard to equip
employees to respond to customers who are searching for data on different product
offerings.

Ø Analytics:
Through ecommerce, associations can easily calculate and evaluate sales
effectiveness, customer effectiveness, marketing efforts, item blend, customer
engagement and that’s only the tip of the iceberg.

Ø Expand Market for Niche Products:
It is hard for buyers and sellers to locate each other in the physical world, yet it
becomes very easy for them with the inception of e-store. Customers can search their
required items on the web and can purchase it from any corner of the world.
Regardless of what sort of item customers are looking, they can discover a wide range
of items with no hassle.

Ø Scalability:
With effective ecommerce arrangement, you and your association develop and scale
easily to meet market demand just as customer requirements by presenting different
sales channels and reaching market segments.

Ø Ability of Multi-site:
With ecommerce, it becomes easy for businesses to dispatch channel specific and
specific brand ecommerce website. This capacity enables you to provide co-branded
websites for your specific customers and takes into consideration websites catering to
specific international spectators.