The Online Shopping Option
Online shopping is an option that is on the table. You are not limited to the items that are local. This is a big different from the past. You don’t have to drive around town wasting all of your gas trying to locate an item. You can now pull out your smartphone or pull up websites online and type in your searches to see if the products are currently available.
This might be a better experience than going to the stores and searching through a lot of products that you don’t want. On the flip side, the experience of going into the stores might reveal products that you didn’t consider before. The need for a solution might mean taking a chance and buying a product that was not immediately on your mind.
The internet opened up the doors to zeroing in on the products that you do want. The time factor could also come into play. The shoppers might want the item now, but when you are shopping online and the product is not near your location, the shipping time could become an issue.
Price is another big factor. The power of the internet can come into play and bring about alternatives. You might find the product in multiple stores, but the pricing can be the deciding factor. Are you going to buy the product from your favorite store at a higher price point or are you going to go with a store that has better pricing? The inventory could be sitting in the store and the internet could bring the customer that is happy to take the item off of the hands of the retailer.
The internet and information have shifted the playing field. Are you going to get into the world of selling online? Are you going to set up your own ecommerce store and go after the online customers? Some business owners might not be tech savvy and they could be missing the opportunity to sell online. Are you going to come up with services to help bring the brick and mortar retail stores on to the internet?
