Question

What were the traditional commerce challenges facing prior to adopting Ecommerce? Explain briefly, give examples if possible.

Answer 1

Before adopting e-commerce, traditional commerce were facing several challenges-

1. Geographical challenge-  A traditional commerce could not reach out to a large number of customers as its reach was limited to the people of the area/ city in which its store used to be. But with e-commerce, it can reach out to a much wider audience for selling the products/Services.

2. Acquiring a new customer was tough with traditional commerce. There were a few limited methods of marketing and advertisement a business could do in order to promote its products. But nowadays, e-commerce used digital marketing, and acquiring a new customer is much easier.

3. Cost- Earlier business had to maintain offline stores at a prime location in order to attract customers. The cost would include rent of the store, electricity charges, maintenance charges etc. E-commerce can help and reduce the initial investment required to start a business.

4. It was not easy to maintain details, consumer behavior, preferences, etc.of the customers in traditional commerce. But e-commerce can maintain these data very easily which can later be used to retarget relevant customers.

5. The traditional business could not operate every time. There could be some family emergencies, or environmental issues such as rains etc., but e-commerce business is active 24*7