E-commerce refers to businesses and consumers buying and selling products online. The majority of e-commerce websites are retail stores selling products directly to the public. But there are also a proportion of online stores dedicated to business-to-business (B2B) sales or wholesale activity. E-commerce does not only define the selling of physical products, it also defines the selling of services where payments for the services are made online. In general, an e-commerce is a website where a transfer of funds is completed electronically.

E-commerce in process
There are hundreds of different products and services for consumers and the hundreds of different ways these products and services can be delivered. E-commerce by its nature is varied in the way it works. In its most basic form e-commerce works as follows:

• Consumers choose a product or service on a website
• Consumers pay electronically on the website (online credit card transactions) or using a third party payment provider such as PayPal
• The business owner or merchant receives the order and payment and the order is fulfilled (delivered by post, booked in for services etc)

Making payments online is completed via a secure connection to ensure that sensitive data such as credit card details and personal information are kept private.

Benefits of DoIT E-commerce to the consumer
E-commerce has become the most preferred method of shopping for a large number of consumers. Online shopping provides a vast array of benefits to the consumer that is otherwise unavailable in standard brick and mortar stores.
E-commerce has enabled the consumer to complete transactions from the comfort of their own home, transactions that would usually happen within the walls of a store. Transactions now take only minutes, rather than the hours included in physically getting to the stores.

Consumers are finding it quick and more convenient to shop online and they are also making more comparisons than ever. It’s very simple to comparing the price, delivery time and product specifications. Browsing multi websites that stock products that match your criteria is as simple as a Google search. Consumers can now compare multiple products in minutes.

Most of the consumers are turning to e-commerce for their needs due to the lower price for many everyday items. Different factors on the merchant’s side allow them to sell products at a lower price compared to a standard store and these cost savings are often passed to the end consumer.

Benefits of DoIT E-commerce to the merchant
End consumers are treated to lower prices and this is all due to reduced costs for the merchant. No sales staff is required for online retailing, and reduces labour cost. Electronic payments which are often automatically tracked and linked to accounting software results in reduced paper work and errors in data entry. Costs of maintenance of a physical store are also reduced, with the major cost of e-commerce going to warehousing and product storage.
E-commerce allows for highly reduces lead times, as well as the more efficient delivery of products.

E-commerce allows online merchants to stock a larger product range than a traditional store. Larger product range means that more products are suited to a larger consumer base and attains greater possible reach. E-commerce stores are also available from anywhere, interstate and international customers are no longer a missed segment and this results in a massively increased possible consumer base.