Over the past few years Internet has become a powerhouse of development. Everything we see or use whether from downloading applications from websites to searching any information over the internet has become facile.

Image Source:pexels

One of the most trending issue that has grown to extreme popularity over the past years and had proven to be a game changer in the market is online retail stores or in general terms online retailing.

Let’s go back in time and know where it all began. The history of online retailing goes back to the year 1994 when the world witnessed its first secure and successful retail transaction over the internet. After which in the year 1995 Amazon and eBay launched its shopping sites.

WHAT ARE ONLINE RETAIL STORES:

Online retail stores in easy terms are websites like Amazon, Flipkart, Alibaba, Myntra etc. and many others that sell products over the internet. These stores provide services to its customers by allowing customers to directly buy products from internet and pay by online payment and further the company delivers the product at customers doorstep. This form of e-commerce has helped small vendors to come up and sell their products.

With the growing popularity of Online retail stores, starting a retail business has no longer remained a headache to open a storefront. This methodology of shopping over the internet has influenced a large number of customers in a short period of time. According, to a research it is found that at present approximately 147 million Indian customers prefer using online shopping and still counting. It is expected that at this rate the number will rise upto 210 million, “well that’s a pretty large number”.

ONLINE RETAIL STORE VS OFFLINE STORES 

Opening a retail store online is far more cheaper and easier than opening a storefront. This is because, for opening an online retail store all you need is a technical designer and a domain that you need to buy from hosting websites whereas opening a storefront might seem a bit costlier and head aching work as you will first need to buy a land and then you need to get interior and exterior stuff, hire labors and a lot of small things for which you need to do investment.

Apart from the investment factor online retail shop opens you and your services to the whole world. Anyone in the world can see your services. Moreover, your store will be available every time. Also, online retail stores provide a variety of options to choose from that storefronts sometimes might fail to provide. Various offers and promotional schemes attract the customers like ants to sugar. 

But as we know everything has some pros and cons so in some factor's storefronts prove to be more preferred by some people. Like products available at the online stores cannot be physically viewed or checked however if it defected it is returned but the whole process of delivering and returning back might be time taking in some cases.  

Future of Online Retail Stores: 

Online Retail Store has increased its reign in a short period of time and with this being said it is clear that the future of shopping is “online shopping”, with the evolution of e-commerce the customers have also evolved. The facilities that online retail stores provide is what makes this method of shopping so reliable and secure. Statistics show how the boundary line between online stores and storefront will keep on diminishing with time.

There is no doubt that online retail stores have shown exemplary output to the customers and will become the future of marketing and shopping. 

Recommend For You: commercial property for sale