What is Ecommerce?
Ecommerce, also known as electronic commerce or internet commerce, refers to the buying and selling of goods or services using the internet, and the transfer of money and data to execute these transactions.
Ecommerce is often used to refer to the sale of physical products online, but it can also describe any kind of commercial transaction that is facilitated through the internet.
Examples of Ecommerce
Ecommerce can take on a variety of forms involving different transactional relationships between businesses and consumers, as well as different objects being exchanged as part of these transactions.
- Retail:
The sale of a product by a business directly to a customer without any intermediary.
- Wholesale:
The sale of products in bulk, often to a retailer that then sells them directly to consumers.
- Dropshipping:
The sale of a product, which is manufactured and shipped to the consumer by a third party.
- Crowdfunding:
The collection of money from consumers in advance of a product being available in order to raise the startup capital necessary to bring it to market.
- Subscription:
The automatic recurring purchase of a product or service on a regular basis until the subscriber chooses to cancel.
- Physical products:
Any tangible good that requires inventory to be replenished and orders to be physically shipped to customers as sales are made.
- Digital products:
Downloadable digital goods, templates, and courses, or media that must be purchased for consumption or licensed for use.
- Services:
A skill or set of skills provided in exchange for compensation. The service provider’s time can be purchased for a fee.