What is Online Shopping? The Advantages and Disadvantages of Online Shopping

What is Online Shopping?

Online shopping is considered to be a very helpful way of buying products through the internet especially during the holidays and clearance seasons. It allows customers to enjoy a wide variety of products and items not only from a specific store, but from a diverse storage that includes all kinds of items. Online shopping also provides customers with a good customer service that also occurs online.

There are many advantages of online shopping; this is the reason why online stores are a booming business today. Online shopping includes buying clothes, gadgets, shoes, appliances, or even daily groceries. Listed below are several online shopping advantages and these are the following.

Many people around the world prefer to shop online and buy products from several brands and companies that they cannot find or are not available for purchase in their home countries.

Nowadays, and with the help of the new technology and the support of the internet, people from all around the world started to purchase items online by simply sitting in their homes.

Advantages of Online Shopping

•  Save Time – Do you have the specific list that you want to buy? With just a couple of clicks of the mouse, you can purchase your shopping orders and instantly move to other important things, which can save time.  
• No pressure shopping.Generally, in physical stores, the sales representatives try to influence the buyers to buy the product. There can be some kind of pressure, whereas the customers are not pressurized in any way in online stores.
• Save Energy – Admit it, it is tiresome to shop from one location and transfer to another location. What is worse is that there are no available stocks for the merchandise you want to buy. In online shopping, you do not need to waste your precious energy when buying.
• 365x 24/7 Availability – Online shopping stores are open round the clock of 24/7, 7 days a week and 365 days. It is very rare to find any conventional retail stores that are open 24/7. The availability of online stores give you the freedom to shop at your own pace and convenience.
• Comparison of Prices – The advanced innovation of search engine allows you to easily check prices and compare with just a few clicks.  It is very straightforward to conduct price comparisons from one online shopping website to another. This gives you the freedom to determine which online store offers the most affordable item you are going to buy.
•  Easy to Search Merchandise You Want to Buy – You are able to look for specific merchandise that includes model number, style, size, and color that you want to purchase. In addition, it is easy to determine whether the products are available or out of stock.
• Online Tracking.Online consumers can track the order status and delivery status tracking of shipping is also available.

Disadvantages of Online Shopping

• Delay in delivery.Long duration and lack of proper inventory management result in delays in shipment. Though the duration of selecting, buying and paying for an online product may not take more than 15 minutes; the delivery of the product to customer’ s doorstep takes about 1-3 weeks. This frustrates the customer and prevents them from shopping online.
• Personally Check the Item – If you are one of those shoppers who want to touch, see, and test the product personally, at online shopping, you are not able to do so. Online stores are only showing product description and photos of the merchandise, which can be a disadvantage for many online shoppers.
• Lack of shopping experience.The traditional shopping exercise provides lot of fun in the form of show-room atmosphere, smart sales attendants, scent and sounds that cannot be experienced through a website. Indians generally enjoy shopping. Consumers look forward to it as an opportunity to go out and shop.