What is E-Commerce?
E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the
activity of electronically buying or selling of products on
online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies
such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain
management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic
data interchange (EDI), inventory management systems, and
automated data collection systems. E-commerce is in turn driven by
the technological advances of the semiconductor industry, and is the
largest sector of the electronics industry.
E-commerce typically uses the web for at least a part
of a transaction's life cycle although it may also use other technologies such
as e-mail. Typical e-commerce transactions include the purchase of
products (such as books from Amazon) or services (such as music
downloads in the form of digital distribution such as iTunes
Store). There are three areas of e-commerce: online retailing, electronic
markets, and online auctions. E-commerce is supported by electronic
business.
E-commerce
businesses may also employ some or all of the following:
·
Online
shopping for retail sales direct to consumers via web sites and mobile
apps, and conversational commerce via live chat, chatbots,
and voice assistants;
·
Providing
or participating in online marketplaces, which process third-party business-to-consumer (B2C)
or consumer-to-consumer (C2C) sales;
·
Business-to-business
(B2B) buying and selling;
·
Gathering
and using demographic data through web contacts and social media;
·
B2B electronic
data interchange;
·
Marketing
to prospective and established customers by e-mail or fax
(for example, with newsletters);
·
Engaging
in pretail for
launching new products and services;
·
Online
financial exchanges for currency exchanges or trading purposes.