Advantages And Disadvantages Of E-Commerce

E-commerce is the process of selling, and buying services and products using the internet. Furthermore, it is the process companies utilize to conduct online transactions. However, first, the company must have an effective e-commerce strategy to satisfy the needs of its business and customers. With this aim in mind, companies create an e-commerce platform that has a substantial effect on the profitability of the company. Particularly so, for a company that also has a large global presence. Thus, e-commerce has begun to gain a lot of attention overseas. However, there are also concerns that due to certain barriers companies would not be able to effectively adopt e-commerce in these countries. For example, a few of the barriers are; language localization, infrastructure, technology, payment means, socio-cultural, and cost, to name a few. Despite these barriers, there are some companies that have managed to successfully implement e-commerce on a global scale (Gibbs, Kraemer & Dedrick, 2003). Notwithstanding, content is one of the most important factors of e-commerce. However, the content is unimportant if it is provided in an unfamiliar language. Unfortunately, one of the main barrier to e-commerce is language localization. For example, I went online to a Chinese shopping website and encountered the image below. Appropriately so, I became discouraged as soon as the web page finished loading. Thus, there are over 1 billion consumers who shop online at any given time, therefore, it is imperative that companies’ e-commerce provides an option in the consumers’ native language. Moreover, language localization includes; product description, currency, and functionality tabs. Consequently, potential e-commerce barricades can negatively impact a company’s revenue and its success in capitalizing in new markets. However, if a company can successfully eliminate language localization barriers, it can translate into sales, and growth opportunity (Nantel & Glaser, 2008) In the case of PayPal, while steadily expanding its global reach, the company faced a problem with effectively keeping the sites in different countries updated in the local language. …show more content…
Unfortunately, there was not readily available software that would solve PayPal’s problem. Normally, companies will outsource if a product or service is not available in-house. However, PayPal took an innovative e-commerce approach and created its own software that would allow its entire system from 15 nationalities and locales, ranging from Poland to France, to be simultaneously refreshed. In addition, at the time, PayPal had just become a partner with eBay. Consequently, since PayPal became the primary payment system for eBay, and experienced a dramatic increase in the use of its services. Accordingly, the company was forced to go global to support the needs of all its customers. Unfortunately, early on the company realized that it needed to confront the language localization issue. Therefore, PayPal had to re-architect its code to a more flexible version to solve the language localization issue. After successful implementation, the company wanted to put content management in the hands of the business. Nonetheless, PayPal was not interested in selling its technology, instead, it wanted companies to create their own solutions very early on. Thus, PayPal suggests that companies start developing its own Sim-Ship systems early, and ensure that there is room for growth. In short, as PayPal continues to grow the company has ensured that its e-commerce system can support that growth (O 'Brien & Marakas, 2011). In summary, e-commerce is one of the best opportunities for growth that a company can embark