In part 1 of this topic, we discussed the first three advantages of having an online presence over a brick and mortar store. These advantages were:

1) Low overhead, which makes maintaining an ecommerce site much easier and more affordable for the small business owner

2) Convenience, which allowed the business owner to run their business 24x7 from anywhere in the world with an Internet connection, and

3) A larger market base, which allows online business owners to sell their products and services anywhere in the world.

These 3 advantages are significant in themselves, yet these next 2 advantages seal the deal for ecommerce and will round out the reasons for having an online commerce presence. These advantages include:

4) Low Start up Cost

The start-up costs that are required to having a decent online presence pale in comparison to the start-up costs that are required to having a brick and mortar store. The brick and mortar store start-up costs can be easily in the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars depending on the type of retail space that is required and how much renovating has to be done in order to open the business. Retail spaces that vary greatly in the changes required (a pizza space that needs to be converted to a salon requires much more upfront costs than if a new salon opens in the place of the old salon).

The upfront costs of an online business consist of web design and installation, shopping cart setup, and gateway setup. These costs can easily be upwards of $10,000 to $15,000 for very sophisticated customized ecommerce web sites. Most websites can be done within $2,000 or so, less if the business owner does more of the work themselves. This lower point of entry will allow more small businesses into the online commerce world.

5) Highly automated sales process

An online business can have much of its sales process automated because the process relies on software to do much of the online transaction processing. Not only are payments automatically charged to the credit card, but funds are also deposited into the bank account and notification emails are sent off to the purchaser as well as the merchant, and the fulfillment house if necessary. All of this is done without any intervention from a human, which greatly reduces the amount of effort required for each sale compared to a physical sale at a brick and mortar store. The automation process also reduces the amount of human input error that can be introduced for each sale.

There are many advantages of having an online presence and all of these advantages can be categorized into 2 major areas, saving time, and saving money. It is easier than ever before for a budding entrepreneur to start an ecommerce business out of their home and grow it into something that gives them a comfortable living.