Quote:
Originally Posted by Sydney's Mom
As long as you can design a website and accept paypal, you are in business. I have bought items from some really small sellers over the internet- so long as the website where I enter my information is secure.
|
I agree - it's probably never been easier to open up a retail business than it is now. But I'd be interested to know
why you chose those sellers over Amazon.
There are usually three main influencing factors on people's decision to buy: availability, price and customer service. Obviously, we can discount the first - if one stocks it and the other doesn't, the comparison is meaningless. I would say the third is usually fairly meaningless to most people who buy over the internet because there's usually more protection than when buying in-store. Hence, if the only discriminating factor is price, it becomes very difficult for small businesses to compete with something the size of Amazon, especially in view of the fact that Google (the most widely used search engine) ranks companies in order of popularity, thus Amazon will usually be one of the top hits. Therefore, the small company is disadvantaged, and the larger company keeps edging closer to a monopoly. It's no different from having a massive Tesco or Borders move in next to a small family grocery or newsagent - the little guy might stagger along for a bit, but eventually, he'll croak. And eventually, far, far too late, the penny might drop and the monopoly will be split into several companies, which will behave like the Hydra's heads and start getting bigger again.