Online shopping using real-time information (part 1)

While the internet offers more and more real-time information, the content on most webshops is particularly outdated. Yes, it is possible to see opinions of your fellow consumer, but these reviews are mainly from a month or even a year ago. These webshops doesn’t use the fundamental power of the internet: direct and real-time interaction.

Over the past years e-commerce have made it possible to buy and sell products or services via the internet. This online marketing develops more and more towards real-time e-commerce. Examples of these developments are live banners, which refresh real-time to show the current prices, and live campaigns, which stop automatically when all products are sold. Another example is live e-mail, in which content is composed only at the time of opening. Because the content in the e-mail is associated with the inventory system of the related company, it will always show the current situation. As a result, the consumer is always able to see what products already have been sold out.

Live e-mail, showing a product that already has been sold out

Live shopping

Live shopping is an alternative to traditional online shopping. Mostly a single product is temporary offered for a very favorable price, often the daily lowest on the internet. The price of this product is usually far below the recommended selling price. Because the offer is temperorary, consumer have to decide quickly whether to buy it or not, resulting in many impulsive purchases. The American company Woot was the first company to launch this idea of offering one product for 24 hours at a very low price.

Live shopping at Woot

These examples of real-time e-commerce are particularly from the Business to Consumer (B2C) point of view. Next time I will be back with another example of real-time e-commerce, in which social communities become more and more important. So keep following this blog!