HOLIDAY SHOPPING ONLINE - seasonal effects on e-commerce

witiger's 10 reasons why online shopping for Canadians, will be more popular in 2007
 

1. more women shopping online - women spend more on holiday gifts than men - more women means more people buying  o women shopping online from home - busy moms and women who have taken early retirement or who have "at home" employment find shopping online more convenient  o women shopping online from work - more women are enthusiastic about shopping online from work where they have high speed corporate access, nice monitors and colour printers - they also find it easier to shopping online in bursts, 10 minutes here, 5 minutes there, instead of dedicating an hour or more to drive to a mall   2. more Canadians with credit cards as MBNA and Capital One expanded aggressively into Canada – which allows people to buy something online, online sales can’t take place unless there is a way to affect the payment 3. more sites serving Canadians, Canadian sites increasing and American sites allowing postal codes to be typed in as well as Zip codes 4. electronic consumer products are booming in the categories of gaming and cell phones - these items are easily sold online and shoppers are increasingly using website information to compare specific models and vendor prices 5. shipping times are better and the big shippers FedEx and UPS are better at customer service than in 2004 6. busy lifestyles mean more people buying online – traffic congestion in major cities is increasingly intense, also extended families and long-distance relationships mean more people buying for more people  o extended families - Canada's multi-cultural communities, mainly centred in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal make great efforts to maintain contact with family members in other countries and as we move further into the years of the internet era the internet plays a bigger role in keeping these families together, including the seasons of the year for gift giving  o long-distance relationships - Canadians, compared to other countries, have always had a high rate of telephones per capita and we are one of the world's highest users of internet services - which facilitates the cultivation of, and sustaining of long distance relationships for friendship and romance. During the holiday seasons - these relationships are being included in gift buying and most people do this online   7. increases in gasoline prices will have a negative effect on their holiday shopping budgets but proportionately increase the amount bought online, instead of driving to a store 8. increased popularity of gift cards - more and more people unsure of the exact gift to buy, many of these people go online to select something from a general category, then buy a gift card and mail it or email it 9. larger selections. More stuff being sold online. Music, movies, books, clothing and accessories continue to be the sought after categories for online shoppers. Many companies find that some customers prefer shopping for these items online because selection is larger than at an individual store which might not have a particular item in stock  o other stuff - As vendors of products and services, other than books, CDs and DVDs become more adept at selling online, you'll see these items show up in gift selections, such as          o specialized sports and outdoor recreation equipment          o specialized utensils and apparatus used in ethnic cooking          o specialized services, such as vacation packages                        catering to particular demographics          o memorabilia from sports and entertainment 10. the economy is a bit better in Canada, our dollar is still worth more than the U.S. dollar for Sept - Oct and Nov 2007, and interest rates are still comparatively low so people won't mind racking up charges on their credit cards or dipping further into their lines of credit card.

 
 

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