E-commerce - Cape Peninsula University of Technology

Chapter 2: Literature review Page 43
Walsh and Godfrey also state that e-retailers establish direct customer­
to-customer interaction through online communities. These bring like­
minded groups of people together for discussions or chats, or to
participate in 'talk forums' hosted by a representative of the e-retailer.
The e-retailer posts on the net the specific topic and the time of the
discussion in advance. Anyone is free to 'join in'. E-trade.com, the US
financial and trading services company, has two successful sites for
online communities - 'Communities at E-trade' and 'Uve@E-trade'.
This is probably the closest that e-retailers get to address the social
aspects of shopping on the Internet.
• Rewards and Incentives: As in the traditional shop, e-retailers are
developing reward programmes and purchase incentives.
Clickrewards offers frequent flyer air miles when purchasing from
specific online sites. Mypoints offers points that can later be redeemed
for purchases on the Internet. Other forms of incentives are 'structured
surprises'. Customers appear to like this because the gifts are relevant
but unexpected.
E-retail shops offer e-consumers a set of conveniences, and also introduce
some new conveniences for shopping. For instance, while e-shopping
attempts to be quick and efficient, its round the clock availability adds a
dimension of "schedule convenience" that allows the customer to access
merchandise and make comparisons regardless of the time of day. These
customers can fit shopping into their schedule, it can be started, paused, and
resumed when interruptions occur (Dennis, Harris & Sandhu, 2002).
It can be argued that Internet shopping eliminates many of the structural
barriers that disabled shoppers have encountered in the bricks and mortar
setting. This i According to Reichheld and Schefter (2000), successful e­
retailers do not win the loyalty of customers through technological application