Why you should be Internet Marketing, What is happening to the high Street chains?
As we are all aware the Internet is at a growing phenomenal rate and if we look around our high streets what is apparent is that a significant number of household names are going or have gone into liquidation with potentially the rest of them fighting for survival.
May be it’s about the overheads, business rates, public liability insurance, staff wages etc the high Street cannot compete, even to the point where purpose-built out of town shopping malls are crucifying them.
Or is it the likes of Amazon and Google who are one of the causes of the downturn of economic growth in the Western world in traditional retail shopping.
Whilst a large proportion of the population would probably acknowledge that we are still in recession contrary to what the “alleged experts” would have us believe people are just not spending, together with the banks who have practically “shut up shop!”
What a mess, however what is bucking the trend is the rise of sales on the Internet whether this is simply buying car insurance, holidays or groceries everything is available at the click of a button the convenience and the ability to price check from the comfort of your own home whilst drinking a cold beer or glass of wine is certainly preferably than walking the streets, parking the car using public transport.
You only have to go back a few years when Amazon started selling books, what this has done for the book market worldwide, here in the UK Borders has vanished and most recently Waterstones have announced that they are being sold to a Russian billionaire, I guess in hindsight this is what happened to the music industry with vinyl (records) and latterly CDs most people now purchase their music via iTunes.
It is also reported that huge businesses such as Comet, Currys and PC World are facing huge losses when it is so easy to Google whatever you wish whether that may be a TV, washer or any electrical item. Most of these websites have reviews on specific goods so therefore do you really need to go down to the shopping mall. The facility to purchase on-line take delivery of the product and even return it if it doesn’t meet your criteria, how can the high street remain competitive.
Perhaps time is another major factor in why the majority of the Western world are buying more and more on the Internet. Surveys indicate that Britain has the highest proportion of families in which two people work, therefore the ability to purchase whatever goods we need from our PC, is a huge benefit on what is possible our greatest asset ie: time.
Therefore it may be argued that Google and Amazon are providing the service which the modern world have asked for but we need to be conscious that the larger they become the less choice we shall have on price and product. Again look back at how the supermarkets have more or less crushed the independent retailers, whether this is simply groceries or clothing, the same will happen with the internet. They seek total domination within their niche this is what their ideal goal is.
Even to the point, if you observe closely, you will find that the above companies have moved into different niches to supply everything you could ever wish to purchase. Again if we look to the United States we just seem to follow their trends. The supermarkets are cash-rich and as such they even offer credit cards and banking facilities.
So that is why all the high streets seems to be full of charity shops, one pound shops, etc because this is what we as its customers are looking for, we want the flexibility to shop at Amazon, Tesco, Sainsburys, Ocado, which brings the discount prices, but do we want to be able to walk down our high street to find niche retailers selling our favourite products where we can feel, touch and smell. Perhaps the Internet has already changed the way we buy products and the way we live our lives.
