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The Beginning
In 1991 the internet was opened up to commercial use; since then many businesses have taken up residence at web sites.
(http://www.ecommerce-land.com/history_ecommerce.html) -
Money Online
In 1994 third-party payment services for processing online credit card sales began to appear, also the first online bank opened. In October 1994, Stanford Federal Credit Union became the first financial institution in the U.S. to offer internet banking to all of its customers. (https://www.gobankingrates.com/banking/history-online-banking/ https://www.templatemonster.com/blog/history-of-ecommerce-timeline-infographic/) -
Changing the Playing Field
eBay was founded in Pierre Omidyar's San Jose lback in September 1995. eBay is an American multinational corporation and e-commerce company, providing consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales services via the Internet. It changed the playing field for e-commerce. (http://www.ebay.com/) -
E-commerce Changed
In 2000 a great number of business companies in the United States and Western Europe represented their services in the World Wide Web. At this time the meaning of the word e-commerce was changed. People began to define the term e-commerce as the process of purchasing of available goods and services over the Internet using secure connections and electronic payment services. (http://www.ecommerce-land.com/history_ecommerce.html) -
The Collapse
The year of the dot-com collapse when thousands of internet of internet businesses folded. Despite the epic collapse, many of the worlds' most established traditional brick-and-mortar businesses were emboldened with the promise of e-commerce and the prospect of serving a global customer base electronically. (http://www.spirecast.com/history-of-e-commerce/) -
Shopping Made Easy
In 2002 Google spotted a gap in the market and started what is today known as Google Shopping. Back in 2002 Google Shopping was a price comparison search tool that would crawl all online products and display them in the “Shopping” tab and was a great way for smaller businesses to advertise their products for free. (http://www.yoma.co.uk/blog/20-years-ecommerce-history-timeline/) -
Amazon
In 2003 the company made its first annual profit which was the first step to the further development; at the outset Amazon.com was considered as an online bookstore, but in time it extended a variety of goods by adding electronics, software, DVDs, video games, music CDs, MP3s, apparel, footwear, health products, etc. The original name of the company was Cadabra.com, but shortly after it was changed to Amazon because of popularity.(http://www.ecommerce-land.com/history_ecommerce.html) -
Targeting
In 2006 Facebook signed a deal with Microsoft to provide and sell ads on their site so as to start making a profit. This was much to the pleasure of e-commerce businesses as they could now reach out to an audience who were mostly tech savvy and open to the idea of buying online; now targeted ads, video ads and timeline ads.(http://www.yoma.co.uk/blog/20-years-ecommerce-history-timeline/) -
B2B
Business-to-business electronic commerce accounts for the vast majority of total e-commerce sales and plays a leading role in global supply chain networks. In 2008, approximately 40 percent of manufacturing sales and 16.3 percent of wholesale sales in the United States were e-commerce related. (http://www.supplychainquarterly.com/columns/scq201102monetarymatters/) -
E-Commerce to M-Commerce
It is believed the as e-commerce grows it will turn more and more into m-commerce as smartphones become increasingly the norm in day to day life; 55% of time spent with online retail today occurs on smartphones and tablets—imagine what that figure will be in five years. (https://www.internetretailer.com/2014/04/28/e-commerce-and-m-commerce-next-five-years) -
Multi-Shopping
Nowadays, consumers don’t just have options for where they shop; they also have options for what they want to shop on. Customers might see your product while window shopping at the mall, check it out on their smartphones, conduct further research on their tablets, and finally buy the product on their desktops. They move fast between devices and expect brands to keep up. (https://www.curalate.com/blog/future-of-ecommerce/) -
Affiliation
Amazon is one of the first e-commerce businesses to establish an affiliate marketing program, and nowadays the company get about 40% of its sales from affiliates the third party sellers who list and sell goods on the web site. In 2008 Amazon penetrated into the cinema and is currently sponsoring the film "The Stolen Child" with 20th Century Fox. (http://www.ecommerce-land.com/history_ecommerce.html) -
A Wave
One big reason e-commerce will continue its steady march of growth is simply because more people worldwide will hop online and start spending money. In 2015 the number of digital buyers stood at 1.46 billion; in 2019 that figure is expected to cross the 2 billion mark. (https://www.curalate.com/blog/future-of-ecommerce/) -
Asia-Pacific
According to eMarketer, the region with the highest total of ecommerce sales is Asia-Pacific, where ecommerce sales overtook North America in 2014. According to Forrester, the ecommerce market trend in the Asia-Pacific region will reach $1.4 trillion in 2020. eMarketer attributes the growth of Asia-Pacific market to the development of technology in the region, allowing customers to make online purchases.(https://www.demoup.com/blog/six-new-ecommerce-trends-shaping-the-future-online-retail/)
