It's not delivery... it's marketing!
Researching various modes of creating a web business yield many kinds of potential models. However, these models provide much more options than there were in the past. While a young business can be caught up in their decision paralysis with the myriad of choices, a simple amount of research will show that a good entrepreneur could make them all work, yet knows which would be best for his current state of the business.
A look back at the history of sales shows that even before the invention of the internet (yes, people lived without the internet), stay at home and ease of convenience ordering was something on everyone's minds. These took the form of catalogs. Some of these catalogs were brick and mortar businesses (like Sears), while others would scour the world to find you the best deals and go through them (think of the magazines you would find on airplanes).
Children themselves were trained at an early age about this style of ordering by consuming five boxes of cereal to gain a decoder ring. Modern children no longer marvel at the ease of this, since clicking a button on your parent's phones sends you games and toy in a matter of days.
And yet, a majority of the companies that many of us use in our online ordering are no longer manufacturers nor even direct sources. This is true to sites like eBay and Amazon that allow you to peruse different sellers and click on the one you desire to web exclusive businesses that use other manufacturers to send you their products.
The newer concepts to me include affiliate linking and drop shipping. Affiliates allow an even further step away from the manufacturer, as I am able to make a few coins by linking my "products" to the various other sites that themselves don't even experience manufacturing! This benefits the inexperienced and those with limited time, allowing themselves to focus on the selling of the product without even leaving their house.
Drop shipping, on the other hand, is an alternate style of a wholesaler. If I were to start a physical storefront and wanted to sell M&Ms, I would seek out a wholesaler in my area who would buy from Mars candy in large bulk and sell a small bulk order to me. I would then be able to store that small bulk and sell the candy individually as it suited me. Drop shipping would be akin to me gaining the money from the sale, then using that money to order the candy individually from the wholesaler, who would then deliver it to the customer. How convenient is that?!?
There are draws to these business styles, respective of themselves, but they all allow one thing: The seller to focus on the selling and allow the model established to worry about the rest. Is this beneficial?
Definitely to an extent. The last thing we want is every marketplace to turn into a used car lot. However, by allowing us to focus on the product in its finished state, we are then able to reliably communicate its effectiveness to our customers.
A look back at the history of sales shows that even before the invention of the internet (yes, people lived without the internet), stay at home and ease of convenience ordering was something on everyone's minds. These took the form of catalogs. Some of these catalogs were brick and mortar businesses (like Sears), while others would scour the world to find you the best deals and go through them (think of the magazines you would find on airplanes).
Children themselves were trained at an early age about this style of ordering by consuming five boxes of cereal to gain a decoder ring. Modern children no longer marvel at the ease of this, since clicking a button on your parent's phones sends you games and toy in a matter of days.
And yet, a majority of the companies that many of us use in our online ordering are no longer manufacturers nor even direct sources. This is true to sites like eBay and Amazon that allow you to peruse different sellers and click on the one you desire to web exclusive businesses that use other manufacturers to send you their products.
The newer concepts to me include affiliate linking and drop shipping. Affiliates allow an even further step away from the manufacturer, as I am able to make a few coins by linking my "products" to the various other sites that themselves don't even experience manufacturing! This benefits the inexperienced and those with limited time, allowing themselves to focus on the selling of the product without even leaving their house.
Drop shipping, on the other hand, is an alternate style of a wholesaler. If I were to start a physical storefront and wanted to sell M&Ms, I would seek out a wholesaler in my area who would buy from Mars candy in large bulk and sell a small bulk order to me. I would then be able to store that small bulk and sell the candy individually as it suited me. Drop shipping would be akin to me gaining the money from the sale, then using that money to order the candy individually from the wholesaler, who would then deliver it to the customer. How convenient is that?!?
There are draws to these business styles, respective of themselves, but they all allow one thing: The seller to focus on the selling and allow the model established to worry about the rest. Is this beneficial?
Definitely to an extent. The last thing we want is every marketplace to turn into a used car lot. However, by allowing us to focus on the product in its finished state, we are then able to reliably communicate its effectiveness to our customers.
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