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Does Selection Trump Price Online?
from the depends-on-what-you're-shopping-for dept
A new study of online shopping habits is suggesting that it’s often the wider selection that’s more important than price online — contradicting a number of other studies saying that price was still the main driver for people going online. Of course, the truth is that it’s probably a combination of factors — and some of that depends on what you’re shopping for.
Comments on “Does Selection Trump Price Online?”
Not needing to expand
Online businesses still make it difficult for people to buy merchandise from foreign countries. But when they work that kink out, it will take away the incentive for stores to open outlets abroad.
Abercrombie & Fitch, the Ohio-based white supremacist clothing chain that forbids nonwhites from working in sales positions, has cancelled its plans for opening stores in Japan. Known as “abakuro” or “wild black” in Japan, the clothing chain says it will focus its expansion on Anglo-Saxon countries such as Canada and England instead.
http://www.nikkei.co.jp/news/sangyo/20051213AT1D1306U13122005.html
But if people could just buy A&F online, what’s the point?
Re: Not needing to expand
Well, whether or not that is true, I don’t buy from A&F (or others like it) anyways. One of my biggest pet peeves is wearing clothing that advertises for that clothing. It never made sense to me.
They should be paying me to advertise for them, I shouldn’t be paying them. I would much rather buy my clothing without the manufacturers name emblazoned in 3 inch tall letters across the front. It’s cheaper too.
Sorry for posting off-topic.
Re: Re: Not needing to expand
Oh great, now I have to throw away my Linux Penguin t-shirt because you guys think I’m advertising for Linux!
No Subject Given
I agree completly, sometimes I end up paying more online, and I know that I am doing it. Most of the time items are cheaper due to the lower overhead of not operating a brick-and-mortar store, but sometimes meatspace beats out.
I pay more for the selection and the ability to easily see unmoderated reviews of other people like me who have purchased or used the product. I can easily compare products and prices through the reviews and other resources.
The ammount of information available for an online purchase is massive and is infinatly larger than what you could get from a store display or employee.
It's what made Amazon huge
Until online shopping, I was lucky to find specialized books in the big stores in Boston.
I make my living because the small percentage of people who want my product can find me from anywhere in the world.
Convenience trumps price, mostly
Selection often wins because I don’t want shipping charges from multiple sites and I want everything to show up at once.
If there’s a big difference in the price then I’ll deal with the incovenience.
Sometimes though, the ability to go back to the store and return an item makes a big difference too.
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I’m with dan on the advertising. If you want me to advertise for you give me the shirt (or whatever) for free. If I have to pay for it then your logo had better be discreet.
Online Geishas?
What if geishas can be bought online? Here’s the first (known) blog by a geisha.
It's gotta be both
I shop by finding the item with the best functions/features/style in my price range, then once I know exactly what I want I shop strictly by price.
So to get my money, you have to have exactly what I want, and be the cheapest.
it's easy to find cheep items
with sites like pricegrabber, shopzilla, and froogle, I don’t see why you would ever pay more than you have to. I always find the best deal out there and buy from them, even if the online store is small. I like to support up and coming businesses anyway.
Re: it's easy to find cheep items
I’ll sometimes pay a little bit more to buy from a well established site. I don’t want to buy from some up and coming place, as they’re working through their shipping bugs or still scraping to get buy with the possibility of going under at any moment.
I don’t think people buy from the Amazon’s of the world because they have a great selection, they buy from them because they’re well established and safe. They just happen to have a good selection because they’ve been around awhile.