1. E-commerce companies face many challenges including verifying online customer identities, providing consistent customer service across channels, analyzing competitors, adapting to changing customer behaviors, reducing shopping cart abandonment, maintaining customer loyalty, managing product returns and refunds, and competing on price and shipping costs. 2. To address these issues, companies should take steps to verify customer information, equip support teams to respond via all channels, identify key channels to optimize, maintain context across conversations, conduct in-depth competitor research to differentiate, leverage marketplaces, segment visitors to personalize experiences, simplify checkout processes, prioritize customer service, create loyalty programs, design transparent return policies, and consider warehouse distribution to lower shipping costs.

1. 1. GLOBAL ISSUES IN E COMMERCE
i. An absence ofOnline Identity Verification
 When a visitor visits an e-commerce website and signs up, the portal is unaware of the
customer except for the information he/she entered. The customer is genuine or not is
questionable. It creates huge revenue losses for a company when a customer makes a
Cash-On-Delivery (COD) purchase and the information entered like phone number,
the address is invalid or fake.
Solution:
 This challenge can be solved by taking the proper steps to verify the customer’s
information. First of all recognize signs of suspicious activities like if any customers
are placing high priced orders or large orders, Detect fake phone numbers or email
address, check zip code whether it is matching with state/city. Besides this when a
customer signs up, send a verification link via a text message or email to validate the
genuineness of customer. And when a customer makes a COD purchase automated
call can be dialed out to the customer and ask him/her to validate the delivery address.
ii. Delivering on Omnichannel customer service
 In today's business scenario, a customer can contact you at any touch-points. For
instance, he can visit your website, contact your agent, leave a message on your social
media page, shop from your store or contact you through live chat or messaging
platform.
 According to ecomdash, “Any business that isn’t moving toward an omnichannel
retailing strategy will likely be left behind by its online savvy competitors.”
 Modern visual engagement tools capacitate your organization to serve your customers
across all touchpoints, channels, and journeys.
Solution:

2.  Equip your team with the right technology - Set up customer support staff with the
right technology so that they can reach out to your customers via their preferred
channels like phone, email, live chat, video call, online help centers or in-app
messaging.
 Identify the key channels - Identify the channels which are most important to your
customers. Integrate and optimize those channels by adding personalized messages
and offer one-to-one interaction with live chat or video calling.
 Maintain the Context - Direct the conversations based on a user’s previous response.
Keep a track of customer conversations with important parameters like user profile so
you can always respond contextually to the customers irrespective of the channels
they used.
iii. Competitor Analysis
 “You can’t look at the competition and say you’re going to do it better. You have to
look at the competition and say you’re going to do it differently.” – Steve Jobs
 In this competitive world, there will be too many competitors who will be offering the
same products and services as you. Unless you have the best strategy that
differentiates yourself from other competitors; it will become difficult to survive.
Solution:
 Conduct proper and deep research of your competitors. Put your efforts in making
strategy which enables you to shine brighter than your competitors. Use social media
platforms and blogs for promoting your products. Invest in promotional offers this
will help to get more web presence and customers.
 “Businesses with customer’s loyalty programs, on average, are 88% more profitable
than customers who do not.”
 Carry out research to find which new products are more in demand and remove old
and unwanted items less in demand. By offering best & extraordinary customer
services can even help you to be one step ahead of your competitors.
iv. Stuck at the old schoolway of selling

3.  The reason eCommerce companies find online selling fiercer is that they are still
stuck with the old way of selling. Most of them lack the necessary insight into
customer behavior and their buying patterns which can help them strive in the current
e-commerce scenario.
Solution:
 Offer your product on prominent marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, etc as these e-
commerce sites already have an existing network of buyers so pitching and branding
your product becomes relatively easy.
 Segment visitors - Visitor segmentation allows eCommerce companies to focus on
their website visitors on the basis of their customer journey - past conversations,
geographical location, browsing behavior, referral page, and more.
 This allows eCommerce companies to anticipate customer needs and offer them
personalized service ( free delivery or promo codes ) to convert them more easily.
v. Shopping cart abandonment
 Shopping cart abandonment is one of the biggest issues faced by eCommerce
businesses today. Even big giants cannot escape the problem of cart abandonment.
 For instance, when a brick and mortar giant Nordstrom started its online e-commerce
portal, they witnessed a huge loss due to cart abandonment, customers were literally
abandoning the cart due to tedious and buggy checkout process.
 This lead Nordstrom them to come up with a brand new checkout design which
doesn't get navigate to other pages and makes checkout a two-step process.
Solution:
 Consider redesigning your shopping cart, make sure that there are no bugs or
unnecessary clingy form filling process.
 Fortunately, it has been observed that live chat solutions reduce shopping cart
abandonment instances. Features such as visitor segmentation can help you to
proactively reach out to your customers during key stages of their journey. You can

4. track visitors who have left the checkout process without placing an order, and engage
with them.
 Visual tools capacitate you to instantly address customer queries during the checkout
process.
vi. Maintaining customer loyalty
 No matter how attractive or fancy your website looks, if you would not be able to
build customer trust and loyalty, the business has to struggle another day!
 It’s the work of lots of efforts for companies to make a new customer and maintain
the same customer for a long time. One of the reasons why e-commerce companies
face the struggle while building trust and loyalty with the customer is because a seller
and a buyer don’t know each other nor they can see each other while making a
transaction, unlike street-shopping. It takes few transactions, time and plenty of
efforts by the company to build customer trust and loyalty.
Solution:
 “Customer service is what you and your organization provide. Customer loyalty is
the result of the service.” – Shep Hyken
 To earn customer loyalty, what you must provide is excellent customer service.
You must make sure from ordering online to shipping, the customer is satisfied
with your service. There are plenty of online retailers that might be selling the
same product like yours, so you must identify your competitive advantage and
nurture your customer service accordingly.
 The few simple ways to increase trust with visitors are as follows:

o Display your address, phone number, and pictures of staff, customer
testimonials, and credibility badges on your website.

o Add live chat option to the website.

o Create blogs. Often blogs help e-commerce to build trust.


5. o Make customer service as a priority before profit. Always remember, it’s
always easy to maintain an existing customer than to find a new.
o Create loyalty programs. As the points are not transferable to other companies,
the customer will definitely make next purchases from your sites.
vii. The headache ofproduct return and refund
 In a survey by comScore and UPS, 63% of American consumers check the return
policy before making a purchase and 48% would shop more with retailers that offer
hassle-free returns. This clearly shows how conscious consumers are for the return
and refund policy.
 When the product is returned, due to whatsoever reason, whether a customer was
dissatisfied or the product was damaged, the business suffers a heavy loss of shipment
and reputation. Cost of logistics and shipping have always been scary for those e-
commerce sellers who deliver the product for free.
Solution:
 Return and refund are also part of great customer service, therefore it will be a big
mistake to underestimate them. The best thing you can do is build a strong returns
policy. Below consideration should be kept in mind while designing returns policy:
 Never hide your policy. Be transparent.
 Use plain English that even understand by laymen. Not all your customers that will
read the policy will be highly intellectual.
 Don’t use the scary stuff in the policy like, “you must”, “you are required”, the too
harsh policy may stop customer to purchase the product.
 Outline what they can expect from you. Provide them various options for payments
and shipping.
 Educate your staff about your return policy. So, that they can assist customers quickly
and effectively.
 Be prepared to face the cost of your mistakes. If the product is shipped wrong, then
take extra efforts to make the customer happy.
viii. The struggle of competing on price and shipping

6.  Online merchants frequently compete on price. Plenty of sellers may list equal
products on their sites. The product can be the same but the only difference here is the
price. They are vying to sell the product to increase its market share.
 The price competition affects the small e-commerce business badly. Because the mid-
sized or large competitors often offer products for less price and free shipping on
nearly every order, while they couldn’t afford to offer the same with competitive
price.
 Online sellers like Amazon and Walmart generally have shipping amenities around
the country. Their distributed warehouses allow large e-commerce businesses to ship
orders from the closest facility; approximately 60 percent of orders are in the same
area the customer is in. As the orders are shipped from the nearby warehouses, the
cost to send the order decreases and the order arrives in a day or two.
 Ultimately every online shopper expects fast and frees shipping that too at the lowest
price.
Solution:
 To survive in the competitive market, e-commerce companies need to distribute their
own inventory to fulfillment warehouses, become extremely resourceful shippers, or
find some unique products to minimize this problem. Because ultimately every online
shopper expects fast and free shipping that too in lowest price.
ix. Competing againstretailers and manufacturers
 Many online stores bulk buy products wholesale from manufacturers or distributors to
sell that in retail from their online store. This is the basic business model for online
stores.
 Unfortunately, because of e-commerce's low barrier to entry and other reasons, many
product manufacturers and retailers start selling directly to consumers.
 The same company that sells your products may also be your competitor. For
example, ABC Garments sells not just your online marketplace, but also directly to
consumers on its website. Even some of the manufacturers build distributors that
make the scenario worse.

7. Solution:
 Though it is not completely possible to stop manufacturer to sell products to
customers directly, few tactics may help to minimize the problem. Below are the
tactics that might help the online seller:
 Giving priority to buy from those manufacturers that are less likely to sell directly to
customers.
 Offering the product at fewer prices or with the added benefit to increasing sales.
 Restricting the manufacturer to sell the product directly to the customer by enforcing
the policies and strict rules while making the contract. It will be not possible for every
manufacturer but you can deal with the small manufacturers.
x. A problem of Data Security
 Security issues over the web can lead to a nightmare. Fraudsters post lot of spam and
they may attack the web host server and infect all websites with viruses. They can get
access to all your confidential data about your customer’s phone number, card details,
etc.
Solution:
 Manage your own servers and do not use common FTP to transfer files. FTP is prone
to theft. If any developer copies any file in an open Wi-Fi network can lose passwords
and other confidential data to the thief. By constantly updating the shopping cart you
can minimize the risk of data stolen. Most content management systems store their
data in the database. Developers should take backups at regular intervals and should
retrieve the data if stolen.
 The last word:
Surviving in the E-commerce competition, which is no less than war, requires
outstanding strategies. If you don't want to struggle, then give extra efforts on your
every aspect of the business. You must be prepared for challenges and growth at
every stage of your business, and ultimately it will have a better chance to bloom.

8. xi. Access to infrastructure
 In order to conduct commercial transactions over the Internet, consumers and business
people must first have access to telecommunications networks and services, including
backbone networks. Once connection to the networks and services is ensured, in turn,
their capacities and quality become important for the users. It is thus of critical
importance for E-Commerce to ensure that a proper and efficient access be available.
xii. Access to content
 While access to infrastructure is a necessary condition for people to adopt and
participate in E-Commerce, various types of content transmitted over this
infrastructure are also critical elements for the success of E-Commerce. The contents
have to be competitive as well as respecting the cultural values of others.
xiii. Universal access
 Connectivity to telecommunications networks is a prerequisite for enjoying the
benefits of E-Commerce. With the increasing importance of Information and
Communication Technologies in our everyday lives, universal availability of various
communication services, including basic telephone service, is regarded as a principal
policy objective in competitive market environment. At the same time a large number
of people are even without the basic telephone services. This gap in the world
population is called as digital divide.
xiv. Issues relating to Trust
 There is a need of trust when we engage in a relationship or interaction with other
people. Generally lack of knowledge of those people requires us to take risks in the
relationship or interaction. Renowned scholar Arrow says “virtually every commercial
transaction has within itself an element of trust, certainly any transaction conducted
over a period of time.”
 Any type of commercial transaction presupposes trust between the transacting parties.
In any contract parties to it must trust each other and perform their part of the
contract. In normal contracts the rules and procedures for dealing with instances of
breach of trust are all ready laid down. But this continues to be a problem in E-
Commerce.
 Any form of E-Commerce will never become successful unless the trading parties
trust each other as well as the system through which the transaction is made. An
analysis of this area would reveal that the following elements are critical for
developing trust in a E-Commerce system:
a) Privacy and data protection
b) Security
c) Consumer Protection, and
d) Content Regulation
a) Privacy

9.  Generally it is believed that privacy is a necessary precondition for trust. [13] But the
increase of electronically mediated transactions over the information and
communication network raises regulatory concerns on the collection, storing and
manipulation of personal information without consent or even knowledge of
consumers. Databases of consumer information may contain personal information.
 There is a chance that without the consent or knowledge of consumers, those
databases may be shared with or sold to others to whom the consumers have not
chosen to give their personal information. Because of these matters the protection of
privacy has emerged as one of the most important policy issues among policy-makers,
businesses and consumers. At the same time the growth of E-Commerce is inevitably
connected with and relies on the collection, storing of personal information obtained
by voluntary and involuntary consumer surveillance. Taking these things into
consideration the task of the policy makers to balance these conflicting interests
becomes difficult.
b) Security
 The full potential of E-Commerce cannot be achieved until the system is
capable of providing the same levels of trust found in traditional commercial
transactions. This can be accomplished only if consumers of E-Commerce are
confident of the security of transmitted information. Among the prime
security concerns of E-Commerce confidentiality authentication and
integrity of information are most important.
c) Consumer protection
 Price and product information are essential for consumers to make informed
purchasing decisions in any market. When a commercial transaction is made between
parties without a direct face-to-face contact or a physical inspection of products, the
lack of this information affects legitimate expectations of the consumers to receive
quality goods and products. Unfortunately most of the B2C E-Commerce transactions
are of this kind. The following two factors make this issue even more complicated:
 Competition among the business: The competition results in an increasing entry of
businesses into the E-market and the tendency of these people to go for unethical and
unfair trade practices are also on the increase.
The following are some of those major consumer issues in the e-commerce:
1)Fairness and truthfulness in advertising. Some of the online merchants advertise their
products and services in an unfair and unethical way so as to attract more number of
customers. In real space commerce the customers can approach various authorities and courts
with complaints. But this is difficult in e commerce particularly in the context of e-commerce
across national borders. A small retail customer may find difficulty in approaching an
authority in another country where the seller is situated.
2)Labeling and other disclosure requirements such as guarantees, product standards and
specifications: Each country has got its own standards in labeling, quality of the product and
terms and conditions regarding guarantee. In the cross border e-commerce if any of these
standards are not maintained it would be difficult for a customer to seek remedy against this.

10. 3)Refund mechanism in the case of cancelled orders, defective products, returned purchases
and lost deliveries etc. This is another serious issue in the e-commerce. Proving the
cancellation of orders, or a defect in the goods or services etc would depend on him proving
these circumstances. Taking the global nature of e-commerce it would be really difficult to
get the money back from the seller.
The Global Information Infrastructure Commission also points out certain other areas of
concern, which are as follows:
1)Online fraud: The instances of online frauds are on the increase. A person who loses money
in any of such frauds may face difficulty in enforcing his rights.
2)Privacy protection: It is also important that confidential information such as credit card
information, bank account number etc. should be protected. Internet is a medium through
which these information are very often misused.
3) Authentication and security of information: Similarly an ordinary consumer would also
face difficulty in verifying the authentication and security information in an online
atmosphere.
4)Lack of Consumer education: Many persons who use online platforms to engage in
commercial activities fail to understand the vulnerability of Internet and taking appropriate
safeguards.
In order create a trust-conducive environment for electronic commerce consumer protection
issues will have to be answered. The governments across the globe will have to device
reliable protection mechanisms with the help of industry and others. As a useful form of aid,
the new Information and Communication Technologies may be utilized by regulators and
consumer advocates for devising innovative solutions for consumer protection and
education.