The information technology used for Online Shopping

As the techonology develops rapidly nowadays, more and more people prefer to purchase things online. Online shopping is undoubtedly a very convenient way for consumers for they don’t need to be in the mall physically and still could buy what they want.

BCG-Top-Online-Shopping-Motivators-Mar2013

According to the latest statistics shown that, in the U.S., more and more teenagers choose to shop online. You can see that the trend of online shopping is getting higher year by year.us-teens-shopping-online Online shopping is also a low-cost choice for many retailers to hire less employees so that they could earn more money. Many groceries stores now choose not only to own physical stores, opening an online store becomes a popular option.  Read more

I am definitely crazy about shopping online because it really saves me time, and it has the delivery service so that I don’t have to carry those heavy bags home. Also, when there is a festival such as Thanks-giving, I don’t need to go to crowed and crazy stores like this:

Crazy Wal-Mart Black Friday fight for TV

There are also disadvantages of online shopping. For one, we must be very careful with our personal information, such as the passwords and debit card number. Also, we might receive an inferior product. What’s more, it is difficult to return the purchased items.

Online shopping is not as simple and straightforward as it seems to be. It requires a great deal of information technology to keep the business running. For example, whenever you encounter a problem, you might go to the ‘automated help desk’ for help, and it could answer your questions by retrieving the key words in your sentences, and it takes those key words to the background system that contains complete instructions for every possible question a consumer might ask. Matching the key words and the proper solutions, the automated customer service then reply to your question. There are many other information techonogies used in online shopping. Here is a BBC news introducing online shopping behind the scene: read more.

With both advantages and disadvantages, shopping online is becoming a part of our daily life. What’s your opinion of shopping online- do you think it is a good thing or a hidden trouble? And how do you know the information technology used behind the scene?

3 thoughts on “The information technology used for Online Shopping

  1. Online shopping really benefit us now, like Amazon, Ebay….
    In US, 76% of U.S. are online shoppers. In 2023, there would be more than 300 million US online shoppers. Meaghan Brophy also mentions that “Of the millions of Americans who shopped online in 2018, 44% made an impulse purchase. Younger consumers make many more unplanned purchases than the average shopper. Of Generation Z consumers, 76.7% have made online impulse buys, and 78.2% of millennials have made online impulse purchases.” which means the young is becoming the main force in online shopping.(https://fitsmallbusiness.com/online-shopping-statistics/)

    However, our privacy may be damaged online shopping. You may always see ‘guess what you like’ while shopping online. It may generated from what you have buy or what you have browsed, tracing your history or information, for example, social media: like Instagram; when I am sliding on Instagram, they always send me cloth ads that I am interested in, but they may do it depending on my private information. However, the more information they know about you, the better service they can offer you. I hope they can keep away data snoopers.

  2. Online shopping really benefit us now, like Amazon, Ebay….
    In US, 76% of U.S. are online shoppers. In 2023, there would be more than 300 million US online shoppers. Meaghan Brophy also mentions that “Of the millions of Americans who shopped online in 2018, 44% made an impulse purchase. Younger consumers make many more unplanned purchases than the average shopper. Of Generation Z consumers, 76.7% have made online impulse buys, and 78.2% of millennials have made online impulse purchases.” which means the young is becoming the main force in online shopping.
    However, our privacy may be damaged online shopping. You may always see ‘guess what you like’ while shopping online. It may generated from what you have buy or what you have browsed, tracing your history or information, for example, social media: like Instagram; when I am sliding on Instagram, they always send me cloth ads that I am interested in, but they may do it depending on my private information. However, the more information they know about you, the better service they can offer you. I hope they can keep away data snoopers.

  3. Online shopping has reinvented the way people buy their necessities by making it much easier, faster, cheaper and convenient. I do believe that online shopping is great but it of course has its downfalls. For instance, you can purchase almost anything on Amazon; they even sell groceries! What makes online shopping so great is the fact that you get any products for a cheaper price online. Not only is it cheaper, but also websites often have promo codes where you can get a discount on your already inexpensive purchase. Or even some websites will allow you to become a regular member where you get free shipping and you can earn points which can be used towards later purchases. The best part is that within any time of the day you can make your purchases, instead of going to the mall, technology store, or grocery stores you can make your purchases all through online shopping, which is much more convenient.
    The downfall to online shopping is that all websites track everything you do, leading them to selling that information to other companies. One of the biggest concerns today is if a company gets hacked and your personal information being stolen. When your information is hacked it can lead to bad credit, drained bank accounts or opened accounts all over the world in your name. Another disadvantage is that people can choose to do everything online, meaning that they wont go out and interact with other people. The wifi connection to the websites, encoding to build the website is the information technology used behind the scene. Keeping the website running and up to date is also how information technology is used online. Behind the scenes information technology runs every website people use, and without it these websites would not be available for anyone to use.

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