The short answer is Anything… well almost anything that is legal!
Electronics
Retailers who are coming from a traditional offline world can take advantage of the fact that many branded goods are known to customers. This means that the risk of receiving something that they don’t want is lower. Electronics is a great example of this – an iPhone is an iPhone whether you buy it from Apple.com or Souq.com.
Apparel
Some people thought that apparel would never work online. Some retailers still cling to an idea that consumers want to feel the fabric and see themselves in the mirror of a dressing room. But sites like Mr Draper and ASOS have shown that there is a huge desire from consumers to buy clothes from an Ecommerce site.
Mini Case Study – Mr Draper
Not all customers are the same. Men and Women shop differently. For some men, the idea of going to a mall to shop for clothes is a kind of nightmare. So imagine if you could choose your style and personalise your look on a site online, then have the ensemble delivered to your door. This is the idea behind Mr Draper.
Mr Draper is unashamedly “Shopping for Men”. Rather than try to be something to everybody, they have taken the time to understand the male clothes shopper. That is not to say that all men are the same – when it comes to personalisation, Mr Draper treats every customer as an individual with one-on-one attention.
No car-parking, the ability to try on clothes in the comfort and privacy of your own home and a well thought out experience from start to finish. The clothes can be returned in the box that they came in and you only pay for the items you keep.
Fresh
People want to be able to squeeze their mangos before they buy them. Don’t they? Or look into the eyes of a fish and test for freshness. Ecommerce couldn’t work for fresh fruit, vegetables, meat or fish. Could it? Of course, it could. In fact, even Amazon has decided to offer Fresh as an option for customers.
Ecommerce also allows new business models and disruptive challenges to supermarkets. Services like Riverford, deliver fresh produce as a subscription directly from the farm door to home.
Anything… the Long Tail
An online shop is not constrained by warehouse space or geography. Somewhere there is someone who needs what you have to sell – this is also known as the Long Tail. I recently met someone who has a business making and selling replica World War 1 and II uniforms. At first I thought that the demand for such items would be limited to collectors, but in fact, there is a global film industry that requires uniforms to be historically correct.
Next up… Services and Virtual products.
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