An Introduction To The Internet Shopping Giants

Internet shopping is more popular than ever before, as more products are becoming available for customers with low or no shipping fees. Internet connections are also becoming affordable and faster, allowing more people to go online.

With many of the latest electronic portable devices capable of accessing the net, and online shops having their own mobile versions of the site, online shopping is clearly the future. While there are literally millions of online shopping sites, the E-commerce market is basically led by four giants.

Amazon

Amazon started as an online bookstore, but quickly evolved into a site offering all kinds of content from eBooks to music, movies, video games and other multimedia content. Now they offer all the same items you find in malls, including apparel, electronics, toys and other items. It has expanded to many countries including the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, China and most of Europe.

With over 600 million visitors to the site each year, it is not only more popular, but also more reliable than traditional shopping because of its reviews system where customers can rate and write reviews on the products. Amazon's brand further expanded when they introduced the Kindle, which turned out to be one of the best eBook readers on the market.

eBay

eBay is popular in an entirely different avenue, making use of online auction concepts. It launched a year after Amazon, and rose in popularity very quickly since it is easy to sell used or brand new items online, allowing millions of sellers to actively sell dozens of products.

Registered users have benefits of creating their own stores to further emphasize their items to attract buyers. eBay also gained a significant boost in the E-commerce market when they bought their competitor PayPal, which is one of the most popular online payment processors.

eBay is utilizing PayPal to make it easy for customers to complete transactions and build their reputations to become trusted sellers. Thanks to the online auction concept and ability for any member to be a seller, eBay has better international coverage than Amazon.

Walmart

Everyone worldwide should know what Walmart is, and that alone gives the world's largest public corporation potential to set up an online store of their own, which they did in 2008. Their website offers a wide selection of items which is about the same as walking into a regular Walmart store. Shipping is inexpensive, as are the products that they offer.

DubLi

DubLi is not as popular as the other three sites, but is rising to be an Internet shopping giant in its own category. Like eBay, it is an online auction site, but the buying system is different, implementing a special credits system which is used to view the price of items, or bid in reverse auctions. This can often result in great deals for customers, but also the full price still goes to the seller, benefiting all parties involved.

Dubli continues to grow, as shoppers like the unique concept of potentially obtaining products at a discount.