You are visiting this blog and reading this post. It means you have the basic understanding of internet. Good. There might be slightest chance that you don’t recognize that this site is an online store helping other people opening their own online stores. Which is also good.

Online stores are virtual stores offering physical goods and services over the net. You can purchase their goods or services using secure connections and various electronic payment (e-payment) services. It is today the most common form of electronic commerce (e-commerce).

What the heck is e-commerce, you say? Okay, here we go.

Dated back in the late 1970s, e-Commerce originally meant the process of execution of commercial transactions electronically. An awesome English dude, Michael Aldrich, invented online shopping. Using such technologies as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), companies could share and exchange business information and transactions to each other. Invoices and purchase orders could be delivered faster and more easily.

However, there were several different EDI formats to use, interaction between companies might be inhibited. Thank goodness the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) standardized ASC X12 universally in 1984, allowing them to transfer large amounts of transactions.

Throughout the 1980s the proliferation of credit cards, ATMs and telephone banking became popular on the web and thus revolutionized e-commerce–those are also forms of e-commerce, by the way.

In early 1990s e-commerce also included enterprise resource planning (ERP), data warehousing and data mining.

In 1992 the very first web-browser, Mosaic, was created. It then became a downloadable browser, Netscape, which allowed easier acccess to e-commerce.

But the total awesomeness started in 1994, when security protocols such as HTTP and high speed internet connections as DSL were introduced. Such things has allowed much faster connection speeds and faster online transaction capability. And that was about the right time to alter e-commerce definition. It became the process of selling and purchasing physical goods and services over the web using secure connections and electronic payment (e-payment) services. Many businesses have appeared online ever since, offering either offline or online products or services.

AOL had sales of 1.2 billion over the 10-week holiday season from online sales during Christmas of 1998. It was followed by the major merger between AOL and Time Warner in early 2000, evolutionizing e-commerce even further.

A sad turn, however, took place in 2000. The dot-com collapsed causing many e-commerce businesses disappeared. But almost everyone has recognized e-commerce’s advantages over the traditional business models. Next year after transactions online became

The Pioneers

We definitely can’t leave these companies when talking about the history of e-commerce. They are the first one conducting electronic transactions.

Amazon
Launched in 1982, Amazon was first considered as an online bookstore, but now it has almost all thinkable goods as electronics, software, DVDs, video games, music CDs, MP3s, apparel, footwear, health products, etc. It supports famous brands as Marks & Spencer, Lacoste, the NBA, Bebe Stores, Target, etc.

Amazon is also the first one establishing an affiliate marketing program. About 40% of its sales today come from affiliates and third party sellers.

Dell
Dell is another company that has contributed big time to e-commerce evolution. Launched as a static page in 1994, Dell.com has aggressively formed e-commerce as we know it today. Although today we can purchase Dell products from retailer outlets, in early days the major computer company ran its business with no ‘mortar and brick’ outlets and middlemen.

Boston Computer Exchange
Although it had never been a great hit, the Boston Computer Exchange was in fact the first marketplace for used computers. It was launched in 1982.

Here’s a video of Boston Computer Exchange’s Alex Randall explaining the early days of e-commerce:

eBay
Yes, you know eBay. Founded in 1995, the online auction and shopping site is in fact the first one allowing everyone (including my grandma) to sell stuff online. With eBay there is no need to have an existing business or entrepreneurship to sell something. Anything. You can even sell… err, your virginity.

e-Commerce Today

Many researchers have been doing research about e-commerce. But this one attracts my attention the most:
About 66% of adults online have bought something over the web, about 27% more have browsed products and services without buying anything (but they do visit the stores!).

These stats alone show us e-commerce has advantages that conventional stores could not have offered us. And it changes our life. Well, my life at least. Why would I wanna go to the mall for a book if I can sit on my lazy couch, with a laptop on my lap, browsing among thousands of books, paying and waiting for it sent to my door? Yeah, figured.