#4: E-Commerce: Online Blogshops

The Internet has become increasingly more sophisticated as technology becomes more advance. Just a few years ago, setting up an online business is considered a waste of time because consumers do not believe in buying online. Blogshops have gained a rise in popularity over the last few years, judging from the formidable numbers of online blogshops created each year. So what makes online blogshops so popular? In this entry I will explore the various advantages of setting up an online blogshop as well as share a little about some of my favorite "pit stops" while shopping online.


Convenience: One of the advantages of an online blogshop is that it is convenient. Unlike websites, it does not require any web creating skills in order to create a blogshop.


Cost-Efficient: Creating a blog is free and there is no need to purchase the domain name. During the process of creating a blog, you would be required to create your domain name which would then be included in the blog's domain. Unlike website, you would have to pay a certain amount of money to obtain the domain for your website. Not only that it is free to create a blog but you could earn income by allowing advertisements to be placed in your blogshop. (Advertisement companies would keep track of the PPM of the advertisement placed on your blog and payment would depend on how many visitors have clicked on the advertisement).


However it is also important to note that some blogshops eventually become websites because they have established some kind of reputation in the blogshpere or have managed to gather a large following. 


Easier communication between buyer and seller: This is because blogs allow visitors to leave comments on topics that have been posted. This would allow visitors to ask questions or make inquiries into the products that have been placed on the blogshop and the owner can easily answer them. With this function provided, customers do not need to call the owner of the blogshop to make inquiries which would be time-consuming and also allow owners to answer all the questions at a time.

Though communication is made easier by the comment function on blogs and livejournals, I feel that this mode of communication definitely does not take precedence over face to face communication. Face to face communication as we all know, is instant, and physically going down to the store to purchase clothes also gives us the opportunity to feel the fabric and try the clothes on to see if they fit nicely- as we all know again, pictures can be deceiving. 


However, online blogshops are still popular as they give ordinary people like us (without extraordinary skills in visual communications/design), to be our own entrepreneurs. 


Different blogshops have different themes and these themes are generally differentiated by the clothes they carry. Below are screen shots of some of the places I usually shop at (or should I say shop from) and the reason for shopping at these sites is because the clothes they sell are edgier, hence appeal to my style of fashion. 

THE SCARLET ROOM

LUCYDACYD

RIOTLOCO