How will you adapt in order to survive the credit crunch?
As we see more and more high street shops falling around us, the uneasy feeling caused by the economic downturn is ever more difficult to ignore. The reduction in spending, experienced by the High Street, comes as shoppers are faced with soaring inflation, falling house prices and banks hiking up the cost of borrowing. Spending on the internet however, is rising. Traditionally the second Monday in December is known as ‘Cyber’ or ‘Mega’ Monday, as it is the biggest sales event of the year. The internet trade body, the IMRG expects internet retail sales to increase by 15 per cent this year, with customers predicted to spend an estimated £13.16bn online in the lead up to Christmas and a new record for internet sales volumes was set last Monday - typically the biggest trading day of the week online.
There are obvious categories that seem very well suited to selling online. Music, and increasingly games and films, can be bought and downloaded there and then. Availability is often better and you can find pretty much any book or DVD you want online. Sales of more tangible items, such as clothing, also do very well. As an example, online fashion retailer Asos doesn’t seem to be suffering the same fate as the High Street, recording 104% sales growth in the six months to the end of September. There are also benefits to moving online for the retailers themselves. It’s much cheaper to run a business online. The computer screen becomes your shop window, so you don’t need all those expensive high street branches, with high rents, staff to be paid, and energy bills. So it’s no surprise that internet shopping now accounts for around 7% of total sales, and is still growing fast. It seems that internet retailers definitely have the edge.
IT is definitely the way forward, as people are proving by their spending habits. As a business owner you need to ensure that your IT is working effectively for you. Good IT systems can save you money and increase productivity in any business sector, but if you have the advantage of providing a product or service that could be marketed through the internet, it’s something which you should seriously consider. Improving the efficiency of your IT doesn’t have to be expensive either, as is often thought. Sometimes, a minor change to a system you are already using can make a dramatic difference.
For a free, no obligation consultation to evaluate your existing IT, click the following link;
http://www.eximium.net/factfind.asp
This entry was posted on Thursday, December 11th, 2008 at 2:55 pm and is filed under Articles, Business Advice, IT Advice, IT Solutions . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
