Superdrug can impress

Online shopping facility

An online shopping facility allows customers to order and pay for your goods and services over the internet. However there are many disadvantages and advantages of using an online presence.

Advantages reduced overheads by having an online business you don’t have to put up with buying or renting a place for your business therefore the expenses of a shop are eliminated.

Superdrug can therefore focus on building an attractive website for their customers and then can spend the money that they saved from not buying/ renting a place on hiring a specialist that can monitor the website at all times e.

g. administrator. Access to new customers – buy having an online business you will be targeting new customers all over the world and making your existing customers permanent as they are now able to access your product/services at all times.

Superdrug can impress their new customers by having a personalised website and perhaps making them loyal.

Having an online business gives you the ability to compete with larger businesses on an equal footing – if you are a small business than to become an online business can be very beneficial to your company. This will enable you to then compete with much larger businesses because customers judge the business by the appearance of your website and not the size of your business. Superdrug can therefore go a long way by having a professional to satisfy their customers.

Gives customers access to products and services not available in their area – by being an online business, it enables everyone to access your products/services but if Superdrug was not an online business than not everyone could have an access to your products/services therefore you would have less sales and profit making it harder for you to compete and maintain your position in the market.

Offers convenience and privacy for your customers – Superdurg offers a professionally personalised website to their customers according to their wants and needs.

Appealing to a wide and varied base of customers e. g. online shopping allows disabled or housebound people easy shopping. Special offers (cheaper online) – Superdrug offers many offers to their new and existing customer e. g. buy one and get one free or buy 2 items for the price of one. Email feedback comments to the company – Superdrug has a very good website which allows their customers to feedback on their products/services or recommending any changes. This is a very easy and quick way for Superdrug to interact with their customers, as they are receiving a quick response at the cost of nothing!

If you have bought a product online and still haven’t received it then you can track your order and can actually find out how long it will take until it reaches you as they email to inform their customers. Customers of Superdrug therefore have the advantage of tracking their order and can check where their product has reached if it’s being shipped from another country and how long it will take. More convenient – by having a website allows customers to shop very easily and quickly.

They don’t have to put up with the long queues and not finding the car park which makes it more convenient for customer, especially the elderly and disabled people who would find it very difficult to travel. Comparing prices – by having an online business, you are able to compare prices and find the best deal! 24/7 access – having global availability is very important for any type of business to be successful. Having global availability means more customers can have access to your business at any day and at any time.

Superdrug therefore is very fortunate to have an online business as they would be receiving a big profit. Good customer service – good customer service is essential to any business’s bright future. Superdrug has indeed a very good customer service as they offer great deals and deal with customer’s complaint instantly showing that they care about their customers. Customers can get information about the company – new customers of Superdrug can read company’s profile in their website if they are not familiar with Surperdrug or their products/services.

Benefits

This will benefit the customers because they can find out if the company is reliable and save to buy from, by making sure that they have a good reputation and are well known around the world.

• Disadvantages Payments online – the downfall for having an online business is that many people still can’t give out their card details because they feel that it can be accessed by a third party which is not safe. This would result in customer not buying from the Superdrug website therefore you might face decrease in sales and profit.
• A lot of spoof websites – by having an online business, many fraudsters create a website that looks exactly the same as the original website, they do this to divert the customers to them so they can get their bank details when they buy something, which would then result in Superdrug losing their reputation and their loyal customers! If the website they are buying from is not secure then hackers may be able to gain vital information e. g. fraud – it is very important that Superdrug website is well secured to ensure that their customers feel secured as well in giving out their bank details without any hesitation.
• May not be computer literate – some of the users might not know the basic on how to use a computer which can be a downfall as they will not be able to use the internet therefore they will not be able to buy.
• May not have access to the internet – some people have computers but most of them do not have the access to the internet as it costs to have a internet connection, this can be another major problem for the customer as the won’t be able to take full advantage of Superdrug’s online services and offer.
• Brand loyalty – if your business has a bad reputation then the word could spread like wildfire. therefore make sure that your customers are happy and satisfied by your services/products at all time, which means that Superdrug’s staff has to be efficient in dealing with customers complaints and feedback comments and respond to them immediately to keep everything in under control.
• Slow internet speeds can make websites slow for users – many people can’t afford to have high speed internet connection e. g. if a Superdrug customer has a dial up connection (56k) and logs into the Superdrug website, experiencing the web page not to open or taking too long to open then that would make the customer to just completely shut it down as many people will get impatient waiting for the website to open, resulting in the customer not being able to browse through the website.
• Difficulties in delivering goods to worldwide customers – this can be one of the major downfalls to the customer, not receiving their goods immediately after they have ordered. Many businesses have problems delivering their products worldwide, this will be known as poor customer service therefore getting the product on time to your customers is essential, and when they receive their product on time they will be happy and spread good remarks about your product and service getting you more new customers!