Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I know I just left a post but I had some other thoughts. I have enough
issues trying to figure out my own business strategies, however I enjoy
the sharing of ideas.

Quite frankly, I don`t understand how your service is different than PayPal
or others, except for the fact that it is not a shopping cart. Every e-
commerce site has a cart that offers similar features if not more!

It goes back to one of my original thoughts when reading your post.
What if consumers can hold their customer info from ANY purchase from
ALL sites in ONE place? How could this be setup? How simple could the
process be?

This breaks from your idea of online retailers having branded accounts
with you. And it`s a bit of a break from being more a retailer service to
more of a consumer service. Maybe this isn`t what you want to do at all.
But since it seems you are still in the conceptual development phase, I
thought I would throw this out there. While your services are great for
the retailer, I do question its value to the consumer. But like any service,
some would take to it while others wouldn`t. I`m just thinking of how you
can broaden the value to those who will take to it, and in turn broaden
that number of people.

Here are my ideas based on yours. Two elements are key to
implementation: the consumer`s email address and the simplicity of a
button or checkbox.

Like your concept, the online retailer would set up an account service
through your site to be used as part of the checkout on their site,
whether they use PayPal, another payment service or their own.

No matter how the payment is made, the consumer has to log into an
account of some sort and that requires giving an email address. What if,
as part of that process, there were only a simple button or checkbox to
add their purchase info to your site. Check the box and the info is
automatically sent to their account on your site by way of their email
address. No extra logging in or being sent to another site and routed
back again.

Then when the consumer gets their purchase confirmation email from the
retailer, they also get an invitation to your site, either as part of the email
or a separate one.

If they do not have an account with you yet, they could be enticed by the
fact that the purchase they just made is ready to be applied to their
account. They click on your link and are brought to your account setup
page. They sign up and manage as much info as they want!

If they already have an account, then the email prompts them to login and
brings them to their page of purchase history (or whatever page) in you
site. Now they can manage the consumer options you offer.

Now it is more of an online statement service, plus more. Like a credit
card statement that spans multiple credit cards or payment methods.
From inside your site, you could offer interactive features both
advantageous to the consumer and the online retailer. For example, if
someone bought an iPod from a site, then as part of the statement an
iPod accessory could be advertised from that specific retailer with a link
back to their site. Or the
consumer could rate or fill out a survey about that retailer. Maybe leave
comments like on ebay. Or who knows what! People would have the
option to visit your site on their own time, not during checkout.

Imagine the benefits of seeing ALL online purchases in one place.
Individuals and families could access their account for budgeting.
Businesses could track expenses no matter what site they purchased
supplies from. And more!

Or this: How could the purchase data gathered from many people benefit
the retailers? Maybe the retailer could see what other kinds of things
their customers buy at other sites. They couldn`t see specifics that the
customers wouldn`t want to share but more along the lines of data for
marketing. I don`t know because this isn`t my field.

This would give you the chance to brand your own company by adding
the buttons to any e-commerce site. Like PayPal does but you are not a
payment service. Like digg does as a simple little button, click and you
are done. Like comparative shopping sites rate and link retailers but it`s
not for shopping. There could be links to customer service at each
retailer they bought from, all in one place. There could be links to
companies like UPS and FedEx to track shipping. There could be....?

What kinds of features can you offer someone AFTER they already buy
something? How does this benefit them? The little button could be on
ANY retailer`s site, from the little guy to even Amazon, PayPal or ebay.
Think of that exposure! How many people would sign up if all they had
to do was click a button to first get involved?

Hell, I don`t know if this is a great idea. I just thought it up right now as I
typed this. I`m not even sure how one makes money off of it. You`ll have
to work out the details of that stuff. I think you were on to something but
your scope wasn`t big enough. Plus you were talking about features that
already exist for most retailers.

Well, there`s a free web business idea for John or whoever wants to run
with it. It`s not my cup of tea for business so it`s up for grabs. How can
you make it even better?

I just took the dog for a walk and thought up one more thing. I`m
thinking faaaaaaaar into the future of a company like this, as a
comprehensive purchase statement service.

How could the company bridge the gap between online sales and buying
through brick-and-morter? Perhaps a consumer could import
transactions from their credit card companies into their online statement.
So if you bought an ice cream at Ben & Jerry`s on your credit card, even
that could show up on your statement. And with it, a link to
benandjerrys.com, for expample.

There would have to be a way for the credit card companies to benefit
from this as well instead of people using their own statements. I have no
idea how but I thought I would throw this other thought out there.

One consolidated, interactive, online statement service for all purchases
made either on the internet or off!

But ideas like this have to start at the bottom. Develop a simple service
for the small online retailers first and grow it from there. If it works well
for the consumer, they will demand it in all places they purchase from.
And you will offer it.

Hi CampSteve,

Those are interesting ideas but won`t happen because of collaboration and privacy.  You would need to somehow convince Amazon.com, Buy.com PayPap, 2checkout, etc to transmit specific customer information to your online service.  They will need customer consent of course, which no customer will consent too, since that just seems fishy.  Besides, people already have their information spread out all across the Internet as it and aren`t readily willing to keep doing that for little benefit.

I believe some service such as MS Money Online or Quicken do something similar to an online statement, which are tough competitors.

I was referring more to online businesses that want to allow their customers a place to update contact info for that "one" business.  If an online business uses PayPal, they can`t view their customer contact info.  Have you ever tried this in PayPal?  A history tab is there but it doesn`t work.  So this means if the online business wants to mail out a branded mug or something to specific customers, they can`t because the mailing address isn`t available to them.  Perhaps it is but it will take some effort to get it.    With the online service I propose, they could search for the highest paying customers and send out gifts.  Storing customer contact info was just one of the aspects of this service.