Wal-Mart's Business Strategy in eCommerce: The Role of IT in Business Solutions
How IT helps to address challenges now and/or in the future
Wal-Mart, the world largest retailer, is facing the new challenges at a time when low prices and one-stop shopping can be a few clicks away on a tablet computer or mobile phone. (Anne D'innocenzio. 2014). With the great development of Information Technology, Wal-Mart needs to develop the latest technology to survive in the competitive business environment. This part analysis how what challenges that Wal-Mart are facing right now and how information technology can help the company to solve these problems.
What challenges There are three main challenges that Wal-Mart are facing: price pressure, changing shopping habits of customers, and Wal-Mart is surviving in the Amazon’s shadow.
One of the representative feature of Walmart is its low price. Since Wal-Mart built its reputation on everyday low price, which attracts a lot of low income people. These customers prefer to choose low-price products. In addition, until now, “Wal-Mart has been able to make huge profits by keeping worker wages low and using its size to negotiate cheaper prices than competitors”. Brian Sozzi at The Street writes. However, since the economic recovery, Wal-Mart is not the only store provides the low price products. Other stores such as dollar tree, 99 cents only store, and some grocery stores are the main competitors of Wal-Mart. The competition is becoming intense. Moreover, large size of the store is not the advantage for Wal-Mart any more. Customers are tired of searching one product that they need in the whole large store. People are looking for a faster, convenient, and direct way to shopping. As a result, Wal-Mart has had to focus more on cutting its prices. The move that Wal-Mart did is that using Wal-Mart's Savings Catcher, an online tool that customers can compare Wal-Mart's prices with other stores’ price. If a lower price is found elsewhere, Wal-Mart refunds the difference in the form of a store credit. Low prices hurt
Wal-Mart, the world largest retailer, is facing the new challenges at a time when low prices and one-stop shopping can be a few clicks away on a tablet computer or mobile phone. (Anne D'innocenzio. 2014). With the great development of Information Technology, Wal-Mart needs to develop the latest technology to survive in the competitive business environment. This part analysis how what challenges that Wal-Mart are facing right now and how information technology can help the company to solve these problems.
What challenges There are three main challenges that Wal-Mart are facing: price pressure, changing shopping habits of customers, and Wal-Mart is surviving in the Amazon’s shadow.
One of the representative feature of Walmart is its low price. Since Wal-Mart built its reputation on everyday low price, which attracts a lot of low income people. These customers prefer to choose low-price products. In addition, until now, “Wal-Mart has been able to make huge profits by keeping worker wages low and using its size to negotiate cheaper prices than competitors”. Brian Sozzi at The Street writes. However, since the economic recovery, Wal-Mart is not the only store provides the low price products. Other stores such as dollar tree, 99 cents only store, and some grocery stores are the main competitors of Wal-Mart. The competition is becoming intense. Moreover, large size of the store is not the advantage for Wal-Mart any more. Customers are tired of searching one product that they need in the whole large store. People are looking for a faster, convenient, and direct way to shopping. As a result, Wal-Mart has had to focus more on cutting its prices. The move that Wal-Mart did is that using Wal-Mart's Savings Catcher, an online tool that customers can compare Wal-Mart's prices with other stores’ price. If a lower price is found elsewhere, Wal-Mart refunds the difference in the form of a store credit. Low prices hurt