Electronic commerce (or E-commerce) means the buying or selling of products or services over the Internet. The amount of successful E-commerce transactions have grown exponentially since the widespread use of the Internet.

Electronic commerce has changed dramatically over the last 30 years. Originally, the term “electronic commerce” was coined to mean the “facilitation of commercial transactions electronically”. Technology like “Electronic Funds Transfer” (EFT) was introduced in the late 1970s to enable businesses to send commercial documents like purchase orders electronically. Credit cards and ATMs (introduced and accepted in the 1980s) were also forms of e-commerce.

Many economic experts forecasted that E-commerce would become a major economic sector when the Internet became widespread in the early 1990s. During the “Dot com” era, E-commerce came to encompass the purchase of goods and services via the Internet, usually with secure connections and electronic payment services such as credit card payment authorizations.

Almost all purely E-commerce companies collapsed during the “dot-com” bubble-burst in 2000 and 2001. But many “brick-and-mortar” retailers began to add e-commerce capabilities to their Web sites. For example, a traditional supermarket chain, Safeway, started e-commerce subsidiaries through which consumers could order groceries online.

The emergence of E-commerce also significantly increased the opportunities in the selling of many types of goods; many small home-based businesses are able to use the Internet to sell their goods or services. Wish to buy something? Visit eBay.com (an online auction site that provides a platform for selling or buying merchandise). Wish to announce a garage sale? Visit Ablewise.com (a popular online classifieds site that provides services for both free and paid advertising) and place an advertisement with them. With the E-commerce scene as it is today, there is almost nothing that you are not able to find and buy/sell over the Internet.