Business-to-Consumer (B E-Commerce (2C) - Portals

PORTALS

Portals such as Yahoo! and America Online (AOL) have evolved from being large directories that helped people find places on the Internet to places that offered their own content and services. Leading portals such as Yahoo!, AOL, AltaVista, and MSN all offer shopping areas for consumers. In June 2000 the top portal shopping site was Yahoo! Shopping, which attracted 5.8 million unique home-based visitors, or nearly 7 percent of all Internet users. AOL's Shopping Channel had more than 3.4 million unique visitors that month. AltaVista's shopping area attracted 2.6 million unique visitors, while MSN's shopping sections had 1.2 million unique visitors.

Portal shopping areas provide added value to new and experienced online shoppers alike. They offer specialized search engines and many give consumers the opportunity to comparison shop across several sites. The storefront business model made popular by Yahoo! Shopping has also succeeded in attracting more small businesses. These online store-fronts enable small businesses to maintain an online presence with minimal expense, and they benefit from the traffic attracted to the major portals.

A January 2001 study by the Yankee Group found that B2C e-commerce at portals and online malls grew at a faster rate than for stand-alone etailers during the 2000 holiday season. AOL reported an 84 percent increase in holiday sales over its 1999 holiday sales of $2.5 billion, while Yahoo! and Lycos reported that their holiday sales doubled over the previous year. Stand-alone e-tailers, on the other hand, reported an average growth rate of 40 percent. Another Yankee Group study found that 57 percent of online consumers began their shopping trip at a portal or portal-based mall during the 2000 holiday season.