20071223, Article, 高雄
發表於 : 週二 12月 04, 2007 8:45 pmHappy English Club 電子報 本報由EVP Team編審
網站 http://www.happyforum.org/ 歡迎超連結並轉寄網址
論壇 http://www.happyforum.org/happy/ 歡迎至論壇討論
Time：高雄第9次例會，2007年12月23日（週日）下午2:30~4:30
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15
14:30~15:15(Free Talks)
15:30~16:30 (Party Time)
Host:Benjamin Yeh
Assistant Host:Alice Chen
Topic:Shopping the 21st Century Way
Source: August, 2007; Advanced 彭蒙惠英語; P8~P9
Do you enjoy shopping online? If so, you have lots of company. Online shopping easily beat brick-and-mortar retailing, according to the University of Michigan’s annual American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) released in February. Results show Americans gave online retailing a score of 80 on a scale of 100, compared with 74.4 for all retail trade. (The ACSI survey only looked at national retailers.)
The highest-rated shopping experience of all was the book-and-music website www.barnesandnoble.com, which scored 88. Runner-up was its competitor www.amazon.com with a score of 87.
Cathy LaMont, owner of an insurance company, shops frequently on Amazon.com and enjoys the e-mail alerts she gets for books she’s likely to want. “It’s painless. It’s like a private shopper at a clothing store,” LaMont said.
More convenience, more choice
Cindy Ciura, owner of a retail-consulting form, recently adopted an infant girl with her husband. Now, she finds herself shopping online more and more. “The idea that you can purchase something online and within a week or so it shows up at your front door,” she says, “there’s something to be said for that.”
Claes Fornell, a University of Michigan business professor who oversees the index, said customer satisfaction with online shopping is a reflection of consumers’ growing sophistication in finding the best prices, products and service. That’s true both in stores and in the virtual world. Customers’ overall satisfaction with American retail hit an all-time high during the fourth quarter of 2006, measured at 74.9 on the 100-point scale.
“There’s a shift in power form seller to buyer,” Fornell said. “The buyer has more choice, inflicting a more severe penalty on companies that don’t provide good levels of service, and… reward[ing] companies that do it right.”
What about the brick-and-mortar stores?
Costco, the warehouse outlet company that scored an 81 satisfaction level in the survey, obtained the highest score for any specialty retailer.
“They do a part of what used to be the consumer’s job,” Fornell said of Costco, which stocks an ever-changing array of limited quantities of items.
“They select the product assortment and it’s fairly narrow, and they only try to go for things that they know are of high quality,” he said.
If online shopping is popular, gasoline stations as a group were not. Gas stations scored just 71 on the scale, the lowest of any category. High gasoline prices account for that, Fornell said.
Online vs. offline
One reason for online’s popularity among shoppers is that retailing websites have become much more useful, said Larry Freed, president and chief executive of ForeSee Results, a web-retailing consulting firm.
“There are many product lines where you can actually get a better browsing experience online than offline,” he said. “If you’re looking for a big-screen TV, 60-inch plasma or whatever, you go to a store, [and] you see it alongside 20 other models. It’s the same feed coming in to all; it’s really noisy; you can’t hear how loud the fan is; you’ve got an associate that may or may not be very skilled and knowledgeable about it.
“The alternative is that you can go online, and you can get a great sense for the product. You can turn it around, look at the back of it─ all the features and specifications and even… things like consumer reviews.”
Vocabulary:
Retail: 零售 sophistication: 老練的 inflict: 強加 warehouse: 貨倉 assortment: 分類 specification: 規格
Questions:
1.Do you have any experience about online shopping (include e-bay)? Share it with us.
2.What kind of shopping you prefer? Why?
例會須知
參與例會，請自行列印當週的討論文章並帶至現場，圖示如下：
請將社團網站，加入我的最愛
http://www.happyforum.org/
台北，每週六 (2005年6月起)
Taipei, Saturday, Weekly
from June, 2005
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15
高雄，每月最後一個週日 (2007年4月起)
Kaohsiung, Final Sunday, Monthly
from April, 2007
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15
網站 http://www.happyforum.org/ 歡迎超連結並轉寄網址
論壇 http://www.happyforum.org/happy/ 歡迎至論壇討論
Time：高雄第9次例會，2007年12月23日（週日）下午2:30~4:30
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15
14:30~15:15(Free Talks)
15:30~16:30 (Party Time)
Host:Benjamin Yeh
Assistant Host:Alice Chen
Topic:Shopping the 21st Century Way
Source: August, 2007; Advanced 彭蒙惠英語; P8~P9
Do you enjoy shopping online? If so, you have lots of company. Online shopping easily beat brick-and-mortar retailing, according to the University of Michigan’s annual American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) released in February. Results show Americans gave online retailing a score of 80 on a scale of 100, compared with 74.4 for all retail trade. (The ACSI survey only looked at national retailers.)
The highest-rated shopping experience of all was the book-and-music website www.barnesandnoble.com, which scored 88. Runner-up was its competitor www.amazon.com with a score of 87.
Cathy LaMont, owner of an insurance company, shops frequently on Amazon.com and enjoys the e-mail alerts she gets for books she’s likely to want. “It’s painless. It’s like a private shopper at a clothing store,” LaMont said.
More convenience, more choice
Cindy Ciura, owner of a retail-consulting form, recently adopted an infant girl with her husband. Now, she finds herself shopping online more and more. “The idea that you can purchase something online and within a week or so it shows up at your front door,” she says, “there’s something to be said for that.”
Claes Fornell, a University of Michigan business professor who oversees the index, said customer satisfaction with online shopping is a reflection of consumers’ growing sophistication in finding the best prices, products and service. That’s true both in stores and in the virtual world. Customers’ overall satisfaction with American retail hit an all-time high during the fourth quarter of 2006, measured at 74.9 on the 100-point scale.
“There’s a shift in power form seller to buyer,” Fornell said. “The buyer has more choice, inflicting a more severe penalty on companies that don’t provide good levels of service, and… reward[ing] companies that do it right.”
What about the brick-and-mortar stores?
Costco, the warehouse outlet company that scored an 81 satisfaction level in the survey, obtained the highest score for any specialty retailer.
“They do a part of what used to be the consumer’s job,” Fornell said of Costco, which stocks an ever-changing array of limited quantities of items.
“They select the product assortment and it’s fairly narrow, and they only try to go for things that they know are of high quality,” he said.
If online shopping is popular, gasoline stations as a group were not. Gas stations scored just 71 on the scale, the lowest of any category. High gasoline prices account for that, Fornell said.
Online vs. offline
One reason for online’s popularity among shoppers is that retailing websites have become much more useful, said Larry Freed, president and chief executive of ForeSee Results, a web-retailing consulting firm.
“There are many product lines where you can actually get a better browsing experience online than offline,” he said. “If you’re looking for a big-screen TV, 60-inch plasma or whatever, you go to a store, [and] you see it alongside 20 other models. It’s the same feed coming in to all; it’s really noisy; you can’t hear how loud the fan is; you’ve got an associate that may or may not be very skilled and knowledgeable about it.
“The alternative is that you can go online, and you can get a great sense for the product. You can turn it around, look at the back of it─ all the features and specifications and even… things like consumer reviews.”
Vocabulary:
Retail: 零售 sophistication: 老練的 inflict: 強加 warehouse: 貨倉 assortment: 分類 specification: 規格
Questions:
1.Do you have any experience about online shopping (include e-bay)? Share it with us.
2.What kind of shopping you prefer? Why?
例會須知 參與例會，請自行列印當週的討論文章並帶至現場，圖示如下：
請將社團網站，加入我的最愛 http://www.happyforum.org/
台北，每週六 (2005年6月起)
Taipei, Saturday, Weekly
from June, 2005
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15
高雄，每月最後一個週日 (2007年4月起)
Kaohsiung, Final Sunday, Monthly
from April, 2007
Place：
viewtopic.php?t=15