In 2018 Amazon’s share of the e-commerce market was nearly half. Yes, you read that correctly. According to market research company eMarketer, Amazon accounted for 49.1% of all U.S. ecommerce sales. This is just one example of the dominance that the Big Tech companies have over their industries. In fact, Amazon and the other Big Tech companies have become so large and so dominant over their industries that politicians have begun to call for the companies to be broken up. The increasing influence they have as well as monopoly fears are often presented as reasons. However, although Amazon has by far the largest share of the e-commerce market in the U.S., there are a small number of other companies that have a pretty big share of the market as well. Here is a list of the top 10 U.S. companies ranked by U.S. retail e-commerce share in 2018.
With the sales shares of the top 10 companies equalling 70.1%, that leaves less than 30% of the market for the rest of the companies fighting for a share of the e-commerce market in the second largest e-commerce market in the world. Companies like those on eMarketer’s top 10 list have become what they are today through innovation. So, we must be careful not to punish innovation, but at the same time create a more balanced market with more key players.
Rather than focusing on regulations and legislation from governments, a more competitive market must be renewed. Competition benefits consumers because when companies are forced to compete for business, they have to drop their prices in order to stay on top and offer the best value to customers.
Ok great, so increasing competition sounds like a good plan but the question remains,
how do you get a piece of the pie when others have such a large portion of it?
By entering a different segment of the market that hasn’t been fully utilized yet.
The big players in the ecommerce market, like Amazon and Ebay, use fiat currencies only. When shoppers are ready to pay, they pay using a fiat currency like U.S. dollars. By focusing on cryptocurrency payment systems, AllForCrypto will target a different segment of the market that isn’t dominated by Amazon, Ebay, and other ecommerce corporations. This will ensure that AllForCrypto receives a larger market share, rather than fighting over what’s left of the already greatly diminished fiat currency U.S. ecommerce market.
Remember, after the market shares of the top 10 companies are totaled, only 29.9% remains for all the rest of the companies selling products online to U.S. consumers in exchange for traditional fiat currencies. The smart move is to enter a new market that has fewer players, thus increasing the likelihood of a winning share.
Unfortunately, credit card payments are often fraudulent. According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), in 2017 credit card fraud was the most common form of identity theft, with 133,015 reports. Between 2016 and 2017, credit card fraud increased 23%, overtaking employment or tax-related fraud as the most common. According to a survey conducted by consumer credit reporting company Experian in August 2017, nearly 3 out of 4 (73%) consumers said they are very or somewhat concerned their email, financial accounts, or social media information could be hacked.
Statistics in The Nilson Report, a global payment systems publication, stated that in 2017 there were $26.24 Billion of worldwide payment card fraud losses, with the U.S. accounting for 38.6% of the worldwide losses. Projected worldwide losses in 2022? $34.66 Billion!
By offering a system that does not rely on credit card payments, AllForCrypto can provide secure transactions to sellers. Fraudulent chargebacks will no longer be an issue in the AllForCrypto payment system.
Currently for cryptocurrency users, one single marketplace they can go to and find everything they need does not exist. In other words, the “store for everything” concept that exists in the world of fiat currency purchases does not exist yet in the cryptocurrency market. However, the number of cryptocurrency users is growing. A report by online statistics portal Statista shows that the number of blockchain wallet users worldwide has grown steadily, from 6,648,664 users in Q1 of 2016 to 34,660,975 in Q1 of 2019 (end of March).
By developing a platform for the sale of goods and services with a wide range of items for sale where you can buy virtually anything with cryptocurrencies, AllForCrypto is guaranteed a sizeable portion of the market.
The main benefit of blockchain technology is the added security that it offers. It is far more secure than other older technologies and using it in e-commerce can provide relief to buyers and sellers alike, essentially eliminating the potential for fraud and hacks. Let’s take a closer look at blockchain technology to see exactly how it is more secure than other options.
First of all, in case you didn’t already know, a blockchain is a chain of digital blocks that contain records of transactions. Each block is connected to the blocks before and after it, making it difficult to make changes. A hacker would be required to change not only the block containing the record they wanted to steal, but also the blocks linked to it in order to avoid detection.
Second, the records on a blockchain are secured with cryptography. Each participant in the network has its own key that is assigned to their transactions, similar to a digital signature. If a record is changed in any way, the signature is no longer valid and the peer network will become instantly aware that something happened. Blockchains are also decentralized and distributed across peer-to-peer networks, so they do not have a single point of failure like in centralized networks.
Finally, the validity of a transaction must be verified through consensus between the different nodes before it can be completed and added to the database (blockchain).
Each of these important security characteristics helps to keep information safe and provides an excellent payment system for e-commerce transactions that is resistant to fraud. Which would you choose, a payment card system that costs consumers and financial organizations billions of dollars a year in fraud losses, or a cryptocurrency system that is powered by technology with additional levels of security?
These are just some of the problems that currently exist in eCommerce. AllForCrypto provides a better, more secure marketplace for buyers and sellers than the current systems in place, and as the first of its kind will get a head start on any future competitors in the eCommerce and cryptocurrency markets. By eliminating problems, buyers and sellers can get what they are looking for and trust that transactions will be fair and secure.
