Internet Shopping

26 May 2007

I'm a member of Virtual Tourist, a website wherein the members relate their experiences from trips to different places around the world and share tips regarding accomodation, shopping, transportation, and the like (including where you are from). Before I left for Seoul, one of the questions I asked was where would be the best place I could shop for groceries and household items. A common answer given was that I order through the Internet because this would always come out cheaper. I immediately checked out the different sites but unfortunately, all were in Korean except for one ....

South Korea has the largest online population in the world, with 83 per cent of the country's residents connected to the internet. As such, Koreans love to shop online and they are second only to the United States in terms of the size of the market; which is estimated to be around US$ 10 Billion this year (and growing). There are dozens of internet shopping websites to choose from and the most popular web portal is Korean: www.naver.com/.

While "surfing" the various Korean shopping websites, I discovered only one site, Gmarket, that offered an English alternative. Initially, I was thrilled about this but it did not last long as I realized that the offerings were limited. After placing the order for the few items we chose from the English website, I then clicked on the Korean Gmarket website to check on the items we were missing out on. I would click on the picture of a particular item but the text of the descripition and specifications remained to be Korean. However, I began noticing that the items I had clicked on remained on the rightmost column as a "List of Items Reviewed". I took a chance and switched back to the English site and to my surprise, the list remained on the screen. From thereon, I was able to either save the particular item on my Wish List or purchase this outright because I was in the environment wherein my account resided. Of course, the description remained in Korean so I asked the assistance of the Korean front desk at Fraser Suites to translate for us. As a result, we were able to purchase (from the Korean website)several ladies bags at less than PhP 500 each, sneakers for my daughter at around PhP 400, and a suit (coat and pants) for PhP 1500 only!

The lesson I gained from this experience is to remember that the Internet has a lot of possibilities. It is up to us to take advantage of these opportunities.