Internet's Backoffice

This is one of the premier Internet Retailer events in the US in 2008. Here are details of this key Internet Retailer event of 2008:

Basic Details
Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition is the world's fastest growing largest e-retailing conference. Around 5000 participants are expected to attend in 2008.

Who should attend it?
Online Retail vendors: If you are a vendor of some service or product to the Internet Retailer community this is a must attend show as 1000s of your potential customers will be here. This is also a beautiful opportunity to scout the internet retailing market for new ideas on internet marketing, internet technologies etc which you can then think of adopting.

Online Retailers: Internet is a very dynamic medium and so you need to remain on top in terms of newer internet marketing opportunities and ecommerce technology adoption. This show is a perfect avenue for you to scout for vendors who can help increase your internet sales.

Options to participate in this event
Online Retail vendors can exhibit in the Exhibit Hall consisting of around 500 others and thus have eretail clients walk-in and talk to you. You can also attend the Conferences or workshops. Infact it is a great idea to maybe even try to conduct Workshops etc. There is also a Media center where you can give interviews to generate free PR. Apart from this there are many other networking events too.

Online retailers can increase their knowledge of trends and ideas by attending the Conferences and Workshops and networking with peer internet retailers. They can also walk in to the Exhibit Hall where apart from food :-) you can check out various vendors offering cool products and services to help you.

Overall I have personally attended this show as a vendor providing services in the Internet Retail domain and have had a great experience during the IRCE 2007 in San Jose.

I rate this show very highly.

Though there were many exhibitors at the whole event, there are some interesting top level summarisations that can be done to get the Big Picture on what are the Services available to an Internet Retailer.
Please have a look at the diagram below to understand my summary:
(picture coming soon...)

The diagram clearly shows two broad areas of services/products:
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1) Bring more customers
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It was a very well attended show targeted at those who Sell Online and also provide various Products & Services to Internet Retailers. The show had around 4000 attendees and 340 exhibitors. Apart from this the show also had many relevant Speaker Sessions & Workshops.

I intend to summarise my learnings and air my thoughts and views on the Internet Retail industry in general based on the learnings from the conference over a series of articles.

The key focus of the articles would be the Operations side of the Internet businesses i.e. the Backoffice functions like Content Management, Order Processing, Analytics and even Customer Support.