Walmart Inc. is the world’s largest retailer, and it is one of the most admired companies in the United States. Walmart is known for its unique product ranges in the travel, movies, music, and pharmacy industry. A few shopping aids are used in E-commerce procedures, such as the aid by search engines, wish lists, product reviews, and also store locators. Walmart.com provides services such as internet access, and financial services (credit reports, Walmart credit cards). It provides other features such as DVD rentals, music downloading, DVD rentals, and vacation planning. In comparison to Apple iTunes music downloading pricing, Walmart has the upper hand. The search format for Walmart is the “Walmart search engine.” Walmart is also contributing to Netflix subscriptions with its promotional antics (Agarwala, 2015). In addition to operating its website and stores in the US and UK, Walmart is prevalent in Mexico, Korea, Canada, China, and Germany.

JCPenney offers customer services at low prices, and it has been in the business for more than 100 years; it is one of the biggest department store chains, and it was accredited in 1968 by the Better Business Bureau. It promotes its services with commercials and other media outlets. It has an Alexa ranking of 231 in the United States, and the global traffic rank is 1255. It has millions of unique visitors every month (Compton, 2016). The company coordinates its activities with its official website only, and can also be found on other social media handles such as YouTube. The products they sell can be from a tank top to fedoras; their prices are very low, and this makes it a very competitive service. The JCPenney online store also accepts MasterCard, American Express, and Visa cards. After these customers purchase a product online, they are permitted the option of returning these orders and are allowed to receive the money back. The customers are made to pay for the return shipping.

Walmart E-Commerce

Source: (Compton, 2016)

The retailer is maximizing its efforts at e-commerce sales and is a competitor of other online giants such as Amazon, and JCPenney. Walmart is focused on growing its business organically and operates on a B2C business system. It targets the consumers, and it focused on looking for opportunities to buy other retailers so that it can enhance its product assortment and experience. The business approach is to increase the sales and target specific demographics online. In the first quarter of 2016 for example, its e-commerce sites grew by 26.6%, and the total value increased by 16.8% (D’Onfro, 2015). The business development in the past few years is below average for Walmart, as it does not have a definite plan to compete with other e-commerce giants. Walmart’s primary strategy is to attract a different and unique customer base.

The investments in ads without design optimization is not financially beneficial; the higher Return on Investment is seen with investments in design. Walmart prioritized the mobile first strategy and had ranked higher in sales. Walmart has shifted its attention to a target group, and mothers are one of the largest groups, as this demographic owns the largest numbers of tablets. As many as 47% of mothers’ tablets. The design of the website was not attractive before the changes. Walmart reformulated its plan and looked at the website, to enhance its e-commerce (Compton, 2016). The mobile-first plan laid the framework for smartphone and desktop optimizations. Walmart’s team decided to adapt the more tablet-centric responsive design, and a lens was used to redesign their look and elements such as touchable and clickable elements.

The collapsing of information was done to fit the smaller screen size of mobile phones and tablets. The goal was to make a responsive design that would make the e-commerce suitable for many screens.

Mobile design for Walmart. Source:

(Compton, 2016)

The Walmart team allowed the content the required content to be highlighted, and the image above can be noticed for its purchase inclined patterns. Outdoor furniture and summer pool items are prioritized alongside. The increase in conversion rate by 20% increased the mobile sales by 98% (Compton, 2016). More than the responsive e-commerce mobile design the company also focused on mobile design optimization. The responsive design does not always guarantee a better UX, and the responsiveness does not mean that the device is optimized.

Another great addition to Walmart’s team was the displaying of in-stock items. Walmart tried to display the clear inventory status on the top right by the add to cart button, on the top right. The increase in conversions is seen due to the inventory messages that inform the customer that products are available online. The mobile design optimization has a great impact on the Return On Investment. The mobile market revenue growth can increase by 100% with optimization (Compton, 2016).

Walmart has the biggest success story of e-business and the implementation of B2B, and the dominance can be seen in the North American Retail market. The growth in the short amount of time is impressive and is arguably an important factor in its capturing of the e-business markets. The internal processes are significant in maximizing this advantage. Walmart has also introduced the supply chain management with the “Pull” model, and the customers are the drivers of the suppliers (Agarwala, 2015). The inventory control is also controlled with the purchasing trends that are known to the suppliers.

The millions of customers are determinant in the controlling of the supply. The decision was made by Walmart to decentralize procurement processes results in that the in-store staff can order the stock electronically almost immediately. The replenishment system and the apt forecasting helps Walmart to reduce the overall costs and provide low prices to the customers.  While it is not always good for suppliers, the e-giant has established and broken new records in B2B e-commerce. Walmart operated under the mindset of cutting down extra costs, that resulted in them deploying EDI to eliminate VAN altogether (Compton, 2016).

EDI-INT uses newer standards such as AS2, the communication protocol that makes the communications online more secure and reliable. By using AS2, Walmart leads the path by creating the demand for EDI, and this, in turn, drives the entire business forward. It is important to note that Walmart how not always been adaptive in the local markets. It underwent losses worth 1 billion USD in 2006, with the pricing strategy on the predatory pricing. Walmart’s supply chain management, retail applications from Oracle and HP, and its contacts with social networking companies such as bazaar voice did not bring about the needed benefits. Compared to its competitors, Amazon, Target, JCPenney, Walmart has aimed at improving its e-commerce approach.

Walmart has kept its desire to lowest prices constant, and one can witness the continuing rise of the profitability of Walmart. The new business model by Walmart is an interesting one, and the company has been targeting at underrating the customers’ needs. To recap the mobile purchase and stock display strategies, the company implemented new strategies by displaying what is in stock. The details button only had one clear CTA, and Walmart was able to display the inventory status online. Source: (Compton, 2016)

JCPenney E-Commerce

To discuss the different forms of e-commerce in JCPenney and Walmart, it is important to understand B2B and B2C e-commerce. In B2C e-commerce the goods are sold directly to the consumers; in B2B e-commerce the goods are sold with the same website based system, and the customers are given the orders with payment. However, B2B requires more complex transactions and accommodate payment over email, electronic order, or documents. At a basic level, JCPenney offers its customers lower prices goods online, and the website launches new products. The primary focus is on customer satisfaction, and the rate cuts are introduced for the customer to purchase these products online. The products are planned their discounts with a particular focus on demand.

JCPenney e-commerce sales growth. Source: (Smith, 2014)

The graph above shows J.C. Penney’s changes in e-commerce outputs. In 2011, the brand aimed at creating varying strategies for physical and online stores and the changes were noted well accepted. It started by treating e-commerce as a separate medium to its manually operated stores. The store managers were not permitted to refer JCpenney’s official site to customers, and they were not able to find the desired products. In 2012, the online sales declined by 32%, to gaining only 1 billion USD in revenues. Many other factors also accounted for the lowering of sales, other than the separation of physical and online stores. Following the rapid fall in 2012, it introduced e-coupons and discounts in an attempt to attract more audiences. Following these improvements, in 2013, the separation of physical and online stores was rejected, and the organization recognized its mistake. The sales took a drastic turn on 2012, with rapid increases in sales. JCPenney realizes the importance for brands to align online sites and stores. Today, the online sales far outnumber the store sales.

Methods such as buyers buying online and purchasing the products the same day online are also being added in the e-commerce strategies; that is, the products will be shipped to the store free of charge. JCPenney also plans to digitalize and optimize its locations.
JCPenney is primarily operating on an Omni-channel strategy:
• E-commerce.
• Brick & mortar.

These are the strategic pillars of growth, and it is still not clear if the strategy is working optimally. In 2017, it reported a decline in the comparable store’s analysis. The shifts in sales, however, are not primarily due to the type of business model used. JCPenney also decided to start an innovative “pricing strategy, ” and the low pricing daily will help in changing the customers ‘shopping habits.

Source: (Muehlhausen, 2013)

In the popular media, JCPenney also introduced its collaboration with Ellen DeGeneres (Smith, 2014). The strategies make the experiences more convenient for the online buyers. The everyday low pricing model is also what the competitors emphasize. The management is also interested in developing the Omni-channel capabilities and is aimed at sharing inventory from bricks and mortar. It also plans on having a seamless connection with the customers. JCPenney is heavily involved in investments in data analytics and mobile commerce, that will boost the localization or pricing and product assortments. In Q4, 2016, the web traffic from devices was 25%, and the conversion was up to 60%. JCPenney also researched the most searched products by the consumers on JCP.com and added these appliances to the stores, which lead to an increase in sales. The company added numerous of these terms. The highlight was also the JCP system adding data analytics to improve these Omni-channel services. Mobile e-commerce, buying online, and pick up in a store are only a few things that JCP is covering in his campaigns (Muehlhausen, 2013). The ordering of merchandise online and picking up later was a huge success; as a result, the market share has increased tremendously. As part of the promotional campaign, JCPenney also used the web channel to send a monthly 96-page directory to the 14 million customers.

There are indeed many similarities between JCPenney and Walmart; the ideas that distinguish the business models of both sites is to be emphasized. Walmart is certified and has a safe site, and its checkout is protected with a high-grade encryption. Unauthorized persons are not allowed to obtain confidential customer information. JCPenney is secured with a 256-bit secure socket layer encryption on the pages; this is one of the best ones found on e-commerce sites. Walmart is one of the most affordable in the industry and is the favorite in the United States. JCPenney is also very competitive in their pricing. Walmart is one of the websites on the internet, and it has a very high traffic evidenced by Alexa; JCPenney has an overall higher page rank at number 7.

Bibliography

Agarwala, A., 2015. The Economist Investment Case Study Competition. Amazon vs. Walmart, pp. 2-18.
Compton, J., 2016. Case Study: How Walmart’s Mobile Ecommerce Site Design & Optimization Increased Mobile Sales 98%. [Online]  Available at: http://bluestout.com/blog/mobile-ecommerce-site-design-case-study/
[Accessed 4 March 2017].
D’Onfro, J., 2015. Wal-Mart is losing the war against Amazon. [Online]  Available at: http://www.businessinsider.com/wal-mart-ecommerce-vs-amazon-2015-7
[Accessed 4 March 2017].
Muehlhausen, J., 2013. J.C. Penney Launches an Innovative Business Model. [Online]  Available at: http://businessmodelinstitute.com/j-c-penney-launches-an-innovative-business-model/
[Accessed 4 March 2017].
Smith, C., 2014. J.C. Penney Has Turned Around Its Collapsing E-Commerce Business By Going ‘Omnichannel’. [Online]  Available at: http://www.businessinsider.com/jc-penney-has-turned-around-its-collapsing-e-commerce-business-by-going-omnichannel-2014-6
[Accessed 4 March 2017].