Evolution/revolution
Since then the world, and e-commerce in particular, seems to have gone through two major revolutions. The first was the dot-com bubble in the 90s.
Before anyone really knew how the web would work or how it could really be monetized, anything that had a website address as its company name found millions and millions of dollars in investment capital being thrown at it.
But after one too many Learjet lunches and sooner than you could say "GeoCities-dot-bomb", the whole thing collapsed in on itself.
However, one thing that did happen as a result of the dot-com bubble was that the world got introduced the World Wide Web.
Out of the ruins came the second revolution as the steady rebuilding of confidence in online commerce began, a process that saw Google, Apple and Facebook rise to global dominance and in 2012 saw global e-commerce sales top US$1 trillion for the first time.
Projections for 2013 see a near 20% growth to something like $1.3 trillion.
But what do things look like closer to home? South Africa has been particularly slow in embracing e-commerce.
In 2012, local internet users spent only R3,3 billion shopping online (only about 0.03% of the global figure). This lag can be attributed to the fact that only about a third of households have access to the internet, with half of those connections coming from a smartphone and only a quarter from a connection at home.
However, despite these poor levels of internet penetration, those South Africans with regular access to the web have customer expectations that are equal to those in the first world and local online retailers are doing their best to maintain international standards.
But it is not an easy task. Long gone are the days when the simple novelty and convenience of shopping online was enough to draw curious customers.
Online retailing has become and high-end, high-tech experience where eCommerce sites need to be at the leading edge of site design, online marketing, SEO and payment and delivery systems to stand a chance in a world where the competition is simply a click away.
Delivery in particular is a space where South African retailers are slowly starting to find their way.
Pick n Pay recently launched a paid-for, one-hour delivery service - a service which required a complex logistical and bespoke IT system to get up and running.
Smaller retailers like Yuppiechef.co.za, who do not have the resources to set up such a system have been working out the ideal combinations with which to use local courier and postal systems, navigating the geographical complexities of South Africa along the way.
On the whole the though, things are looking decidedly up, with courier services like the SkyNet reporting that they are being approached for their service by online retail sites at an average of three times a week.
