Why is online shopping a relative success in USA? What do we need in India?

If you look at USA, it is a huge country with a not so huge population; people are spread thin across the country. So if you want to go shopping you have to travel greater distances as compared to a country like India (not a huge country but has a huuuuge population). So, people would like to avoid the effort and cost of going to a shop and buy, when they can get it online. Moreover, it was a natural transition for the people of USA: Labor is costly so they have self-vending machines that vend soda, newspaper, food etc. So it is easy for an american to shop online in the sense, they are used to intearcting with machines and buy stuff. Whereas, Indians had had a mixed experience. Malls, departmental stores are happening only in cities now. So if I were to start an online shopping business, I'd do this: 1) Offer those products that aren't available easily (like train tickets for example) 2) Tap the rural population: they are the ones that don't have the facilities that we have. This means I have to work out a way through which a rural person can shop using his/her language and without a computer. Maybe vernacular kiosks? 3) I also have to take into account the literacy here, so maybe I need to worry about people who can't read 4) Most importantly I have to work out a payment scheme that doesn't involve credit cards. Something like VPP? 5) So I cant deliver stuff within 24 hours... Well, nevermind I wont get into B2C!

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