E-commerce lags behind in profitability is that changing a consumer's purchasing habits is considerably more difficult than moving business suppliers online. Health care delivers no products electronically, regardless of whether the services are ordered online or in person. It's all physical, such as a doctor's office visit or a pharmacy pickup or deliveries via parcel post. But look for that to change in coming years. The Web is an odd medium, one in which the people charged with customer relations usually don't know who they're handling.
Cost is the key factor in decisions about how best to approach and interact with customers.
The idea of using electronic means to lure customers to a call center may strike some managers as counterintuitive.