Investors find niche medium sized etailers attractive investment destination; Jewellery, Sports and Baby Products find takers

It is not just the top Indian ecommerce players such as Flipkart, Snapdeal, or Jabong that have attracted big ticket investments by foreign funds,institutional investors, private equity or hedge funds.

Niche ecommerce small and medium sized marketplace such as Myntra, pepperfry, caratlane and Limeroad have also found a spot in the sun. Besides top funds such as Tiger Global, Sequoia,Soft Bank and Naspers, the year 2014 has seen emergence of new investors like DST Global,BlackRock, and Sofina among others.

For instance Pepperfry, a furnishing portal launched in 2012 has so far received close to $28 million while niche fashion display portal Limeroad has received around $20 million while jewellery portals such as Caratlane and Bluestone have received $27 million and $15 million respectively.

For more details, check the table given below:

Micromax's CyangennMod Yu to launch on Amazon Thursday

Brace yourself for yet another smart phone product launch! On December 18th, Micromax's CyangennMod powered phone Yu will be available to Indian buyers exclusively through Amazon India website (http://www.amazon.in/).

Micromax Yu is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 octa-core CPU and its operating ystem is Android based. It will support the 4G networks in India. Micromax had earlier adopted a similar strategy for its Android One Canvas A1 smartphone.

Currently Amazon is exclusively selling Casio watches and President Pranab Mukherjee’s book titled the Dramatic Decade.

Currently most companies are using online ecommerce marketplace to launch products exclusively as they are able to directly reach their target segment at minimal cost .

Brands such as Lenovo, Huawei, Xiaomi, and OnePlus all have special sub brands that only cater to an online-only market. At present Motorola which is among the top five smartphone companies in India, sells its devices exclusively only on Flipkart. Similarly Xiaomi has used Flipkart and its flash sale event to create an aura around its devices.

Exclusive launches on ecommerce websites not only help these brands create a buzz but also help companies save on marketing and other overheads and they are able to pass on the price benefit to consumers.

After Flipkart, Myntra too woo online shoppers thru Mobile App

After Flipkart, now it is online apparel marketplace--Myntra's (Myntra.com)turn to woo the mobile app users with a hefty 50 per cent discount on its entire range of clothing. Myntra is owned by Flipkart hence understandibly it is following the customer acquisition strategy of the former.

However, shoppers will have to move fast as the discount is available for mobile app user only for today. In order to make the deal more sticky for customers, the website is giving additional 5% discount to Axis Bank credit/debit card users. The company is offering 50% discount on its latest winter collection through its ‘App’.

Flipkart acquired Mantra early this year for a whopping $330 million. Together they command close to 50% of the market share.
Flipkart’s 5-day big app sale early this month and Amazon Appiness day sale early this year were widely successful. According to “Ecommerce Trends to watch out for in 2015,” predicted by us, companies will more frequently launch App based sale and new launches on App next-year to tap the growing mobile user market segment.

According to Global Mobile Operators Industry Body (GSMA), India had 111-million smartphone connections in the second quarter of 2014, trailing leader China, US and Brazil. A GSMA study has predicted that by 2020, four out of every five smartphone connections worldwide will come from the developing world (mainly China and India).

According to another industry report by Ystats.com, India’s large population and growing Internet connectivity contribute to optimism for online retail take off.

“Although India had the smallest B2C E commerce market size and spending per online shopper of the BRIC countries last year, the country is a leader in Internet connectivity growth, particularly through mobile devices,” Y stats report stated. According to the report, mobile shopper penetration in India tops many other countries, ranking third among emerging markets and fourth among Asia Pacific countries. Some online merchants report double digit mobile traffic shares. Over 90% of several hundred million Internet subscriptions registered by the end of 2013 were mobile users.

The etailers wish to tap this highly potential market. The Indian e-commerce sector, pegged at about $4 billion, is expected to grow to $15 billion in two years. Brick-and-mortar stores account for the bulk of India's $600-billion retail market, the majority of which is unorganised. The e-commerce sector's share remains only three-four per cent. This year, investments in this sector have risen to Rs 20,000 crore, four times the amount last year.

Ecommerce Trends to Watch Out for in 2015

The Calendar Year 2014 brought cheers to the ecommerce sector. The India Ecommerce industry witnessed some topline acquisitions, big ticket deals in the industry, skyrocketing valuations for the topline Ecommerce players and large scale funding by top private equity funds.

The stakes are high! Huge amount of money is riding on prominent players. Indian investment banks and private equity funds are making a beeline for ‘the most innovative ebusiness.’

Top Ecommerce trends to watch out for in 2015:

• More innovative discount deals via app or online shopping festivals
• Niche product online marketplace
• More mergers and takeovers
• Big ticket funding from private equities
• Big ecommerce players to diversify into service offerings
• Emergence of more players in logistics-delivery segment
• Large scale hiring by Ecommerce sector
• Emergence of Indians as second largest online shoppers (chinese continue to maintain numero uno position)
• Focus more on social media especially Pinterest
• Indian consumers to chanalise larger percentage of shopping via mobile phones
• Blitzkrieg by Ecommerce players on Mobile platform to become more popular
• Emergence of discount deals, online coupons, discount stores

Ecommerce Shopping Festivals-The new playground for product launch

Indian ecommerce companies are becoming the most sought after product launch platform for marketeers.

The euphoria surrounding the Indian ecommerce companies is not showing any sign of abating. As online shoppers as a genre are busy framing their bucket list and looking for that exclusive discount deal on branded good, ecommerce companies are going all out to grab customer attention by announcing limited period sale almost every month.

This in turn is compelling most brands to ditch the age old practice of launching products before a ‘handpicked’ audience(read press conference) to grabbing the attention of millions at just the click of a mouse.

The most recent example is the scheduled launch of President Pranab Mukherjee’s book published by Rupa, to be sold exclusively on Amazon.in from December 11th.

If that’s not all, telecom company Micromax is launching a new Canvas phone exclusively on Flipkart during its three-day ‘Big APP Shopping Days’ beginning today (Dec 8th). In order to promote its App, the company is offering exclusive deals and offers to its App users.

Similarly, large number of retailers are planning to launch products exclusively on Google during the 3-day Great Onine Shopping Festival beginning December 11th.

Google has tied up with close to 450 players for this event. The shopping festival which will commence on December 10th and will feature exclusive launches from brands like Motorola Nexus 6, HP, Lenovo, Tata Housing, Karbonn, Van Heusen, Asian Paints and great deals on exclusive designer collection from Pernia's Pop Up Shop.

Flipkart App records 10 million downloads so far; 2 lac users give 5-star to the App!

It is a manic Monday in every sense of term!!! Flipkart’s 3-day ‘Big APP Shopping Days’ have begun with a big bang. By 12.00 noon, close to 10 million Flipkart App downloads had taken place, according to the data analytics visible during the app download.

At the time of this blog going online, the flipkart app had received close to 5 lac user responses. Over two lakh users rated the app as excellent giving it a 5-star rating while few were disappointed as they couldn’t find the big discount deals or new product launch.

Flipkart is providing stickiness to the campaign by offering exclusive 12-hour discounts on few product categories. On some product categories, discounts are as huge as 50%.

Some users found it disappointing as they couldn’t see the profile information updates or offer selection categories, while few users who were logging onto the app through their facebook account were initially not able to do so.

However Flipkart officials were quick to rescue the situation by connecting with their app users.

From the initial euphoria, it is clear that the ‘Big App Days’ will find many takers, however, it remains to be seen whether it will also bring all round smiles and cheers.

Eye-popping discounts grip Google's Great Online Shopping Festival

The buzz about the 3-day Great Online Shopping Festival (GISF)is gaining momentum as expected. Online shoppers are spoilt for choice. Most ecommerce bigwigs are creating attractive GISF landing page to grab maximum eyeballs. Some of the deals and advertisements on the Google Shopping Festival Page are not only bizarre but also offer eye popping freebies and discounts. Consider this- while Jabong is offering discount as huge as 90% others like Big Bazaar is offering 14 minutes of free shopping.

Jabong, top apparal ecommerce website is offering almost 90% discount on some of its products while Mantra is offering a flat 50% discount on some of its products.

Amazon, the Ecommerce frontrunner is offering fabulous deals on electronic, tablets and TV. For more details, check out Amazon GISF Page

Others like Fab Furnish is offering Rs 5000 gift voucher on purchase of certain products. Branded store like Shopper Stop has also jumped into the bandwagon. The store is offering a flat discount of 15%-20% during the sale period.

Snapdeal meanwhile is offering 40% discount on few apparel brands and close to 30% discount on few home furnishing brands

For more details on the deals on offer, check out the google shopping festival page

Google has tied up with close to 450 players for this event. The shopping festival which will commence on December 10th and will feature exclusive launches from brands like Motorola Nexus 6, HP, Lenovo, Tata Housing, Karbonn, Van Heusen, Asian Paints and great deals on exclusive designer collection from Pernia's Pop Up Shop.

India shoppers opt for direct debit to cash for eshopping;Jabong most popular:comScore

Indian shoppers are most comfortable using direct debit option for online transaction when compared to other mode of payment. According to comScore, in the quarter ended October 2014, most Indian shoppers used direct debit option for online transaction, followed by credit cards(Visa). Cash on delivery was the third most preferred option used by online shoppers.

In comparison shoppers in Japan were most comfortable using their credit card followed by cash on delivery, for online shopping. Very few shoppers preferred direct debit as transaction option. For instance, 46 percent of Indians used direct debit option compared to Japanese (5%)while 27percent Indians used Visa brand against 39% Japanese. In comparison, 11.2 percent Indians used cash option as against 18.8 percent Japanese shoppers (source:comscore mastercard study 2014).

In the ecommerce website category, in terms of userbase, Jabong came across as the most popular website. According to comScore, in October 2014 Jabong had 26264000 unique visitors, 65% up from last year (October 2013), while Amazon had 24156000 unique visitors, 59% up from previous year while Flipkart and Snapdeal clocked 22393000 visitors and 20993000 visitors respectively, up 59% and 88% from previous year.

The other popular sites in the India ecommerce landscape were ebay, myntra, shopclues, homeshop18, book myshow and zovi.

Although for websites like zovi and shopclues, unique visitors were slightly less when compared to the top five ecommerce companies, however the percentage increase in unique visitors were highest at 339% and 202% respectively when compared to top sites, signifying higher user activity in the current year.

Tug of War: Retailers Vs Ecommerce Service Providers

Top retailers who are also member of the Indian Retail Association of India are up in the arms against their digital counterpart as they are not able to match the competitive pricing of the etailers such as Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeals and the like.

Why this hue and cry? Is the anger justified? I don’t think so. E-tailing is a game changer as industry players are giving traditional retailers a run for their money. Most ecommerce companies save on the warehouse (inventory cost) and operations cost and pass on the benefits to consumers. In comparison big retailers incur substantial operations cost and pass these on to the consumers.

The adage “If you can’t beat them, join them” holds good even today. Instead of knocking the doors of North Block Mandarins and lobbying for policy change, the big retailers should read the market (consumer) sentiments and expand their reach by taping online customers through ecommerce. Such a move will not only benefit big players but also improve the level of competition in the ecommerce industry.

Taking cue from the market some of the big retailers such as Future Group, Aditya Birla among others are either tieing up with existing etailers or planning to provide digital shopping experience to customers. Others should follow suit.

Numbers say it all! The e-commerce sector, pegged at about $4 billion, is expected to grow to $15 billion in two years. Brick-and-mortar stores account for the bulk of India's $600-billion retail market, the majority of which is unorganised. The e-commerce sector's share remains only three-four per cent. This year, investments in this sector has risen to Rs 20,000 crore, four times the amount last year.

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Ebiz like Flipkart, Snapdeal attract customers thru innovative mkt deals

Most ecommerce companies are becoming ‘app’ savvy marketeers lately. The big guys in the industry have realised that in order to grab marketshare, they have to nudge their new found consumer base to move over from tablets and desktops to mobile phones. Its convenient, easier, faster and reaches many. Flipkart, one of the fastest growing etailer has announced a special discount sale only for its mobile application users.

Last month Amazon had announced a similar sale for its ‘app’ users.. The forthcoming flipkart 5-day sale will commence on December 8th.

In order to encourage its customers’ to use the mobile app during the sale period, the Ecommerce bigwig is providing vouchers worth Rs 1200 for every app download.

To make the advertisement more sticky, it will also announce lucky winner during the ‘big app shoping days’ lasting 5-days.

Not to be left behind, to grab eyeball and clicks, Snapdeal has launched its “season of 9s” where it is selling products at Rs 499, Rs 999, Rs 2999, Rs 4999, and Rs 9999 and Rs 29999.

These innovative strategies ahead of the festive season will most certainly get traction for these etailers.