Offering dream bargains

Bequeathing huge opportunity for e-commerce trading, Mr Sandeep Komaravelly, Head marketing, SnapDeal.com talks to Avinder Batra about how retailers need channels all over wherever customer is striking to buy products and how they can benefit through new marketing tools offered by Jasper Infotech, the parent company.

AB: Describe SnapDeal.com as a site to our readers? What was the motto behind launching this portal in India?

SK: SnapDeal.com is India’s largest group buying web based service which features the best stuff to do, see, eat, and buy in your city at an unbeatable price. Our model revolve around featuring one very attractive deal in a day and in a city and then instantly notifying the growing 1 million+ opted-in subscribers to purchase the deal from SnapDeal. In a short period of 10 months since inception, the site is ranked among the top 50 sites of India (Alexa), and receives about 5,00,000 visitors/day.

The website acts as a platform to connect customers who want to explore new things and try out various places, and the merchants who offer such kind of services. Customers are hooked on, because of the attractiveness of the offerings and for the merchants; it’s a great channel for acquiring new customers, and increasing their reach.

AB:  How much has today’s customer changed while buying a product online vis-à-vis any physical store? How is Snapdeal.com making a difference to the customer?

SK: Today’s customer prefers the convenience factor of buying online. All the information related to the product or service is available online, and you don’t need to visit a physical store anymore to know about it. Top that up with an amazing offer, and there is a value proposition that is hard to ignore. Snapdeal.com is precisely doing that to today’s customer.

AB: Which are the main categories which sells the most on Snapdeal.com?

SK: Dining and health & beauty services are the categories which sell the most. But over the last 2 months, we have seen significant uptake for categories like weekend getaways and travel. In order to cater to this need of our customers, we have opened up a new section called Snapdeal Getaways, which focuses on the same.

AB:  What difficulties did you face initially while bringing the retailer on the virtual space? How is it benefiting the retailers/manufacturers?

SK: Most of the retailers are yet to embrace new age marketing tools which revolve around the online space. They resort to the traditional spray and pray marketing techniques which are print, radio etc. But given the effectiveness of the mediums like Snapdeal, they are keen to test out the same. And the benefits to the retailers are multi fold. In addition to being a very cost effective model, it drives a lot of customers to the merchant location in a very short span of time.

AB:What are the new concepts of buying emerging in the virtual space?

SK:Customers are increasingly buying services online. They are open to try out new things and the online platforms are catering to this very need of the customer. Another interesting trend is the amount of marketing that happens through the social media platforms which eventually result into buying as well. This will be a major focus area for all marketers, be it of products or services. 

AB: How is Jasper Infotech supporting the small firms and retailers in marketing retail services? Cite some examples?

SK: Snapdeal.com acts as a medium of marketing for small firms which cannot afford traditional mediums of marketing like print and radio. We also act as a channel for reaching out to new customers, and increase footfall in a very short span of time. And this channel is not restricted to small firms alone. For instance, Carnation, which is Mr. Jagdish Khattar’s one-stop-shop retailer for cars, acquired 5000+ customers through SnapDeal in a span of 3 days. Many other merchants have had similar experiences.

AB: How do you gauge the future of e-commerce in the next two years?

SK:There will be tremendous growth in the user base which will be open to transact online. Increase in internet penetration, more players offering different kinds of services online, will drive this growth. The amount of spends from the existing e-commerce users, is also bound to grow.