Bharat Takes Over India

Bharat has always dominated over India when it comes to growth of various industries in the country. This time Bharat, which resides in cities beyond the metros, has now transformed the way it shops, as it goes online. The e-retail arena of the Indian market is seeing an enormous boost in terms of buying patterns from the non-metro areas. Almost every e-retailer, on an average, is seeing a contribution of 45 per cent in terms of visitors from non-metro areas, a number which was nearly half of the same last year.

Today, the e-retail business volume in India is USD 700 million. The report by Franchise India “Indian eRetail Report 2012”, points out that the growth is driven by the need to save time in the urban India, about 50-53 per cent of the demand comes from tier II and III towns.

“E-retail is not bound by traditional boundaries and in a lot of ways it is more likely to be sort out by folks in locations beyond the cities as they are normally restricted by limited choice that would be available at the local retailers. Most traditional e-tailing sites would see a significant percentage of their orders from the smaller towns,” says Vijay Singh, MD & CEO, AaramShop.com.

Freedom to shop

The e-retailers have given people in non-metro areas freedom to shop. The consumers now have a wider access to brands which are not yet accessible to them through physical stores. These cities are now well equipped with internet services and have the spending power as well.

“Big brands don’t find it viable to open shops in small towns and an online shopping portal like ours is the perfect route to deliver their products to those customers in non metros who can afford them,” says Aasheesh Mediratta, Director - Sales, Fashionandyou.com.

Moreover, apart from accessibility and spending power, people are now having a trust factor in the online retailers. According to Ranjith Boyanapalli, CEO, Buytheprice.com, “The consumers in non-metro areas are buying online with a completely different mindset. Their purchases are more need based. For instance, someone in non-metro areas would buy a low-end phone which is his/her need, but a consumer in urban area would buy it for different reasons including less time availability, experimental or completely impulse based.” 

People in non-metro areas are very well versed with the brands available in national and international markets; all thanks to the television and internet. The only problem they face is inaccessibility.

Moreover, what makes it a complete win-win situation is the kind of services that e-retailers are now offering, ranging from cash on delivery to online payments and from virtual trial rooms to try n buy services. While COD (cash on delivery) helps create a trust factor among the consumers; the services like trial rooms and “try n buy” gives them the liberty to get the perfectly sized products.

The growing numbers

For e-retailers, of the total number of visitors everyday, 40-45 per cent is from non-metro areas. Of this nearly one-two per cent is converted into concrete buys.

Boyanapalli says, “Of the total number of visitor we have everyday, ie, 60,000, almost 30 per cent of them are from non-metro areas. What is interesting is that the conversion rates are higher among non-metro areas. While urban cities have conversion rate of one-1.5 per cent, the conversion rates goes up to one.5-2 per cent in the non-metro regions.

For eBay, metros contribute 51 per cent of all e-commerce transactions while tier II and III cities contribute about 40 per cent of transactions, and rural India is contributing to nine per cent of transactions.

While Pradeep Katyal, CEO, www.utsavfashion.in informs that the ratio of non-metro customers as compared to top four metros has increased by 25 per cent in the last six months.

Small towns that are e-retail savvy

Bharat, in terms of e-retail, is making greater purchases in almost every region of the country. “We have seen an insurgence of purchases happening from cities like Surat and Bhavnagar in Gujarat, while cities like Bhatinda and Pathankot are picking up in Punjab. If we go down the southern cities like Trichy and Vizianagaram, we will see immense growth,” informs Sandeep Komaravelly, VP- Marketing, Snapdeal.com.

While, Deepa Thomas, Head – Partnerships, eBay India says, “eBay India receives traction from several smallest cities in India. These cities have emerged as unexpected regions and depict the growth and potential of eCommerce in India which includes Salem, Tiruvallur, Udupi, Dharwad, Kakinada, Guntur, Ambala, Hisar, Panipat, Hooghly, Bardhaman and Alappuzha.”

For buytheprice.com, cities in North and South of India have emerged strongly.

“Several small towns and cities have become the hub of e-commerce in India. Chandigarh, Coimbatore, Vadodara, Goa, Jamshedpur from the North, South, East and West respectively are the top tier II cities that have picked up immensely when it comes to buying online. Majority of the business is still coming from Delhi NCR, Bangalore, Mumbai and Chennai,” says Mediratta.

A step towards brighter future

What will make this scenario even brighter are strong logistics, marketing and promotional strategies specifically targeting the non-metro areas. The e-retailers are already making their logistics strong by partnering with leading logistics players in the market and further channelising with local service providers. For marketing and promotions, print advertisement and social media visibility are the sought after ways of reaching out to people.

The future for e-retail in non-metro areas is bright with e-retailers expecting a rise in the sales coming in from these areas as trust grows stronger among consumers.