Snapdeal targets low-end value shoppers in strategic shift

KOLKATA: It has been more than six months since the onset of the pandemic. While most businesses have taken a major hit, e-commerce has been have a rollicking time with a further boost projected during this festive season.

A recent report from ReedSeer Consulting said that goods with a gross merchandise value of  $3.1 billion were sold by e-commerce companies  like Flipkart, Amazon, Myntra, and Snapdeal  in less 4.5  days of starting their festive sales. Snapdeal’s Kum Mein Dum sale, which concluded on 20 October, saw a massive adoption in smaller cities. Eager to hold on to this fresh inflow of shoppers, the platform is widening the depth of the value segment, said Snapdeal communications & corporate affairs SVP Rajnish Wahi.

He explained that a large part of the audience the company targets is in tier-2, tier-3 and beyond. Moreover, many of them have high aspirations but limited disposable incomes. After fulfilling basic expenditures, they may not have Rs 10,000 to buy a pair of shoes at the end of a month. But they shop often, mostly in local outlets. “Our target is to bring the same collection online which they would possibly go to local markets for,” he said, adding that most products on the platform are priced between Rs. 250-2,000.

The e-tailer has added 10,000 small and local sellers  and manufacturers in the last couple of months.

Along with creating the value shopping segment, Snapdeal is also trying to make the service easier and more accessible for buyers of all shades and income levels. As a number of them are not comfortable with English, it has also added eight Indian local languages to its user interface. 30 per cent of the overall users opt for the UI in vernacular languages. Not only can they shop in their mother tongue, but also get promotional messages in that language as well.

“India is a very heterogeneous market. At first, the 80-100 million who came online were largely urban, English-speaking with high disposable incomes. In the second phase, up to 300-400 million are going digital, and these people have different tech-awareness, different language preferences, and lower disposable income. Those who seek to discover, who want to explore further are our target segment. What differentiates us is the depth of merchandise in  our "value" segment,” said Wahi.

He emphasised that owing to its good brand awareness and high recall value, Snapdeal is among the top three e-commerce players in India.

With the change in its business strategy, Snapdeal has also started going hell for leather by investing increasingly in digital marketing, especially on social  media. Wahi explained that the platform has moved beyond the brand-building phase and is now looking at a more targeted, result oriented marketing strategy.  While social media can also help to explain a product, it’s word of mouth that greatly helps a discovery-led platform like Snapdeal, he added.

Will visitors make a great deal out of Snapdeal's  broadbasing strategy?-