Research On Global Markets found a lot of interesting insights into the E-Commerce Market In India 2019 in their new research work. The data showed that this sector is a crucial part of a retail market scene and that it’s estimated to grow at a 41% CAGR and has since increased from the INR 2,375.43 Bn value in 2017.
From that data, they were able to derive that purchasing power and good internet connections were the two leading causes of growth in this market. It also showed that the industry is dominated by the online travel segment, followed by retail, financial services, and online classifieds market. The statistics defined some rather unusual challenges, in spite of the growth that the e-commerce sector exhibits.
For one, the sector lacks a general business, with most players burning capital on advertisements, discounts, and special offers even though it’s not the smartest approach. The best example here would have to be Flipkart, which had billions in revenue but still achieve the desired profits levels.
Then, given the ease of entering this market, there’s too much competition and new ventures are opening up every day. Big, established players are finding it tough to maintain their hold on market shares as their main threats are a collection of niche, boutiques. At the same time, these smaller boutiques don’t have a very long life as they are unable to cope with heavy demands and other obstacles in this market.
The easy availability of capital for anyone that has a unique idea for the e-commerce field is all it takes to uproot a well-established brand. One can see this with the boom of online stores for everything else, except clothing, like groceries, baby care, real estate, organic, foods, stationery, and books.
Intense competition and multiple offerings create another critical issue of customer loyalty. Most of these buyers are attracted by prices or discounts and are least likely to be loyal. Even if a brand did cook up some interesting incentive schemes, they could very well lose that customer over to a competitor who might be offering better deals.
Dissatisfied buyers might even destroy brand name if they had a bad experience with a vendor. This can harm sales and be a huge setback for all involved in making those particular orders happen. And in this sense, it’s hard for companies to recover from the effects of a tarnished reputation.
Although it might not seem like it, limitations in connectivity issues and internet penetration are very much there in many parts of the country; adding to which individuals still don’t know how to use e-commerce platform services like updating details, tracking orders or making payments.
Most of these issues are being addressed through an assortment of clever marketing and promotions to regain or find new buyers, reboot profit margins, deal with bad vendors and unhappy customers. The biggest hit, however, comes from the logistics sector. A steady flow of online orders depends largely on areas where the logistics infrastructure is of the best quality.
Creating this quality is a task for the logistics industry that is still struggling to connect various aspects like transport channels, inventory management, deliveries infrastructure. Some e-commerce brands try to work around this by developing their own delivery system, only to find out that it’s a huge expense or that they can’t find the right resources to make it happen.
