Flipkart Fashion's VP talks about its Big Billion Day sale, celebrity marketing & personalisation
On October 10th (tomorrow), leading e-commerce brands Flipkart and Amazon will lock horns in the festive sale battle to woo the Indian audience.
Flipkart Fashion's VP talks about the Big Billion Day sale, importance of celebrity marketing and personalisation / Flipkart
Flipkart has already roped in actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Deepika Padukone, Ranbir Kapoor, Diljit Dosanjh to promote its marquee Big Billion Day (BBD) sale. Meanwhile, sports celebrities like Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Sunil Chhetri and Saina Nehwal will also be promoting the same.
According to Flipkart Fashion's vice president Rishi Vasudev, the brand has identified celebrities to be one the biggest influencers of fashion trends in India as they contribute to over 15% of all searches; and a similar quantum of all sales on platform (in line with some leading category’s sizes). He further believes that the consumer base for Flipkart fashion will grow by at least 60% during the festive period.
According to a recent research report by KPMG, brands with focus on personalisation are rated better by consumers, and this trend has not slipped by Flipkart, a business with a lot of customer data.
As to what data Flipkart is using to personalise and how many variations will be created, he says: "Flipkart has been on the forefront of customization of content. Over the last several months, the Flipkart data platforms have been collecting user behaviour signals based on browser and shopping history, preferences for certain brands and price-points, category preferences, etc. This enables Flipkart to have a large repository of data to fine tune content to specific shopper cohorts.
"This BBD, shoppers with different preference sets will be welcomed on the platform with curated set of offers, brands callouts, deals, category focus and even celebrities! Flipkart Fashion is working tirelessly to create multiple on-platform experiences for different types of customers based on their average shopping basket, brand preferences, which categories they look out for most, and obviously gender.
"Experiments running on these for the past few months have shown that shoppers, when shown curated content, are more engaged resulting in higher conversion as well. Moreover, these customers are likely to visit more often as well."
Vasudev further highlights how personalization is one way to ensure that customers are able to effortlessly find merchandise that they are looking for. Flipkart has further invested Rs 3,463 crore into its online marketplace, Flipkart Internet, which is its biggest capital infusion since Walmart acquired majority stakes. Amazon too pumped in Rs 2,700 crore into Amazon Seller Services in August.
Whether consumers are getting a 'fatigue' over the number of sales and if the sale relevance can be maintained, Vasudev says: "A key goal for Flipkart Fashion is to expand the e-commerce base by enabling customer transition from offline to online. This is deployed through several affordability constructs that we take live during sale events like 'No cost EMI', 'Buy now pay later', 'Instant discounts through banks' etc. Currently, sales are a platform that enables us to reach out to customers with these benefits and get value merchandise, specially during festive period, which sees a huge uptick is retail sales across all industries and categories.
"While we are doing this during festive period, we also invest heavily in building our brand and perception. In July - August period this year, while the entire industry was on heavy discounts and communication, Flipkart Fashion launched its latest campaign “India ka Fashion Capital” which focused on delivering value to a customer through exclusives, large selection in every category and celeb fashion."