Wednesday, August 21, 2013

LazadaPH: Picking the right destination when shopping online

So what is new in the local online scene nowadays? I’m pretty sure everyone is seeing the online shopping trend that is continuously rising in the Philippines.  A lot of us never envision online shopping as an accepted option dating a couple of years back. It's actually expected since the rate of fraud in the country is high both in online and offline. Logically, this makes local online users shy to shy away from online transaction. In the local online space, local online classified websites were the premiere local websites closest to Ecommerce. Unintentionally, it helped the local online mall's arrival in the country.

A marketplace community was eventually born thanks to these local online classifieds. When people want to buy something online, they didn't have option yet when local online classifieds didn't exist yet. It became a venue for pricing benchmark on the items that user want to buy. It paved way for local online users to maximize the usage of Internet. It was being used as a medium for local online users to buy and sell. It's very different from Ecommerce since local online users deal with third party resellers. Transactions are usually done offline. Group buying website also have this contribution to the local online users. They paved way for upcoming Ecommerce websites in the country. When they arrived in the country, local online users already have experience in online dealing. Online shopping was still considered since the reward customer's will get beats the risk. Group buy websites showcased great deals that can't be found from others. With the great deals being offered by group buy websites; it makes it harder for customers to refuse them.

Last year, Lazada Online mall was launched in the Philippines. It is an online mall available in other countries of South East Asia. It is backed by the Samwer brothers and is under the Rocket Internet umbrella. They made an impact in Ecommerce through their various payment methods. A lot of online payment methods are available for customers to make it easier for them. It is usually credit card or PayPal payment that is allowed in paying online to online malls. The conventional way of payment is usually tough for local customers since they don't have any of the mention for online payments.

The Philippines’ Online Shopping Mall introduced Cash on Delivery or simply known as C.O.D. as new way to pay online. The payment method allowed Lazada online store to tap the untapped market in the Philippines. As a matter of fact, this is the majority market in the country.  It allowed the Ecommerce to grow with this market now included. By allowing this to happen, it helped them sufficient number for their business to be maintained or even grow further. It’s really remarkable to see that an online store successfully launched in the country. If we go back a few years ago, we would have surely said “no way”.

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