After capturing the major part of e-commerce segment, the leading e-commerce player Flipkart is now planning to tap the segment of the population that still have some hitch to buy things online, or simply they are not much comfortable buying phones online. The unique instance of online and offline retail coming together, Flipkart, India’s leading e-commerce portal, has tied up with, India’s smartphone retailer, to showcase its exclusive phone portfolio in retail stores across India. Yes, Flipkart goes offline.
A recent announcement made by Flipkart announced on Wednesday its partnership with Spice Hotspot stores, where its ‘exclusive’ portfolio of phones will be showcased offline at Spice Hotspot. For this, Flipkart will be using an “assisted e-commerce model” that will let customers interested in buying phones to walk to the nearest store the e-commerce company has tied up with, and use, experience the phone before buying it. Shopkeepers at the store will also help customers buy the phone at the end of the experience, using Flipkart’s mobile app.
Right now, the facility is restricted to phones only. For the ‘assisted e-commerce model’, Flipkart has tied up with stores, where customers can go and see the phone in physical form. After placing order, the customer can choose to take delivery at the store or at his/her home.
This association is aimed at reaching out to a larger target audience, especially the not-so-tech-savvy customers as they can now get a first-hand experience of these exclusive products and place their order conveniently at a store near them. This will be really amazing for the online exclusive brand like Alcatel, Moto and Xiaomi.
Mr. Rajiv Sethi, Chief Marketing Officer, Spice Retail said “We are delighted to partner with Flipkart as an offline partner for their exclusive smartphone range. With our wide footprint across India and our well-trained store staff, we are confident that we will add a lot of value to our customer’s shopping experience.” He added, “This unique “online and offline synergy” will offer customers the best of both worlds – the convenience of online retail and the touch and feel in-store experience of offline retail.”
Mr. Sandeep Karwa, Director Retail Flipkart, said, “This is targeted mainly at places where online shopping is still catching up. Customers in Tier-3 and Tier-4 towns have heard about online shopping but are still circumspect. This initiative will empower and ease customers from smaller cities to shop online. Overall, we foresee this becoming a big customer conversion tool for our smartphone category.”
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