Facebook is eyeing the Indian e-commerce market, and it seems to be using WeChat thinking to meet the retail giants such as Amazon and Ali. When the vision of Chinese companies began to move towards the world, international companies were also quickly learning Chinese strategies.
This article comes from the WeChat public account: Geeks Park (ID: geekpark) , Author: Shen know Han, from thematic map : Visual China
Social giant Facebook has been coveting e-commerce for a long time, this is not a secret.
On April 21, Facebook announced that it will invest $ 5.7 billion in Indian telecom operator Jio Platforms, and it looks at the latter ’s Indian retail business. Jio stated that the goal of the cooperation between the two parties is to help India’s 60 million small, medium and micro enterprises to carry out digital transformation, so that ordinary people can enjoy online and digital shopping experience.
Jio’s e-commerce platform JioMart has been launched on WhatsApp. Users send Hi to JioMart on WhatsApp to get the link to the online store. After the order is placed successfully, JioMart will automatically assign the order to the offline store nearby. A few days ago, it was reported that JioMart’s service scope will cover more than 200 cities and towns across the country.
Facebook’s entry into the Indian e-commerce market is a good time.
In recent years, the Indian government has frequently relaxed restrictions on foreign investment in the e-commerce industry. India ’s e-commerce market can be described as an untapped new world . According to eMarketer 2018 data, the Indian e-commerce market has more than tripled since 2015, but in 2018, e-commerce sales accounted for only 2.9% of total retail sales. According to the Morgan Stanley report, the Indian e-commerce market will reach USD 200 billion by 2026.
No wonder Walmart and Amazon, who are deflated in China, want to go to India, hoping to create another AlibabaMyth. It is not easy for Facebook, a social media company in the e-commerce business that has repeatedly fought and failed, to grab food from the mouth of experienced e-commerce and retail giants.
But its advantages are also obvious. Facebook intends to use its huge user base in the Indian market to focus its e-commerce business on the platform’s core social attributes . After all, when it comes to connectivity, no company can match it.
The e-commerce dream that is constantly being explored in failure
In the beginning, Facebook tried out the water and electricity business only to better meet the social needs of users.
For example, the Marketplace (market) service that Facebook tried earlier, does not provide self-operated goods and trading services, and uses acquaintance socialization and positioning to display Nearby items for sale allow users to establish trading groups to trade on their own, similar to Xianyu C2C second-hand trading platform. However, the lack of platform supervision will inevitably lead to transaction fraud, unreasonable quotations, and poor product quality. Later, Marketplace gradually transformed to B2C.
In addition, Facebook has also launched a gift-giving service, Gifts. As the name implies, users buy gifts for Facebook friends through third-party websites on the site. In a statement to close Gifts, Facebook (2014) wrote that it will explore everything from Gifts to explore new ways to help businesses and developers Drive sales better on Facebook.
In 2009, Facebook let companies build brand homepages, attracting many well-known retailers. “However, Facebook is like a party where friends chat and fall in love. Brands want to interrupt the party by letting people jump in and let you buy clothes and games. This is not realistic.” Business Insider commented This action failed.
These unsuccessful attempts are enough to show that not only did Facebook not make money at the time, Facebook did not allow merchants to make money, and the simple superposition of social and shopping couldn’t work. Even FaceboWhether ok really understands e-commerce is also questioned by the outside world. Business Insider commented on this, “ Facebook does not necessarily want to be the next Amazon, maybe just to help its advertising revenue. ”
Facebook is indeed vigorously adding to its advertising business. In 2012, after Facebook went public, the stock price shrank, and the capital market was very worried about the advertising value it could create. Zuckerberg decided to let go and allow more ads to be added to NewsFeed. In order to ensure the user experience, Zuckerberg was sensitive and restrained about the location and content of ads in NewsFeed.
In 2014, Facebook began testing a new form of streamed advertising, adding a purchase button (Buy Button) at the bottom of the ad. This feature was ported to Instagram in 2016. Users click the image tag (shoppable posts) , and they will automatically jump to the merchant ’s website to purchase. In contrast, this way of visually displaying products is more attractive to users. Instagram added shopping functions to Stories and videos. In 2019, it announced the launch of checkout (Checkout ) function, users can complete the purchase directly within the app without jumping.
In exploring the e-commerce business, Facebook has undergone a transition from C2C to B2C. Enterprises buy social media ads from them, build stores and establish brand image. In the recent years of product function updates, Facebook improved the e-commerce experience by improving e-commerce tools, and the ability to connect and serve B-end merchants began to show .