Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Lazada online store: From surfing the web to online shopping








All throughout my experience with online surfing I never realized that online shopping would come along in the future of modern digital era. I remember when I first got into online surfing, which no longer is the term used for online browsing by the way, I only use the Internet for research and news. Websites weren’t sophisticated at that time. It was actually pure text based website at that time. If you want to entertain yourself, it will be very hard for you especially if you are not into reading. As the Internet and technology progressed, so did the websites online. In the Philippines, online shopping only took off last year, which is a surprise for people on other countries that are used to online shopping in their country. Online shopping is clearly not new when it arrived in the country last year.

Prior to a year ago, Ecommerce was struggling to expand in the local online community. A lot of factors made Ecommerce penetration almost impossible from a local standpoint. Somehow it started to change when website giant like Lazada Online Store was launched in the country. No one actually knew what it was about when they arrived last year. Having a foreign company name doesn’t help either. A lot of skeptics were even forecasting the online business of Rocket Internet, which is known for aggressively starting-up online business models throughout the globe, to flop. So in order for them to have a unique selling point that will break the Ecommerce barrier that is plaguing the local Ecommerce industry, they offered Cash on Delivery or C.O.D. This alternative payment method allows anyone to order anything from their website. Customers don’t need to leave their credit card details or Paypal account if they want to avail their service. All they need to do is to visit the Lazada website.

From there, all they need to do is order anything they want from the website and have it shipped on their address. No need to pay upfront which is the conventional setup between online customers and online stores. Typical online stores, usually require their customers to pay first before they shipped out the order. With Lazada, they don’t need to pay right away. They can wait for their order to arrive and pay in cash as their order package is handed over to them. That helped eliminate the online shopping woes of the country. No need to worry about giving away your confidential credit card details and no need to doubt the trust factor of online store. Since customers are not required to pay right away. Anyone can try them out. If it works, then if satisfied, buy again; if not, then they still get to keep their money in their pockets. It’s clear that Lazada has the lower leverage with this kind of payment setup to their customers. But the thing that made Lazada on top of the local competitors are their overall service package which includes friendly alternative payment methods. It’s not just about an online store that offers products online.

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