Lazada Philippines: Ecommerce woes in Asia – no longer a factor

It took a while before Ecommerce finally arrived in Asia. For most part, it was only operating in Europe and USA. I’m not exactly stating that there was no Ecommerce at all in Asia. I’m simply implying to the fact that its operation in Asia compared to those countries were far apart before. Ecommerce in South East Asia is actually a very challenging online business to crack during the mid 2000 for any investors. Most of the market share is still unable to pay online at that time in South East Asia. Only a few of them own a credit card.

For the credit card owners, not all of them will consider online payment and online shopping because of the concerns about fraud. Since the online market in South East Asia is aware of the scams and frauds that is why they are very hesitant to try online transactions. People can easily find offline businesses more credible than online businesses. In offline business, deals are usually done face-to-face that's why we think it's safer. But some of us are overlooking the other online stores who offer better discounts than traditional online stores.

Online business usually offers the better deals since they offer lower pricing compared to offline malls. Moreover, discounts and promos are easily offered by online malls to make them more enticing. This is actually an obvious tactic that they needed to do in order to lure customers to online shopping. Online Malls like Lazada, ventures available in other countries of South East Asia, is a good example. In our country, they are one of the first to offer the biggest selections that we only see on traditional malls.

Their introduction of Cash on Delivery as an alternative payment method was the first time offered by an online store. This paved way for them to become one of the key players in the online shopping industry. It's actually impressive to know that they only existed for a year and already achieve so much. Their competitors were launched only after the Philippines’ Online Shopping Mall was launched in the country early last year. It's a proof that it opened the eyes of local businessmen about the potential of Ecommerce in the Philippines. We can only become spectators as online shopping takes off in the coming years.

With their overall service experience to their customers, they won the hearts of the local online audience. With the availability of C.O.D., customers who can't via credit card or online can now be customers as well. This eventually multiplied the numbers of their market since almost everyone can now become their customers. It doesn't end there; they even offer free delivery as long as the transaction value exceeds one thousand pesos. Once a transaction goes above the one thousand mark, they will shoulder the shipment fee. It's is much easier for them to convince customers to choose online shopping rather than offline shopping since they can combine Cash on Delivery or C.O.D. and Free Delivery.