Adgully Exclusive | Dealing with consumers, the Rediff way!

Deal Ho Jaye is a property of Rediff.com that comes up with daily offers at discounted rates, which showcases services given by restaurants, spas, hotels, healthcare clinics, tattoo parlours, hobby classes, adventure sports and other local establishments across 70 categories and discounts ranging from 30%-80%.

In an exclusive interaction with Adgully, Vivek Sharma, Senior, VP, Rediff.com, shared his insights about "Deal Ho Jaye'. Deemed as one of the pioneers of e-commerce in India, we asked Sharma to give us an idea about the present key trends in the e-commerce space. "This industry is growing and with the penetration going up, smartphones and 3G also growing in the country. We are at the right point of crust for our next major growth. I will not be able to divide the number that we have registered last time, but yes e-commerce is one of the best industries in terms of growth potential over the next couple of decades," Sharma revealed.

He further elaborated, "E-commerce is a big industry, if you look at Rediff, we are primarily into e-commerce. We launched Rediff.com "shopping' and now, Rediff "Deal Ho Jaye'. So, for us the important thing is to grow, and in the years to come e-commerce will contribute a significant share to the market in the country."

"Deal Ho Jaye' was launched few months back, could you explain us the concept behind it. "This is a segment which is growing rapidly, because it caters to the needs of small and medium enterprises (SMEs). This is for businesses who don't have resources or who don't want to explore with channels of marketing, advertising, television, other online sites and other advertising areas. For that purpose, Deal Ho Jaye has city specific pages i.e. different deals for different cities such as Mumbai and Delhi. It provides opportunity for SMEs to advertise and promote their businesses. Consumers get good offerings in terms of rate prices and for us it's a new line of business. And I think for all stake holders like us, consumers as well as small and medium enterprises makes it unique. I see a lot of scope in the future in this business," explained the senior VP.

Being a nascent industry, where do you see yourself and your competitors, to that Sharma replied, "This industry's segment is the low cost entry barrier. There won't be a natural tendency for many companies to start with this pace today. In the long run, anyone who takes care of the consumer induces as well as tackles the demand of enterprises and can sustain and grow well. Our strategy is definitely keeping this in mind and whatever we have so far accomplished. We are ensuring that we provide long term benefits to our consumers as well as to the businessmen who are associated with us."

He added, "As I have said earlier, for SME tie-ups, this is something that businessmen can't advertise, reason being a very expensive proposition. So, where do they go showcasing their businesses? Thus Rediff "Deal Ho Jaye' becomes a good platform for them. We have received great responses not only from metros but also from SEC B and SEC C towns. Today, we are there in more than 44 different locales across the country."

Rediff.com itself is a very strong brand and has a very large number of unique users every month. Keeping this in mind Rediff.com started campaigns last month to promote the new offerings.

Speaking about their consumer's and target audience, Sharma said, "We would be bringing event specific deals in all the businesses and major towns, which will help the SME's to grow their businesses and of course customers will benefit with our services such as deals in restaurants, hotels and similar set-ups. And, if we directly link TGs to the internet population in the country today, that itself help us to identify how we operate in that space. The second thing is that, as per our business role, we have deals in sectors like healthcare, FMG's, saloons, adventure sports and car services. This provides options for customers with different needs and tips."

Amongst all the segments and the categories, customers pick up the deal from the two most important categories i.e. restaurants and Spas, and this is followed by travel and adventure sports. These are the categories that are selling the most on Rediff "Deal Ho Jaye'.

Many are predicting 2012 as the year of recession. We asked Sharma, what he thinks about it, "Sites like Rediff.com would not be affected", he commented. "Recession doesn't impact our country to a large extent, as we are a growing economy. Nature of our business is to provide value to our consumers, and in that process we are creating a kind of interest amongst our consumers who are looking forward for deals with great services and discounts. Apart, from this we will be moving the e-commerce way very shortly."

Rediff "Deal Ho Jaye' is doing well online, but are you looking to secure deals offline? "Our concept is such that where a consumer subscribes to deals of their choice online, and goes to the respective location with the coupon and redeems the same upon arrival and asked it to be marked to the list sheet. Thus, accordingly, our service person has to go the location to get that service. And, as we are on the right track, we would like to continue dealing online," concluded Sharma. | By Ranjana Gupta [ranjana(at)adgully.com]