7 Reasons why Pakistani E stores are not hitting highs like global competitors

The e-commerce tsunami had taken the world by surprise and now our country is also catching up e-commerce market with giant strides.

According to State Bank of Pakistan figures, Pakistani e-commerce industries witnessed a growth of 93.7% for the FY 2018.

This is some good news, but our Pakistani e stores are lacking behind so much which if overcome can gain the trust of online buyers. Even though online stores today have some facade of transparency and are more personalized. Unlike in the past, e-stores are now more reachable than ever; people operating behind online stores are known, their offices are public knowledge.

But there also exists mistrust between buyers and sellers due to inappropriate product entries, inaccurate content, misleading pricing and much more to be discussed here.

Common Issues with Pakistani E stores

1. Inappropriate Categories 

E shopping starts from running through products in a category or in a search result. The idea is to find the required item fast, but nothing is more unwieldy than getting a completely unrelated product.

Inflatable baby swimming pools are popular search in summers and can be found easily on any e platform on planet. But a simple search on leading e store of country couldn't give me anything. Out of the first 10 items in that search, only three are actual.

What we have here is a product detail of an item. Interestingly, the two pictures of supposedly the same item show two entirely different products. But which one will the buyer purchase?

2. Inaccurate Content writing

Duplicating information is very common between similar products to cut the work load. This often misleads and confuses the customers.

When it comes to describing the products you sell, it pays to use the right words with their proper definition. Using the wrong terms to describe items not only makes a store look bad, it increases returns and charge backs. It can also land you in legal trouble.

3. Lack of Video Marketing

E-commerce brands worldwide are rapidly using social media video ads to drive sales and generate brand awareness. But Pakistani e-commerce pundits for some reason see video as an expense and liability which is not directly relatable to sales. But that is the biggest drawback here. The more viral your video gets, the more brand recall your e-commerce store gets, and that is extremely important in the saturated e-commerce space where every e-commerce store is almost offering the same deals. Although some big names here have recently started video marketing, these video ads need to be made on consistent basis, so that a clear brand image is made in the mind of the customer.

4. Artificial Overpricing and false discounts

Not all stories of giving false discounts during mega sales events are fake and they are not limited to the discount seasons.

Overpricing an item and adding small discount while still keeping the price higher than the original is another decades-old practice in traditional trade, which has unfortunately migrated to digital market spaces.

5. Replicas and Faulty items

Replicas are sent against the full price of original luxury products. Poorly made replicas of branded clothing made from extremely cheap fabric is very common issue every other online buyer complains about. Users receive faulty and damaged goods purchased directly from official vendors of reputed companies.

Users receive defective items or replicas with lengthy return policies. Recently, a friend received absolute rubbish in the name of branded clothes, that didn't even last a day.

Branded clothes, wristwatches, jewelry, luxury gift items are charged for the original amount but instead, low cost replicas are sent to customers.

6. Post sales services

Who could deny the importance of 'Post Sales Services?'

Online businesses have more importance than traditional businesses in this regard. In fact, there’s more value in it since customers are going to order something they have not inspected in person. We have seen time and time again that in case of getting a defective or wrong item, the process of returning the product is often very long and unfriendly, and getting the money back is a very painful process. These complications can be reduced if only vendors double check the items they are dispatching.

7. Lack of  Mobile-Friendly Interface

Most online stores lacks in putting up a mobile friendly interface. Almost 70% of all online sales today in Pakistan are via mobile devices and yet many e-commerce brands fail to optimize their websites for the mobile user. What’s worse, they don’t even have a mobile app.

Your mobile website or app needs to have the same features as that of a desktop – some brands sacrifice that to comply with the scarcity of space in a mobile app. But it all comes down to creating the right user experience for your customer without deleting the necessary features of an e-commerce store.

So if these e-commerce stores want to increase their sales, marketing is one area they need to look into immediately. Leaving a buyer unhappy does not mean the loss of one customer only. It means that one unhappy buyer can stop hundreds of potential buyers, and a happy buyer can multiply the business just as much and more.

It doesn’t mean that all Pakistani online stores suffer the above-mentioned problems. Some are doing a phenomenal job, but still there is a great room of improvement for those doing great job to move forward and fast to make a name in global list of e commerce stores.

To have happy buyers, companies under the spotlight need to act like true leaders and take responsibility to reduce damaging elements to the online shopping experience. At this stage, they also have a responsibility to strengthen the foundation of e-commerce first, before chasing the title of "the largest".