Trends

Indian E-commerce Firm Flipkart Takes Inspiration From Tencent’s WeChat

The company is planning to roll out the mobile app by the end of this year, that will be a one-stop solution to all problems, products and services. The ambitious plans have been announced today.

Flipkart is reportedly planning to launch a ‘one-stop’ mobile app. Users will now get a chance to order food, hail a cab, plan a vacation, buy daily essentials, pay bills and everything under the sun.
As per a recent ET report, the company is in preliminary talks to partner with  food, cab and travel aggregators for its ‘app-of-apps’. The company is planning to roll out the mobile app by the end of this year.
The mobile app will boost customer loyalty and monetize huge volumes of customer data, thereby adding channels of revenue.
The business is targeting a December launch and will follow a WeChat model, where the Flipkart app can be used to book a cab, order  food or plan your travel. With the launch of loyalty  points for all purchases on Flipkart, the Flipkart platform will act as  a distribution channel for these services.
Along with value-added services offered on its ‘app-of-apps’ will complement the company’s advertising business. Earlier this month it was reported that Flipkart  Ads, the digital marketing division of e-commerce major is targeting to become a $100 Mn business by March 2018.
Flipkart with the launch of these services will be a much fulfilling and complete website/mobile friendly for the use of all age groups and all income stratas. It has decided to have partners for all other services like cab-hailing, online ticketing etc while the customer loyalty, transaction and revenues is increasing through this app strategy. However, these are early days and the strategy needs to be refined with a six-eight month runway.
However, the daily essentials category will solely be run by Flipkart without a partnership. As per the same report, the company also has plans to  launch grocery and fast-moving consumer goods offerings shortly. This won’t be its first stint in the daily essentials segment. In February  2016, it shut down its grocery delivery division ‘Nearby’. The “friendly mobile supermarket” was launched in October 2015, in Bengaluru.
This wouldn’t be the first attempt of an ecommerce platform to provide a host of services. In March 2016, food ordering app Zomato tied up with Snapdeal. Snapdeal also partnered with Redbus and Cleartrip, and hyperlocal services marketplace UrbanClap to launch personal services category on its platform.
Earlier this month it was reported that Flipkart was planning to venture into financial services.

Source: BW Disrupt

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