Just a few years ago, online retail was limited to just a small handful – mostly individuals who wanted to resell, without having to manage the costs of stores and inventory. Today, online retail is not just the norm, but an expectation for brands to deliver digitally. Particularly, the increased internet penetration and rising incomes mean consumers are shopping across multiple devices, and expecting a consistent experience.
Asia Pacific, through Japan, Southeast Asia, South Korea and Taiwan, leads the world when it comes to the percentage of online transactions made on mobile devices. For the first time, the leading 25 percent of online retailers in Southeast Asia (SEA) saw more than half of their sales coming from mobile devices. This number is set to grow further – with developing countries in SEA such as Vietnam and Indonesia adopting a “mobile-first” strategy, due to the influx of low-end smartphones.
Vietnam stands out with technology adoption growing leaps beyond its peers. 94.2 percent of the Vietnamese population is covered with at least 3G in 2015, compared with an average of 80.3 percent within Asia Pacific. Correspondingly, mobile devices surged ahead of PCs, with tablets and smartphones growing 128.8 and 32.4 percent respectively, year-on-year from 2011-2015.
A personalised experience across platforms
As the market continues to grow, welcoming newcomers and offline retailers going online, the need to differentiate one’s business from others is now more important than ever. To stand out in this very cluttered marketplace where consumers are spoiled for choice, there are three critical capabilities that businesses need to consider when developing their marketing strategies:
- Storing and understanding data resulting from all the interactions customers have with their site and physical stories via their CRM;
- Using new programmatic marketing tools to show personalised ads in real-time based on shoppers’ online behaviour;
- Optimising data analysis and performance marketing to re-target customers while maintaining relevance and ensuring higher conversion rates.
In addition, retailers need to understand the importance of the continuation of storytelling across all screens and channels in today’s cross-device era. As consumers do their pre-purchase research on whichever platform is handy, it becomes more difficult for brands to identify them as they fluidly move between platforms. Nine in 10 people in Vietnam, for example, browse for products and/or services online while still in the physical stores. Over half (58 percent) want to compare prices to get the best deal, and the same number want to read reviews. The majority of them (76 percent) end up purchasing online instead.
With this in mind, brands must ensure that they are intelligently leveraging data from each customer interaction while combining it with an effective re-targeting strategy that is personalised to each user’s preference in order to continuously offer a highly relevant shopping experience across any device.
Understanding the customer’s path to purchase
The customer’s path to purchase is becoming increasingly complex. Consumers are taking vastly different paths, from research to browsing to eventually purchasing – using a mix of offline and online methods, across multiple devices.
In Vietnam, smartphones and laptops are the preferred devices for browsing, at 38 percent each. Of those who chose smartphones as their number one browsing device, over half (57 percent) thought it was more convenient than a laptop and desktop. However, when it came down to purchasing, more people (43 percent) preferred using a laptop compared to smartphones (33 percent). Shoppers are also willing to spend more on their laptops than their smartphones.
This is a strong proof point as to why marketers must develop an engagement strategy that spans across multiple touch points and that effectively maps back to consumers’ online behaviours. To ensure the continuous success of each campaign or sustain any engagement, regular analysis and adjustments must be done. By doing so, brands can effectively assess and reallocate marketing spends to focus on channels that have the greatest impact on sales.
Last year, Vietnamese spent 15 trillion VND (US$672 million) in internet retail. It is a big market, a growing market with many opportunities for brands. To remain competitive, brands need to adapt an engagement strategy that maps back to shoppers’ behaviour online, and one that spans across multiple channels, thus creating a more personalised online shopping experience.
Criteo will be hosting Criteo Live in Vietnam on 3 November 2016 and in Indonesia on 8 November 2016. This year at Criteo Live, we will help marketers understand how to formulate effective in-market eCommerce and mobile marketing strategies. By dissecting the elements of performance marketing, this year’s session will highlight best practices and deliver local success stories like Tiki, Zalora and MatahariMall. Further, Ronen Mense, VP –Asia, and Paul Michio McCarthy, Senior Manager, from AppsFlyer, will be a speaker at Criteo Live Vietnam and Criteo Live Indonesia, respectively.