Malaysia Crunch

Rakuten finally ventures into Malaysia

2012-06-03T23:04:00.000+08:00

We have heard rumours of Rakuten lurking into Malaysia's market for about 2 years now, and they have finally announced that they will be in for good.

Malaysia is the ninth country out of Japan in Rakuten's global expansion, and interestingly this is Rakuten's first "greenfield approach" - without any joint venture or acquisition.

This also means that 3 out of the top 4 e-commerce companies in the world are now presented in Malaysia, except Amazon (#1). The other 2 being eBay (#2) and Groupon (#4), of course eBay doesn't have a local office here but launched the local site 8 years ago.

People who are not really familiar with the e-commerce industry often get confused by these companies. Amazon mainly provides B2C service (carries inventory), eBay is more like a C2C, Rakuten focus in B2B2C, while Groupon is a group buying / deal site.

What is B2B2C? The first "B" being the merchant, second "B" is Rakuten itself providing the platform, while the "C" representing the customer. In layman term, Rakuten is just like a virtual shopping mall (like Mid Valley, Pavillion etc.) with all the shops reside within the online marketplace.

Different from other existing marketplaces, expect to see big retailers, SMBs to mom and pop stores in Rakuten. You might also need to get rid of the perception that Rakuten is bringing the goods from Japan as most of the merchants will be local businesses.

"Empowering merchants" is always one of the Rakuten's core philosphies. It will be interesting to see how Rakuten will be helping the local businesses to sell online, via its renowned E-Commerce Consultancy. If you are interested to become a Rakuten merchant, find out here.

As for consumer, Rakuten online shopping mall will only be launched by last quarter of 2012. Watch this space for more updates by then.

E-Commerce Articles on Sin Chew Jit Poh

2012-04-09T15:49:00.003+08:00

If you follow my tweets, probably you are aware that I have wrote e-commerce articles for Sin Chew Daily (新媒體) since early this year.

Six articles in total:

1. Current state of e-commerce in Malaysia
    大马电子商务综述/现有状况

2. How to buy safely online?
    安全网购知多少？

3. Where to shop online in Malaysia?
    我国有哪些平台/地方可进行网购？

4. Selling online: selling via multiple channels
    网上销售：哪些平台最适合你

5. Selling online: online marketing
    网上销售：线上行销知多少？

6. Selling online: delivering happiness
    网上销售：顾客至上

Here are the articles (in Chinese) again if you miss it, or if it's useful for you.

Malaysia's E-Commerce Statistics (Updated)

2012-03-15T16:49:00.005+08:00

The last time I wrote about e-commerce statistics in Malaysia was 2-3 years back, which you can read it here. It's time to get some updated figures, thanks to PayPal's "Online and Mobile Shopping Insights" study.

Malaysia's online shopping market size was RM 1.8 billion in 2010, estimated to be RM 5 billion in 2014. It's safe to predict that our e-commerce market size is around RM 2-3 billion for this year.

70% of the total online shopping spend came from the middle income and above groups (RM 4,000 and above).

Out of the RM 1.8 billion, RM 825 million or more was spent on local websites, local merchants.

As expected, travel (airline tickets etc.) still leads in terms of products / services bought online. This time around, bill payment is finally included at second place.

Some interesting facts whether shopping is done on local or overseas websites:

- Malaysians purchased nearly 2.5 times as much airline tickets from local websites (RM 173 million) compared to overseas websites (RM 72 million).

- Financial products / services (RM 78 million) and health / beauty products (RM 29 million) are mainly purchased on local websites.

- Online purchases for clothings / shoes / accessories are slightly more on local websites (RM 48 million) compared to overseas websites (RM 41 million).

- Nearly twice as much spent online for books on overseas websites (RM 63 million) compared to local websites (RM 36 million).

- Nearly twice as much is spent online for movie / music / game downloads on overseas websites (RM 51 million) compared to local websites (RM 27 million).

- Malaysians' favourite countries for overseas online shopping were the US, Singapore, UK, China and Hong Kong.

Mobile Commerce

While m-commerce still in its early stage, RM 100 million (approximately 6% of the online shopping market value) is being spent via mobile devices, in 2010.

As you can see from the chart below, buying physical products via mobile devices hasn't hit mainstream yet.

Statistics sourced from PayPal's "Online and Mobile Shopping Insights" study.

E-Commerce Milestones in Malaysia

2012-02-29T12:12:00.007+08:00

Here, I am compiling a list of important milestones for e-commerce industry in Malaysia.

If you refer to the milestones below, things start to heat up in recent years. Truth to be told, we rely significantly on foreign players to invest into our market. Perhaps local businesses or investors will rather invest into something else rather than e-commerce (which requires long term ROI), haha!

I think there are 3 waves in terms of consumers uptake or market competitiveness:
- Post 2001: Now everyone can fly!
- Post 2011: Coupon madness and group buying war.
- Post 2012: Marketplace (platform) war?

Do leave a comment, and let me know if anything important missing from the following...

1998

The incorporation of Lelong, arguably the biggest local e-commerce company, before the "intrusion" of foreign companies.

2001

The launch of AirAsia online ticket booking site, thereafter many are braving themselves by entering their credit card details online to purchase budget air tickets.

2004

eBay launches service in Malaysia - ebay.com.my.

2005

Mobile88 launches iPay88, Malaysia's no.1 online payment provider to date.

2009

Lelong launches its B2C shopping mall - Superbuy.

PayPal starts supporting Ringgit Malaysia and withdrawal to local banks.

2010

AirAsia launches its megastore - a B2C shopping mall.

Pos Malaysia launches its B2C shopping mall - PostMe.

2011

Groupon enters Malaysia by acquiring Groupsmore.

Gmarket enters Malaysia, quietly launching a local site.

Everyday.com.my acquired by South Korea's #1 group buying site - Ticket Monster.

Malaysia first ever E-Commerce Fair organized by Lelong.my.

Yamato from Japan introduces Ta-Q-Bin service in Malaysia, offering cash on delivery and chilled / frozen goods delivery.

PayPal officially opens global operations center in Malaysia.

Newegg (US largest Internet retailer after Amazon) enters Malaysia.

2012

Rocket Internet launches its Zappos-wannabe fashion site in Malaysia - Zalora.

Everyday.com.my is being officially rebranded to LivingSocial Malaysia.

Gmarket Malaysia is being officially rebranded to Qoo10.com.my.

Rocket Internet launches its Amazon clone in Malaysia - Lazada.

The launch of MOLPay, offering cash payment via 7-11s.

(I will keep updating from here onwards...)

Asia E-Commerce Conference 2011

2011-08-19T08:58:00.000+08:00

Local e-commerce industry seems to be heating up lately. After the just concluded e-commerce fair, we have another event coming up in October...

Bring on the Asia E-Commerce Conference!

Date: 4-5th October 2011
Venue: The Gardens Hotel & Residences Kuala Lumpur

Speakers at a glance:

Find out more on the agenda and speakers.

Personally, I am looking forward to the session by Pawoot Pongvitayapanu, the founder of Tarad.com, which is the largest e-commerce company in Thailand who got acquired by Rakuten.

OK, why should you attend?
- It's featured with quality and keynote speakers representing the core of e-commerce to provide higher degree of exposure.
- Exchange, Research and Development of current global market trend on e-commerce.
- Opportunity to learn about challenges and opportunities in e-commerce that provide better insight in marketing campaign efficiency.
- New strategies to increase productivity and profitability to generate better ROI just like Fortune 500 companies.

If this is for you, register online now!

Lelong.my E-Commerce Fair - Photos

2011-08-17T22:14:00.000+08:00

The first ever e-commerce fair in Malaysia had just been concluded last Sunday. Here are some photos and short updates especially for those who didn't manage to attend.

PayPal, being the main sponsor, had a prominent booth there.

The leading local shopping cart provider - webShaper's booth and team.

Notice the slogan of this logistics company? Sounds familiar?

The leading local payment gateway provider - iPay88's booth.

Yamato is the star of the show for me, introducing the Ta-Q-Bin service (to be launched in September).

Bata had one of the best booth out there, their online store looks good too.

RekaTee, the online t-shirt design community and store.

SuperBid live in action, a proven crowd puller.

Interview with Wei Kwok Seing, Co-founder & Director of Lelong.my

2011-08-08T23:49:00.000+08:00

Before we start, here are some facts & figures of Lelong.my.
- Incorporated since: 1998 by 2 founders
- Total employees now: 30+
- No of registered members: 800,000
- No of registered sellers: 10,000 (around 2,000 sign up for online stores)
- Monthly visitors: 3 million
- Monthly transaction: RM 8 - 10 million

Q: How did Lelong get started?

A: I joined Cyber Village as a Web Business Manager under Tony Pua in 1997, selling shopping cart solution and you know, it's not easy to do so in 1997!

Then, I started buypc.com.my (you can call it a predecessor of Lelong), a platform for people to easily browse price list for computer hardware, and trade second hand goods. Techie people are used to newsgroup during that time, so I invited a lot of people from there to use buypc.com.my.

Apart from for sale item, we let people bid, which was quite advanced during that time. It slowly evolved from computer, to mobile phone, home appliance, and other products which becomes Lelong of today.

Note: Wei was doing a MBA's paper 13 years ago and he had planned his e-commerce business roadmap, from C2C to B2C. He has used that paper to pitch for investor to start Lelong during that time and gotten it. Guess what, he dropped out from his MBA with 1 semester to go and concentrate on Lelong. The rest is history.

Q: What were the main challenges especially during the early years?

A: Fraud, infrastructure issues, not enough users. There were also a lot of competitors, 7 auction sites in year 2000, even Maxis had an auction site that time! After the dot-com bubble burst, all of them died except us.

Along the years, we have implemented our own verification system, able to reduce fraud to a very minimum rate. In recent years, sometimes we don't even have a fraud case in months.

Note: Wei was a frequent guest at police station during the early years, helping to facilitate the fraud cases.

Q: 7 years of losses, how did you survive that?

A: Yes, we don't make money from Lelong and only break-even on the 7th year.

During the early years, we sustained ourselves and Lelong by providing hosting, doing e-commerce projects, developing own CMS and sell.

We never lost faith in Lelong because it is growing all the time, so we thought Lelong will make it one day. Luckily it did after 7 years!

Q: You have fierce competitor burning tens of millions, what's your thought on this?

A: OK I assume you mean Mudah. Actually, Mudah brings more threat to newspaper rather than to us. They are both competing on the classifieds especially cars, properties and jobs.

There are also many channels to dispose second hand items, you can do it in various forums and classified sites.

But, Lelong is a place for more serious sellers, in fact it's more like a B2C rather than C2C. Therefore, we don't see Mudah as our direct competitor.

Q: Talking about B2C, you spun-off Superbuy during 2009. Is it a lot harder doing B2C? Seems like nobody has yet to hit it big locally.

A: The early users of Lelong also grow older together with us. These bunch of maturing users with more spending power are now looking for something more consistent, better service, better guarantee and convenience. So we think Superbuy will fit in nicely for them, also it serves as a channel for people who don't want to buy from Lelong.

Doing B2C is definitely harder than C2C. You need more resources, from directly handling customers, suppliers, goods, delivery to customer service.

Seems like nobody has yet to invest heavily in B2C locally to make it big. You need a lot of resources to penetrate the market. You need to look into the long term ROI. You need to hit certain high volume level to justify the ROI.

Malaysians are generally not a risk taker if compared to Hong Kong, or United States if you are talking about online business. Local investors might think that the market is too small, so nobody is willing to do the educational work. They rather go into property investment, or something else.

There are no longer infrastructure or broadband obstacles, it's just the whole investment environment is not there. Nobody has been adventurous enough (in B2C), yet.

Q: You are the biggest e-commerce company in Malaysia, and you have gone through a lot. What are your advices to anyone out there starting or running their online business?

A: First, believe.

Second, "don't dream big first". What I mean is to start small, focus on niche, and service the very niche area well. Along the way, you will find your own path.

Q: What are your objectives and expectations of organizing the e-commerce fair?

A: We would like to create an occasion for sellers to meet the buyers. Let the sellers meet their customers physically and build trust. It's a lot easier to conduct future businesses, repeat buying when the trustworthy is there.

There are a lot of people want to know more about e-commerce, and the e-commerce fair is the best place to do so. We have gathered all the industry players under one roof, from hosting, solution vendor, payment to logistics. We are also organizing talks on e-commerce topics and it's free for everyone to attend and learn.

It's also a venue for industry players to learn from each other. For example, SMIs might need to learn from the small sellers on conducting online business. They can forge business partnership with each other, the opportunity is endless.

If you are interested in e-commerce, make sure you attend this!

MyDeal hits RM 2 mil revenue / month

2011-07-13T13:09:00.002+08:00

Here's a press release from MyDEAL, key figures highlighted in yellow.

MyDEAL.com.my retains its number 1 spot as one of the most visited websites

After only one year of its inception, MyDEAL Sdn Bhd is proud to announce that it still reigns as the number one online group buying company in Malaysia. According to an internet research website, Alexa.com, MyDEAL has joined in the top 60 websites with most traffic in Malaysia, and emerged as the most visited website compared to other online group buying companies in the country.

Its co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, Jan Croeni started this e-commerce company with 5 staff in early 2010, and now it’s almost 100 strong. MyDEAL has also recorded another milestone by generating almost RM 2mil in revenue/ month, a formidable feat for any medium-sized Malaysian e-commerce company.

The young entrepreneur, who hails from Germany added, “MyDEAL has opened its doors to young local talent to hone their leadership and entrepreneurship skills systematically, but in an open and competitive working environment. The workforce here is young, averaging 30 and below; this young, creative and dedicated team is the driving force behind the phenomenal growth of MyDEAL”

MyDEAL.com.my (and its sister company DEAL.com.sg in Singapore) is also funded by investors like Rebate Networks GmbH; a worldwide leading group buying network with presence in three continents, 30 countries and 300 cities. Such sister companies include: Ensogo.com, the Market Leader in Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines; Dailydeal.de, the biggest daily deal company in Germany and Austria among several others.

MyDEAL is expected to reach monthly revenues of over RM5mil by the end of 2011. Currently MyDEAL has well over 500,000 subscribers in its database and is expected to hit over 800, 000 subscribers by end of the year.

MyDEAL aims to spread its wings throughout Malaysia and Brunei

MyDEAL has now moved one step forward, by launching 4 web portals simultaneously, dedicated to customers in Kota Kinabalu, Kuching, Malacca and Ipoh. Its Business Development Manager Marlia Omar said the company is expected to spread its wings across Malaysia and Brunei by the year end. Initially MyDEAL had already launched portals dedicated to Penang and Johor Bahru.

Sales personnel are the backbone of any company, and in our case, we provide continuous training, emphasizing the importance of consumer interest and business clientele. Our team is also encouraged to come up with creative and sometimes quirky ideas to solve everyday problems; this ensures we stay ahead of our competition.

Provide 24-Hour Customer Service by end of the year

With MyDEAL’s rapid expansion, we are currently also working towards providing a 24 hour customer service hotline by December. Customer Relation Management (CRM) Division Head, Kent Hoong said, beginning July, MyDEAL’s customer relation hotline will be extended from 8am to 11pm, with our eventual goal being a 24/7 support structure.

Mr. Hoong added, MyDEAL will be beefing up our CRM strength to cope with this exponential growth. Our team takes great pride in its role of providing the best solutions for customers as accurately and effectively as possible in a fast-paced environment.

He also added that MyDEAL will adopt a customer service technology similar to the ones operated by big BPO and customer service companies, thus emerging as the first group buying online company to adopt such system in Malaysia. With this, MyDEAL can communicate with the customers more effectively and efficiently via telephone, email and other mediums online.

MyDEAL now reaches out to more than 1 million prospective buyers every single day through our database, website visitors, online advertisements and other collaborations like Yahoo Malaysia.

Exclusively for viewers and readers:

Get a further 5% discount on all products featured on MyDEAL.com.my, offering irresistible bargains of up to 95% on all products and services.
1] Please log on to www.MyDEAL.com.my
2] Register as a user and key in the following promo code to enjoy additional 5% Off: HAPPYBIRTHDAYMYDEAL

Will Group Buying, Deal Sites Stay Hot?

2011-06-17T17:43:00.002+08:00

I have participated in group buying or deal sites as both a consumer and a merchant. Here's my experience and observations from both perspective.

Consumer

Have you been subscribing to a bunch of deal sites? Probably you have unsubscribed from some of those, as it started to look like familiar, boring marketing / advertising messages bombarded during the pre-group buying era.

Bought some of the deals but never / forgotten to redeem it, sounds familiar? You then slowly realize that those were impulse buying, unnecessary spending - buying things that you don't really need it.

Redeemed some and disappointed by the product or service? One of the reasons, the merchant couldn't cope with the sudden surge of customers.

The merchant might not be aware of the capping (maximum number of orders allowed). It is not the priority of deal sites as their objective is to sell as many possible and earn more commissions!

Merchant

It's touted that group buying is a saviour to small to medium businesses. It supposed to be a viable and "affordable" channel for them to advertise and market their business.

Well, not really (with some exceptions of course).

You need to offer steep discount in order to feature in deal sites. And in most cases, it's hurting the merchants' baseline as they might be offering deals on cost price or even making losses. "Marketing cost" as group buying operators will tell you.

For those uninitiated, local deal sites take an average of 30% commission. For example, if you are buying the deal at RM 10, RM 7 goes to the merchant and RM 3 goes to the deal site.

With so many impulse buying, and many of them bargain hunters, how many customers does merchant expect them to come back? Near to zero repeat customers is not marketing cost.

Group buying operators only care about acquiring new members, sell as many as they can. Whether you get quality, repeating customers is not their business.

Alright, those new customers you acquire stands little chance to become your loyal fans. They might not even like your offerings because they are just not in the right target group you hope for. To make things worse, they share their "bad experience" because it's not the right product / service for them. It might even hurt your brand for all your "marketing cost".

Conclusion

Don't get me wrong, it's not all doom and gloom about group buying, and there have been some successful deals. It's just people (consumer and merchant) started to realize it's not always the best deal for them.

Furthermore, many deal sites including Groupon have not made profit yet. This is because they have invested substantially in acquiring especially the members and merchants, as well as international expansion.

Many players are looking at this long term, but can they survive until that point? Perhaps only those strongest will stay, staying as hot is another matter.

Image credit: http://startagroupbuy.com/features/overview/

Why Should You Participate in Lelong.my E-commerce Fair?

2011-05-03T13:45:00.005+08:00

If you are in e-commerce industry, you simply can't miss this event! Lelong.my will be organizing the first ever e-commerce fair in Malaysia this August at Mid Valley Exhibition Center.

If you are an online entrepreneur, start-up or business owner, get a 2m x 2m booth from only RM 1,500 for the 3-days event! It's even cheaper if you are a Lelong.my Store member, only from RM 900!

As for corporate exhibitors, rates start from RM 3,500 (early bird discount) for a 3m x 3m booth. This will be suitable for e-commerce solution, e-payment, hosting providers etc. Check out the floor plan to reserve your preferred location.

In my opinion, Mid Valley is the right location for this kind of event as you get the right mix of crowd, business visitors and consumers.

Therefore, you shouldn't miss this opportunity especially if you are selling online as you can:
- Promote your business / brand (don't need SEO).
- Sell your products offline (for the first time?).
- Get to meet your customers for real and listen to their feedback.
- Networking with fellow online sellers, entrepreneurs and e-commerce industry players.

I can assure you that it will be a totally different experience from ~~hiding~~ selling online as there will be much to learn from everyone you meet in the fair.

So, what are you waiting for? Visit http://ecfair.lelong.com.my/ and register a booth now!

The Success Story of ShaShinki.com

2011-04-20T23:39:00.004+08:00

Every time when I visit ShaShinki.com, the Malaysia no.1 online camera store, I can't help to think why it still need a landing page like this?

Nevertheless, it's one of the rare e-commerce success stories locally and ever rarer for the founder to unveil some of his recipe to success.

Dr Koh Kho King, the founder of ShaShinki.com is featured in Sin Chew Cyberworld today and I think it's a worthy article to be translated and summarized here for those who miss it.

The road to success

Dr Koh, himself a photographer, co-founded www.photomalaysia.com in 2001, arguably Malaysia largest online photography community to date boosting more than 50,000 members. All those members are eventually his potential customers when he started www.shashinki.com in 2005.

ShaShinki is inspired during his PhD studies in Japan, where online shopping is already common there at the same time boosted with a huge variety of photography equipments.

Dr Koh is a self-taught programmer, and he didn't have any programming background prior to setting up ShaShinki. This is because he knew at that time he needs to keep relying on others if he doesn't do it himself since technology changes everyday. And he still tweak his site till date.

ShaShinki has more than 5,700 "active" products, shipping out 70 to 100 parcels daily with 6 employees helping Dr Koh. His own daily routine including replying more than 300 enquiries via email, trying out new products and writing reviews.

Dr Koh has a good memory, he can remember the specification and functionality of more than 5,000 products thus it's easier for him to answer customer's enquiries.

Tips to success

"Don't be too naive and think that the business will come by itself", this is Dr Koh's advice to new online store owners.

It's ultimately important to build your reputation and brand - "A rotten egg can easily spoil the whole pot of soup", this is especially true in this social media era.

Of course, you need to run your online business with passion, hardwork, sincerity and persistence to stand any chance of success in the future.

According to Dr Koh, sometimes it's not purely for profit when you run an online business. The real gain is when you earn a customer's trust. For example, sometimes a customer will reasonably request to exchange with a new arrival's. This is losing money on paper but he's willing to do so because he will be earning the customer's trust and reputation to his business.

Last but not least, ShaShinki usually ship the order within 24 hours. If payment is made and cleared before 3pm today, you will receive the goods by tomorrow.

Interview with Joel Neoh, CEO of Groupon Malaysia

2011-02-24T11:17:00.003+08:00

Q: You were actively involved in social advertising business, namely YouthAsia (Says.my) all this while. What makes you shifted your attention to e-commerce - group buying business?

A: Youth Asia started in belief of using the internet to bring the collective power of young people together. We actually started with www.theyouthfestival.com -- where we used internet tools to bring together 88,000 young Malaysians on-ground to organize + participate in a fully by youth for youth festival, which turned out to be the largest ever youth fest ever. Then we started YouthSays.com (now known as Says.my) to gather their collective voices to represent them through research + social media platforms. So it was a natural progression for us to explore something related to e-commerce. When we saw the Groupon model (during its infancy -- first 9 months) we thought WOW -- from The Point to Groupon -- collecting people together to get discounts - that sounded like something we would love to do! Its almost in our DNA to replicate it in Malaysia.

Q: How did GroupsMore grow so fast, with more than 50,000 members within 5 months?

A: In the first 5 months we did not do external advertising. We simple connected Groupsmore to YouthSays + told our friends to join it if they feel its relevant to them.

Q: This is I believe the first major acquisition by an international company in local tech scene. Do you think LivingSocial or even Google will follow suit? What is your advice to local technopreneurs who aim for similar exit strategy?

A We didn't start GroupsMore with the expectations of an acquisition, what more from Groupon themself. In fact, we thought they'd launch their own here + crush us. Haha. But I guess in that aspect we were wrong. :) There were 2 things that were important to Groupon before they acquired GroupsMore. Firstly, the people behind the business + can they drive and scale the business model locally. At the end of the day, it boils down to growing the small success we started with to bigger ones. I'm sure there will be other international internet companies acquiring in Malaysia in the near future - but what is more exciting if there is one day, a Malaysian Internet company going global to countries like US, UK, China, India, Russia, Brazil, Japan -- the biggest internet population countries.

Q: How many people you plan to hire and what kind of talents?

A: We will be hiring at least 30 - 50 ppl in the next few months. We are looking for young + bright Malaysians to join our team. We also hope to be able to attract young Malaysians who have graduated from renown universities like Oxford, Harvard, Cambridge, Yale, Princeton, etc to come back to Malaysia and join us on this journey. The learnings will be awesome -- and who knows, this alumni in the future may start the next global internet venture from Malaysia itself.

Photo above: Groupon Malaysia's employees, Anisha and Alison wearing RekaTee t-shirts. Buy cool tees at RekaTee.

Q: You mentioned that you don't think there are currently more than 200,000 Malaysians who understand the group-buying model. Mind sharing your formula to this number and do you also mean that only this amount of people is e-commerce-savvy?

A: Well at this point of time, Groupon Malaysia has ard 60,000+ subscribers. There are 3 large group buying sites at the moment -- so I multiplied that by 3 = 180,000. The rest of 20+ other group buying site have nothing more than 5,000 subscribers each = 100,000. In total 280,000 people (this is not considering duplicates amongst the sites -- which I estimate can be as high as 30%.)

Q: Is Groupon Malaysia going to have huge A&P budget to increase its subscriber base? Something like what PostMe has done recently?

A: Although we have an increase of funds, we will continue to spend it wisely to make sure every dollar accounts to growth. We will be spending on advocating group buying to more people in Malaysia and also on recruiting the best talent out there to join our team.

Q: What is the one major thing you learn from Groupon itself, if any?

A: Well, its more of a reinforcement -- to enjoy what I do. Most Groupon leaders I've met during my trip to London last month were very passionate about the vision of the organization -- and they enjoy every aspect of being part of the fastest growing company ever. http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2010/0830/entrepreneurs-groupon-facebook-twitter-next-web-phenom.html

Q: What does Groupon think about Malaysia's current e-commerce state and potential? And, what are your thoughts on this?

A:Groupon has placed the ball on our court to grow the busines sin Malaysia. There's much more we can do to get Malaysians to frequent e-commerce platforms and transactions. The more popular e-commerce activity now would be purchasing airline tickets - but we hope that Groupon Malaysia will be able to further engage more Malaysians to purchase experiences (which they can use for their daily activities) on a daily / weekly basis. This in turn will grow the e-commerce industry -- providing more opportunities for local entrepreneurs to venture into growing successful online businesses that caters to the local market.

You can visit GroupsMore aka Groupon Malaysia at http://www.groupsmore.com/.

If you are interested (or have suggestions) to be featured in an interview with Malaysia Crunch, feel free to contact me.

Joel's photo taken from http://khailee.com/524/photos-talking/

Online Grocery in Malaysia

2011-01-13T16:34:00.003+08:00

Shopping for grocery online seems unthinkable a few years back but some players have emerged in Malaysia since last year.

If you still think that nobody will buy groceries online, try to think of those in the offices, factories and expats. It is pretty convenient for corporates to restock their pantry and utilities.
Other than its huge catalog and challenges in product sourcing and distribution, online grocer also faces its own set of challenges if compared to an ordinary online store:

- The need of accepting payment via cash on delivery.
- The need of shipping fresh or frozen food. (Heck, we are not Taiwan, ok?)
- The need of offering multiple delivery slots in a day.

Due to the reasons above, online grocers can't rely on third party service provider but instead they gotta build their own fulfillment team. That explains why their coverage is limited to certain population densed areas.

Let's do a Groupon-clones-like compilation before losing count on this. I am not going to do an individual write-up on each player and do drop a comment if you have experienced buying from them, also if any online grocer is missing from this list.

1. Doorstep

2. Virgrocery

3. Redtick

4. Presto

5. Khas

6. FoodWorld

Sales and Promotions Aggregator in Malaysia – EverydayOnSales

2011-01-11T00:51:00.006+08:00

I do heard that sometimes people are buying The Star partly to read advertisements.

If you are one of them, flipping newspapers and magazines and scanning advertisements, perhaps you are a shopaholic (just admit it) worried of missing an important sale.

You can't blame yourself though as price hike is happening right now, can't agree more on this, right?

Worry no more! Now you wouldn't miss out a single sale even if you don't buy newspaper.

Head over to EverydayOnSales.com, a site dedicated to warehouse sales, special promotion, great deals, great discount & many other sales information.

Just to be sure that you don't miss out a single bargain:
- Subscribe their RSS feed
- Join their Facebook page
- Follow them on Twitter

If you are a retailer, you can also submit your promotion details to be featured on EverydayOnSales:
http://www.everydayonsales.com/submit-sale

Say no to price hike, say yes to promotions!

Threadless Malaysia Version - RekaTee

2010-12-25T16:21:00.002+08:00

Note: Read towards the end of this post for a special discount code.

Like Threadless in United States, RekaTee is an online community for designers and t-shirt lovers.

Designers can submit their tee design and get voted / commented by the members. Selected designs will be printed as tee from time to time, partly based on the popularity of the designs.

Designers will then be rewarded by cash money if their design is selected, and t-shirts can be bought via the online store.

Yay! As a reader of this blog, you are entitled to an additional 10% discount on top of the running promotions.

Just apply this coupon code during checkout: malaysiacrunch

Happy shopping!

Group Buying aka Groupon Clones in Malaysia

2010-09-23T09:41:00.115+08:00

Well, China has 100+ Groupon clones (updates: 4500+ now!) and Malaysia is picking up as well on its own scale.

Group buying sites are popping out lately in Malaysia. It's a bit of deja-vu like many were attempting to build a local social network site some years back.

The barrier of entry though is relatively lower to build a group buying site, technically. If you are too lazy, just buy a groupon clone script from here or here.

It's the business itself that's far more challenging - signing up quality retailers who offer irresistible deals, and basically bridging the gap between (offline) retailers and online consumers.

Before losing count, here's a compilation of group buying sites in Malaysia. Do leave a comment if any is missing, so that I can append to this list. Thanks!

1. Everyday Coupons

About: This is an expansion from Everyday's main site, which is a social platform to connect retailers, advertisers and consumers.

Currently covered cities: KL, Penang, Ipoh, Johor, Singapore.

Updates: Being acquired by Ticket Monster, terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Updates 2: Ticket Monster being acquired by LivingSocial, hence now being rebranded to LivingSocial Malaysia.

2. MyDeal

About: Originated from a Singapore sibling, invested by a Germany-based company. Despite raising USD 1 million fund, MyDeal had bad reputations soon after they started to operate (not sure whether it still persist).

Currently covered cities: KL, Singapore. (Johor, Penang coming soon)

Updates: Kudos to MyDeal representative who actually contacted me to clarify the situation and I hope they improve!

Updates 2: Don't miss out the epic joke of the town here.

3. Togethergether

About: Are them still alive? Last deal offered was on July 2010 at the time of writing.

Currently covered cities: KL, Selangor.

Updates: First one to die? R.I.P.

4. GroupsMore

About: New player but the people behind it are not. Started by Youth Asia which is already master in community driven projects, looks promising!

Currently covered cities: KL.

Updates: Being acquired by Groupon, terms of the deal were not disclosed.

5. Roonchit

About: Self-declared "the new revolution of e-commerce, Asia's most innovative group-buying site" is launching in October 2010, sounds too gobbledygook isn't it?

Currently covered cities: Not available.

Updates: R.I.P.?

6. Groupego

About: Similar with Roonchit, launching in October and also using iPhone4 as pre-launch bait. They are also as gobbledygook in their writeup, and the presidential introduction. But kudos to them, they have had a good start.

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley. (Johor Bahru, Batu Pahat, Kota Kinabalu coming soon)

7. The Sun Daily Deal

About: The freely distributed newspaper has also joined the game by introducing the daily deal site. They have an edge with advertisements in their 300,000 daily circulations.

Currently covered cities: Malaysia.

Updates: R.I.P.

8. Wow Deal

About: Another newcomer, can't comment anything yet because they are very new.

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur. (Penang, Ipoh, Johor Bahru coming soon)

Updates: R.I.P.?

9. Daily Sugar

About: Strictly speaking not a group buying site because purchase will be valid regardless of whether minimum purchase is met. Aims to be a "lifestyle partner" to consumers as different kind of deal will be offered on different days of the week.

Currently covered cities: Not specified yet.

Updates: R.I.P.?

10. 24 Mall

About: OK again not exactly a pure breed group buying site but it works similarly, featured daily deal fixed on 50% discount and minimum purchase not required. Site design is below par though.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Transformed into a food review site?

11. OrangeDeal

About: Just launched in December 2010, this one is a "pure breed" group buying site as minimum purchase need to be met in order for the deal to be on.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.?

12. Baloi

About: One of the eye-catching stunt done by Baloi is by registering http://www.groupsmore.com.my/, in which http://www.groupsmore.com/ belongs to GroupsMore (no.4 above). Needless to say, they redirect http://www.groupsmore.com.my/ to their own site. The start of group-buying war eh?

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.?

13. Squarelet

About: A well designed site if compared to most of its peers.

Currently covered cities: Penang.

14. My Fat Deals

About: OK, I will stop writing the about section unless there is something special.

Currently covered cities: KL, Selangor.

Updates: R.I.P.?

15. Ezi Voucher

Currently covered cities: Penang, Ipoh, Johor, KL.

16. I Love Discounts

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley. (Penang coming soon)

17. Coopun

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.

18. Group Voucher

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur, Selangor.

19. Dealmates

About: Possibly the first one to launch in 2011, just check out their media partners and you can speculate that Catcha is behind this. They are also the deal channel for MSN Malaysia: http://msn.goingout.com.my/dealmates/

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

20. Koupon

Currently convered cities: Klang Valley.

21. RakanShop

Currently convered cities: Klang Valley.

Updates: R.I.P.

22. Milk A Deal

About: This is an interesting one, ties up with Nuffnang and Churp Churp thus with its social influences it can grow pretty fast.

Currently convered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

23. Funtora

Currently convered cities: Klang Valley.

24. Qpon

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

25. Hahah

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Collaborate with Digi's MySimplifieds.

26. MadnessDeal

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

27. QmuRate

Currently covered cities: Penang.

28. Jack Cow

About: Operated by Qinetics, a division of Berjaya.

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley. (Penang, Johor coming soon)

29. Group Discount

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

30. Price2Check

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.?

31. Super Deals

About: Powered by 701Panduan, a co-joint company by Star Publications (M) Sdn Bhd and Singapore Press Holdings Ltd.

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

32. i1more

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.

33. WheeGroup

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

34. WeBuy

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

35. MyMetroMall

About: Not exactly a group buying site but more like a daily deal site. Minimum purchase is not required for the deal to go through and the numbers bought is also not published publicly. A player to watch as it's operated by Harian Metro (NSTP) with its wide coverage on media.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

36. CheapSkate

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.?

37. StreetDeal

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

38. Red Elephant

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Revamp = R.I.P.?

39. Lady Jimat

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Revamp = R.I.P.?

40. The Deal Bites

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

Updates: R.I.P.

41. Coupon Houz

About: A deal site that doesn't take commission from merchants but membership fee from members. Reported in The Star.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

42. Niwo

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

Updates: R.I.P.

43. Guben

Currently covered cities: Johor Bahru.

44. Good Deals 2U

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

45. Discount Deal

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.

46. Grab It!

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Revamp = R.I.P.?

47. Beblob

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.?

48. Kuponan

About: This is a group buying feature on eBay Malaysia site.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

49. JoyDeals

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

50. QponKini

About: A deal site by MalaysiaKini.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.

51. Slosht

About: A group buying site for drinkers!

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.?

52. BuddyDeals

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

53. Aibay

Currently covered cities: Penang.

54. Deal4Real

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

55. DealTok

Currently covered cities: Penang.

56. Weconomic

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

57. Iced Chili

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley, Penang, Johor Bahru.

58. Wright Offer

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

59. Collpon

Currently covered cities: Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Johor, Malacca, East Coast.

Updates: R.I.P.

60. Deal Hangat

Currently covered cities: Kota Kinabalu, Kuala Lumpur, Kuala Terengganu, Kuantan, Kuching, Putrajaya.

61. e9deal

Currently covered cities: Melaka, Klang Valley, Johor, Penang, Kuching, Sabah.

Updates: R.I.P.?

62. JigoCity

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur, Kota Kinabalu, Kuching, Ipoh, Johor Bahru, Penang.

63. JuzDeal

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: Revamp = R.I.P.?

64. Savemall

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.?

65. SugarDeal

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

Updates: R.I.P.?

66. Dokonee

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

67. Smart Deal

Currently covered cities: Penang.

Updates: R.I.P.

68. Buynett

Currently covered cities: Penang.

69. Coolpon

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

70. GroupASave

Currently covered cities: Miri.

71. Hulala

Currently covered cities: Kuala Lumpur.

71. Myooo.my

Currently covered cities: Penang.

72. Hotvoucher

About: Use SMS to buy SMS vouchers, read more here.

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Updates: R.I.P.?

73. Buy Discount

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

74. Cari Deals

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

Updates: R.I.P.?

75. jvBuyer

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

76. MyCoupon

Currently covered cities: Klang Valley.

77. GroupMe

About: Group buying site owned by Lelong.my, obviously you can expect more physical products here.

Currently covered cities: Nationwide.

78. myiMart

Currently covered cities: Not specified.

Update: GroupsMore founder said only 3 can survive Groupon-clones war.
http://e27.sg/2010/12/22/only-three-can-survive-groupon-clone-wars-say-groupsmore-founder/

Update: Read interview with Joel Neoh, CEO of GroupsMore aka Groupon Malaysia here:
http://www.malaysiacrunch.com/2011/02/interview-with-joel-neoh-ceo-of-groupon.html

My New eCommerce Blog

2010-09-22T10:19:00.001+08:00

My apology for not updating this blog for months.

Have been really busy this year. If you are not aware already, I have actually started co-blogging at a new e-commerce blog - ecomZen some months ago.

And yeah, this is one of the reasons for my disappearance here. :)

Go visit, subscribe to my new blog on our random thoughts on e-commerce trends. I will still update Malaysia Crunch once a while mainly on local context.

Alternatively, you can follow ecomZen on Twitter too!

Malaysia: An Untapped Ecommerce Opportunity?

2010-02-24T09:52:00.003+08:00

I have a guest post published at Zippy Cart weeks ago, so here it is for those who have missed it.

It was the first time in history that a Malaysian company made headlines at TechCrunch last December. Friendster, the granddaddy of social networks has been acquired by MOL Global, a Malaysian e-commerce (payment) company.

How much do you know about Malaysia?

Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia which comprises many ethnic groups, with Malays being the majority followed by Chinese, Indians and others. Our multi-ethnic, multi-cultural background also makes us a unique multi-lingual society. A typical Malaysian is usually literate in 2 -3 languages (or more). English is arguably the common language used on the Internet here as many western sites or services are popular and frequently accessed. Some of us are also accustomed to sites from China, Taiwan, Indonesia or even India.

Malaysia’s facts & figures

Malaysia’s population stands at over 28 million. We have around 30% broadband and 106% mobile penetration as of the end of 2009. According to Internet World Stats, we are number 9 in Asia’s top 10 Internet countries, by having 16.9 million Internet users.

Malaysia e-commerce statistics

Half of Malaysia’s Internet users are buying or transacting online, which equaled more than 8 million in 2009. Most of the numbers are contributed by airline tickets (which we will discuss shortly). Other popular goods sold online include books, general consumer goods, movie tickets, technology gadgets and so on. The most preferred online payment method in this part of the world is credit cards followed by Internet banking.

E-commerce evolution in Malaysia

Malaysia does have its own share of online retailers and e-commerce companies, though on a much smaller scale than the United States or Japan. Some have been around since the Internet hit our shores in the nineties. One of the famous first movers here is Blooming - the online florist, and they are still going strong today.

Another prime example surviving the dot-com bubble burst is Malaysia’s very own online auction site - Lelong. It is still arguably more popular than eBay Malaysia here despite its cluttered look and feel. Interestingly, Lelong has recently attempted an Amazon-ish online shopping site at SuperBuy.

One of the most important e-commerce milestones has to be the online ticketing site by Air Asia, a low cost airline based in Malaysia. Starting operation not long after the September 11 attack, the online site is the primary channel to purchase budget airline tickets (holiday packages are available too). A lot of people here were since braving themselves by entering the credit card numbers online in order to get bargain tickets. I would say that it was the starting point of e-commerce mass adoption here.

In recent years, online buy-sell activities are frequented at major auction and forum sites, and to a certain extent, popular foreign stores. At the same time, thousands of online stores are also mushrooming locally, with fashion and apparel being the most popular segment. Quite a number of them are blogshops too, which I guess is a unique trend happening only in Malaysia and Singapore.

Perhaps partly due to the need of those blogshops to sell more professionally, we have seen a few e-commerce SaaS providers emerging last year in 2009. For example, Neowave (who has been supplying shopping cart software for years) has since offered its e-commerce SaaS branded webShaper at affordable prices to online retailers.

Not to be missed, year 2009 also witnessed the big move by a local e-commerce company - MOL as mentioned earlier. Another piece of exciting news came from PayPal in the same year, who announced that they are now accepting transaction in local currency as well as withdrawals to local banks.

E-commerce challenges in Malaysia

Yes, no doubt we have witnessed exciting developments in the local e-commerce scene, but many will not disagree that we are still far from the maturity level. The general public here simply doesn’t have the online shopping habit yet. It will take a mixture of cheaper, special, choices or loyalty offerings to encourage the habit of transacting online.

To a certain extent, I would say that we are lacking an e-commerce giant, something like Amazon or Rakuten. That could well kick start local e-commerce mass adoption, similar to what Air Asia has done to the online ticketing space. Of course, like any other markets, people here are generally concerned about security. The presence of the big boys (be it foreign or local) can afford pulling in the financial resources to help educate the local public. On the other hand, online retailers should also do their part in gaining trust from their customers.

As for smaller or medium sized online retailers, the biggest challenge would be attracting traffic to their online store without significant marketing funds. Unless you are selling something niche, it is quite difficult to pull traffic organically from the search engines which index product pages from all over the world. Besides huge e-commerce marketplaces, an obvious piece of the puzzle missing here is the price comparison engine, which could be a great channel for products to get found.

What lies ahead?

Coming back to big boys, Rakuten is strongly rumored to be having talks with certain local players, as Malaysia could well be part of their international expansion plan. There were also rumors of a substantial foreign investment on an established local e-commerce company.

Rumors aside, there are already some initiatives or ongoing developments by local companies to venture into (or expand their) e-commerce services. Suddenly, it seems that many want to be part of the e-commerce game plan. Online retailers are also growing by day, from individual sellers to existing brick & mortars. We need to keep an eye on MOL too, as they are the master in micro-transaction infrastructure. Social gaming is expected from Friendster, but what about social shopping?

So, who will be the Amazon of Malaysia? Be it Lelong, Air Asia, MOL, Rakuten, someone or no one, e-commerce’s future here can only be brighter in 2010 and years to come!

7 Reasons to Shop Online

2010-02-04T11:00:00.001+08:00

Generally, Malaysians are skeptical or reluctant to shop online due to security concerns among many. We lack smart consumers, as suggested by Danny Foo.

Air Asia did a great job in our e-commerce education. Desperately in need of bargain air tickets? Learn how to shop online and brace yourself by entering the credit card numbers. We need more major players like them, to instill and encourage the online shopping habit into our populations.

Nevertheless, let's not limit ourselves to online ticketing or reservation (airline / hotel / movie). I am not saying that you gotta buy everything online but here are the reasons that you can look forward, especially for Malaysians who never experience buying physical goods online.

1. Promotions or bargains. Air Asia is a prime example of this - bargain tickets. Due to lower setup cost (compared to the brick & mortars), online retailers are most likely able to price their products lower or offer exciting promotions. If you are keen on bargains, eBay or Lelong could well be a start of your bargain-hunting exploration.

2. Gems or rare stuffs. Talking about marketplaces like eBay or Lelong, those are the places where you can hunt for stuffs like art, antiques, collectibles, memorabilia etc. Internet does facilitate a whole lot of long tail products to be sold. Looking for militaria or an Elmo bento set? The easiest way is to search, shop and buy online.

3. Save time and convenience. Okay not everyone enjoy shopping at our congested shopping malls. This is especially true for people that are having busy lifestyle, or to a certain extent working parents. I am not suggesting skipping mall visits altogether but shopping online occasionally would be just as enjoyable.

4. More options, wider selection. Online stores are not limited by shelf space constraints, in most cases they are able to display every SKUs they have. For instance if you are looking for fashion or accessories, there are already so many online stores to shop. Plenty of options you have, all you need to do is click or type rather than walk or drive!

5. Help buying decision. Online stores are not only giving you the options but more importantly, help your buying decision. Obviously, you can compare products or prices among shops by just a few clicks. You can also check out feedback from their existing customers. Of course, we don't have something as huge as Amazon's yet but you can start your findings via their Facebook pages.

6. Gift purchase. Buying online is a great way to surprise your loved ones. Having it delivered to his or her address could well be a pleasant surprise. This is especially true for guys who typically don't enjoy outdoor shopping, or to avoid embarrassment of making discreet purchase like a piece of sexy lingerie or some adult ~~toys~~ stuffs.

7. Surprise and excitement. Some online retailers might be able to please you by shipping a surprise gift together with your purchase. I personally enjoy the excitement of anticipating the arrival of my purchase, it feels like buying a gift for myself!

Last but not least, you will have more reasons to shop online if you are not residing in major cities. Online stores or shopping destinations are just within touching distance of mouse clicks. This is especially true for those in East Malaysia, in which (offline) prices are generally more expensive. By shopping online, prices are not logistically marked up and all you gotta do is to take advantage of the free shipping promotions. Shop in the spirit of 1Malaysia, 1 price for all!

Do you have anything to add, or disagree? Do share your thoughts by commenting below and stand a chance to win a mini shopping cart (as photo above) - delivered to your address anywhere in Malaysia, courtesy of webShaper.

5 Fulfillment Tips to Make Your Customers Happy

2010-01-21T10:15:00.009+08:00

Do you have the habit of shopping at foreign online store, especially those from the west? I do, like many others, looking for bargains, stuffs that are special or not easily available here.

I do have an extra small habit though.

Whenever the order arrives, I like to observe the way it is being packaged, and minor details (some are not minor, really) that would make a difference.

Let me share two examples from my own experience recently, Threadless from US and Book Depository from UK.

Tips #1: Creative Packaging

Above is the Threadless's packaging which looks like a tee itself, rather than packaged with some ordinary boxes or bags. This leaves a strong brand impression as well as what kind of business they are in (selling creative tees). It will be great if online retailers stamping their own brand on the packaging, better still injected with creativity.

Tips #2: Element of Surprise

We have already discussed the element of surprise on the packaging, what about within it? Throw in some surprise gift! Your customer will be pleasantly surprised even though with small tokens like stickers, bookmark etc. Imagine if I put on the Threadless stickers on my laptop, it helps create brand awareness when I am using it at places like Starbucks. Again, maximize your creativity and brand impression opportunity.

Tips #3: Go Green

While we should support the no-plastic-bag day campaign (or make it 7 days), online retailers should also do their parts on environmental efforts. Take a look on photos above, there is only ONE piece of paper being used by Book Depository. When you extract the piece of shipping label paper from the pocket (fixed on top of the envelope), it is your order receipt too.

Tips #4: Return & Exchange

Providing return or exchange option for your customer is not a luxury, but pivotal especially if you are selling stuffs like apparels. It is also one of the key factors to convert shoppers into customers, to show that you are confident in your own products. As seen in the photos above, Threadless facilitate their customer with a return form as well as return address label. Of course, Zappos takes it a notch higher by providing free return shipping!

Tips #5: Go Global

Last but not least, okay not so much on fulfillment but more like a marketing strategy, an important one. Have you gotten a substantial product inquiries from overseas? Would you like to find out which market would be the most receptive to your products? Try offering a limited one day worldwide free shipping (or selected countries only) - provided if you have significant marketing fund to go global.

This is how I have gotten my Threadless tees for the first time. They even ship to Malaysia for free if you are just buying a USD 9 tee, which I guess the shipping fee itself could be more than that.

They aren't likely to earn any dollars from this deal, but they are earning me as a new customer. I am happy with the tees - the material is thin no doubt, but comfortable for our hot weather here. I will definitely consider buying again even without the rare worldwide free shipping promotions. And, I am even telling my friends and sharing with you guys here about Threadless. Viral!

Interview with Christopher Quek, CEO of Acmamall.com

2010-01-13T10:13:00.003+08:00

Q: Do tell us a little on Acmamall’s background? When was it started?
A: Acmamall.com started in Malaysia and Singapore in July 2000 as an online bookstore. Formerly called Acmabooks.com, it was renamed to Acmamall.com in 2007 to reflect its expanded product range of beauty, gifts and apparel.

Acmamall.com vision is to be the regional online shopping mall where we are a familiar household retail name to get products in a safe trustworthy and convenient way.

Q: How did you get inspired to start Acmamall? Is it Amazon?

A: Amazon.com had a part to play in it as an inspiration to dot com companies. At that time, Acmamall.com was under Acma Ltd, a multi-industry conglomerate group that had a strategic thrust to develop twelve dot com companies at a go in hope of riding along with the dot com wave. Acmamall.com was the online bookstore, while the other dot comes dabbled in tourist directories, HR, property and online education. However, like many dot com companies, many fell after the dot com bubble burst. Acmamall.com remained the sole dot com company to survive profitably in the grouping.

In 2007, the company has since been bought over by its management and private investors who believe in taking the company forward in its vision. By becoming private, the company is now more lean and quick to react to changing environments.

Q: Why the name Acmamall, any special meaning in it?

A: Acma is a significant brand name to many Singaporeans in the 1960s to 80s as it was the only Singaporean manufacturer of air-conditioners and fridges. As the company was one of the many subsidiaries of Acma Ltd, Acmamall.com took on the legacy of the Acma name, hoping one day that it will remain a favourite retail brand not only to Singaporeans but to all people in South-East Asia.

Q: What’s the toughest hurdle to overcome for your e-commerce venture in this region?

A: It was not easy to convince customers in South-East Asia to trust, especially an online shopping store. It has taken many years to build up our brand and getting people to trust us. That’s our toughest hurdle. The second most difficult was the lack of e-Commerce customer experience in this region. Many customers who shopped with Acmamall.com told us it was their first time shopping online! They were very fearful of giving out personal information like financial data and delivery addresses.

We have taken many steps to provide assurances to our customers. For example, we used US standards of e-Commerce practices, where we have an opt-in model of email subscription. There was a privacy policy in place, where we kept customer information confidential. Financial data like credit cards were not kept but transferred to our bankers directly. We have also fulfilled over 110,000 orders to date in the region, which shows we are experienced in delivering orders to customers. Product guarantees and money-backed guarantees are provided if the customers have a justified reason. Lastly, we provided phone-call support where our customer service team was assisting customers in their purchases.

All these efforts have paid off, as we are proud to have a regional loyal customer base of over 50,000 who have purchased from us in the last three years, and it is growing larger by the month.

Q: How do you promote your site especially at the initial stage?

A: For the first two years, the previous management was traditional advertisers, due to the lack of internet channels. Most of the marketing budget was spent on print, broadcast and outdoor media. However, it had dismal results despite having a large budget spent.

In 2007, Acmamall.com took a RM250, 000 marketing budget to advertise solely in Malaysia via print, online and broadcast media. Acmamall.com saw a jump of sales in Malaysia by 50%.

Now in this season, Acmamall.com is taking a different attitude to marketing, where it is investing its marketing dollars into Web 2.0 media to garner awareness.

Q: On average, how much monthly traffic you attract at Acmamall?

A: We are averaging around 120,000 visitors on a low month, but are seeing a higher traffic volume now in the festive seasons. Of course that leads to a good increase of sales as well.

Q: Among all the countries, who are your biggest customers?

A: That would be Malaysia and Singapore which makes a good 60% of total sales. We have operated in these home countries for the last 9 years and established good brand awareness in these countries. In Malaysia, most of our customers are outside Klang Valley, where they have little access to good shopping malls. To them, Acmamall.com is a big blessing to them as they now have access to 1.5 million books and beauty products available for sale, which can be delivered to their doorstep and free shipping included.

The feedback as to why they prefer shopping with us is being able to pay in local currency, free shipping for books, beauty and gifts and trustworthiness.

Q: Amazon took years to breakeven and make profit, what about Acmamall?

A: As a lean and efficient company, we have broke-even operationally a few times. But staying small isn’t our idea of being a good company. In this online business, the bigger you are the better scale economies you achieve. Our board of directors and investors are aggressive and pushed us to take the risk and expand our marketing budget to grow the company. We made our fair share of mistakes and successes in taking such risks and are now still in the midst of our aggressive expansion so the bottom line is negative at this point, but it is all worth while as the sales growth in recent months will justify the marketing expenditure we have put in.

Q: Could you tell (or hint) us of Acmamall’s monthly revenue in average?

A: Ha-ha, I wouldn’t even dare hint on such figures as it is a highly sought after information from our competitors. Suffice to say, we are jumping leaps and bounds in sales due to our expansion in the region and selling internationally as well. The board is quite pleased with the growth as 2009 has been the best growth year and a stabilizing of sales.

Q: What are the favourite payment options of your customers?

A: For Malaysia specifically, customers enjoy internet banking like Maybank2u.com and CIMB Clicks which is considered less risky. Recently, we are now seeing PayPal as a new option rising up as acceptance is rising for this payment option. For the rest of the countries we operate in, PayPal, Visa and MasterCard are the most preferred options for payment.

Q: Do you plan to revise the pricing (especially books on higher price) to be more competitive?

A: I find this question always on everyone’s mind, which I find it very odd, but I will help to clear up this confusion.

For Acmamall.com’s 16,000 beauty products, Acmamall.com is deemed to be very price competitive and considered the best offering in the region. Customers in Singapore, Australia, Hong Kong, New Zealand Brunei and Malaysia told us they find our prices competitive, with the free shipping and being able to pay in local currency and not get cross-border charges have been the reason why they shop with us.

For Acmamall.com’s 1.5 million book products, Acmamall.com reigns in paperbacks and children books. For example, a romance novel by Nora Roberts can cost RM32 in a Malaysia bookstore, but we are selling it at RM23, with free shipping included. That alone saves a customer up to 30% when buying at Acmamall.com.

Moreover, with our special in-house promotions for members, as well as exclusive discounts for Malaysia customers of HSBC, CIMB Clicks, TM Rewards and Maybank, customers will find that the offers are irresistible.

What I believe people say some books are expensive are our hardcover books. The difference between local bookstores and Acmamall.com is that we offer US book versions, while others offer the lower paper quality UK book version, hence the lower price at times from bookstores.

If you wish to get lower prices, then do sign up with our Facebook fan page where there will be special sales which may last for only a few hours and you can get a really good deal.

Q: Could you give us some clues on possible expansions or enhancements in the future?

A: As with our plan to go regional, we will be introducing more product ranges. We are currently working on building our Apparel range which will be a big hit. We are now in talks with international brands which are not available in parts of South-East Asia, which we believe are well-recognised and will be a big hit among customers. We are also reviewing our web store to be more optimised, especially our search engine and navigation which will give our customers a more pleasant shopping experience.

Q: As for you personally, do you have any plan for new ventures?

A: I am currently very happy working for Acmamall.com, as it has been my life for the last 7 years since joining in 2002. Everyday at Acmamall.com, more and new interesting developments pop up that sometimes I just sit back and watch in amazement. For example, our recent venture internationally, we now are proud to have customers as far as Mexico, Chile and Brazil to a small relatively unknown country like Vanuatu. The excitement to see how Acmamall.com grows has kept me focused on this venture.

I am involved in two other ventures but more on an advisory role than an active one. I will not be planning any new ventures until my dream for Acmamall.com to become the online regional mall is fulfilled.

You can visit their online shopping mall at http://www.acmamall.com/ or join their Facebook page.

If you are interested (or have suggestions) to be featured in an interview with Malaysia Crunch, feel free to contact me.

Photo credit: The Star

New Year, New Look

2010-01-07T11:12:00.002+08:00

Believe it or not, face-lifting and cleaning up this blog is one of my new year resolutions. Don't laugh, resolution does not mean that it has to be tough to achieve but do set small targets to accomplish. Those will lift you on achieving the bigger ones.

So, I am done with the new design thingy, do check it out and tell me what do you think? Kewl?

And here's a memorial for the old Malaysia Crunch, R.I.P.

OK, it's not all about design. As you might have noticed, Malaysia Crunch is and will be having more e-commerce oriented content, and new sections will be introduced too:

1. E-Commerce Tips
Tips and tricks on building an online business. I am looking forward to your sharings too especially if you intend or already running an online store.

2. Interview
Q&A with experienced people in this region, mostly e-commerce related. Experienced be it some established ventures, or those whom have gone through the thrills and pains in running an online store.

If you feel like contributing, or you want (or have suggestion) to be featured in an interview, do not hesitate to contact me. Yes, I have a new about and contact me page. :)

OK, talking about new look, how about getting new clothes for yourself in the new year?

If you are also looking for (cheaper) alternatives to G2K and so on, look no further. Office wear for women starts from RM 29.90, and men's starts from as low as RM 12.90...

Just click on the images below to start shopping online. :)

Happy new year! Let's all make 2010 a prosperous year.

Asia Pacific's E-Commerce Statistics at a Glance

2009-12-29T13:30:00.007+08:00

Well, this post is all about charts and figures. Read on to get a glimpse of e-commerce outlook in selected countries of Asia Pacific. Hopefully, you will get a rough idea on those markets that you are not particularly familiar with.

Personally, I am not really convinced with how the penetration rate is weighted in the chart above. Anyway, it is obvious that China has the biggest market in Asia and still with so much room to grow. India on another hand is projected to overtake Japan as the second largest market in this region.

Too bad that Malaysia is missing from the charts above but it is interesting to see that Thailand seems to have good market potential in South East Asia. No wonder Rakuten buys into Thailand's leading e-commerce company.

E-commerce has now become a prevalent activity amongst Australian online users - 80% of them now shop online.

When Australians shop online 37% of them choose online payment system PayPal rather than Visa (22%) as their preferred payment method.

When it comes to the online retailer who attracts the most Australian shoppers, there is one "clear market leader" - eBay, with 56% of online shoppers having bought something from the site.

India currently has 28.1 million online shoppers in its country, which is forecast to mushroom to 203.1 million people come 2010.

When Indian online users do shop online, they, like the rest of the region's shoppers, overwhelmingly prefer to use credit cards, with 60% of them saying they were their most preferred form of online payment, the next popular method being debit cards (24% of users).

Indian online shoppers are more opportunistic than anyone else in the region, with 30% of frequently making impulse purchases, compared to around 10% in Singapore, South Korea and Australia, for example. The items they tend to snap up on impulse are home appliances and electronic products (63% of users) and airline tickets (54%).

Nearly all Japanese Internet users shop online - the country has an online shopping penetration rate of 97%.

More so than anyone else in Asia, the Japanese prefer paying for goods online with their credit cards over any other form of payment method, with 70% of them saying that was the case.

Online shopping is the second most favoured online activity in Japan, after email.

South Koreans love to shop online. Among those who have Internet access, 99.9% have used it to buy something - the highest online shopping penetration rate in the world.

South Korea's Cyworld is the world's second largest music and video retailer after iTunes.

South Korean's online music download market has grown to such an extent that now more music is sold online than traditional offline channels.

Creating that first positive shopping experience is key in order to capture loyalty and money - Malaysian online shoppers tend to stick to the shopping sites they are familiar with, with 60% of saying they buy mostly from the same site.

Malaysian online shoppers mainly buy airline tickets or book travel reservations over the Internet (55% of users), make tour / hotel reservations (41%) and buy computer hardware (22%).

Singaporeans love shopping: 80% of them have shopped online.

Singaporeans are also amongst the highest online spenders in Asia, spending on average US$3,480 online over the period of one year, ahead of Japan, South Korean and Hong Kong.

Singaporean online shoppers like to plan their purchases rather than buy on a whim, with only 10% of them making frequent opportunistic purchases.

Fashion and beauty are the two dominant segments in Taiwan's online shopping market, with compound average growth rates of 88% (fashion) and 49% (beauty).

The statistics above are derived and summarized from Asia Pacific Digital Marketing Yearbook 2009, which can be downloaded here (requires registration).

Related post: Malaysia's E-Commerce Statistics

7 Reasons to Upgrade Blogshop to E-Commerce Shopping Cart

2009-12-08T18:52:00.011+08:00

Blogshop seems to be an unique trend booming only in Singapore and Malaysia. Perhaps, many Singaporeans or Malaysians are accustomed to browse and navigate around blogshop but certainly not me (some might agree with me on this).

Nevertheless, I can't agree more that blogshop is a good platform for individuals or first timers to get a taste on selling online. It is also good for those who are selling products like collectibles or hand-made stuffs (limited quantity per offering). In this case, customers or fans would have just subscribe to the blog feed and check out the offering whenever it is available.

In any other cases, especially when your online business is starting to grow, do consider to commit yourself into setting up a proper online store with shopping cart. In this episode, let's explore features of an online store which are not conveniently available to blogshops.

1. Manage Product

With a typical shopping cart software, you can manage all your product description and attributes via an administrative site. You get the software to alert you when you need to restock your inventory. You can also import products into the online store by bulk, which is pretty handy and convenient.

2. Shopping Cart

Yes, you can apply the PayPal shopping cart or some e-commerce plugins to the blog but it is not a layman's task. Whereas, this comes as a basic feature with a shopping cart software which enable you to easily apply discount code, calculate shipping fee seamlessly based on the product weight and so on.

3. Manage Order

This is the pivotal feature missing from blogshops. Orders are being recorded in shopping cart software instead of manually manage requests via email or phone. You can easily process order whether it has already been paid or delivery is due. You can also track the billing origin and shipping address to minimize the fraud risk.

4. Manage Customer

Customers are also being recorded once they have placed order, rather than doing it manually in a spreadsheet. You don't need to separately install a third party plugin for newsletter subscription, as it usually comes together with a shopping cart software. You can then send promotional updates to existing customers and / or subscribers for new products or festive discounts.

5. Calculate Shipping Fee

Shipping rate can be calculated on the fly based on product weight (or quantity / amount) and delivery zones. Free shipping can also be applied for order that exceeds a preset amount. This will facilitate the checkout process so that your customers wouldn't be confused on how much they have to pay in total.

6. Marketing & Promotions

With shopping cart software, you can use some of the marketing tools to promote your products, for example featured products, special deal, best sellers, new products and so on. Discount code can also be generated on promotional basis to create buzz for your e-commerce store.

7. Reporting

It will be a tedious task to input your order data into a spreadsheet in order to generate sales reports, especially if your business is doing well. Various reports are conveniently available with shopping cart software so that you can easily find out what is your top selling products, who are your top customers and most importantly, how much money you have made!

Extra: E-Commerce Usability

Last but not least, an e-commerce online store is much more easier to use compared to blogshop. Shopping experience will definitely improve with better browsing and navigation of the site. Ordering process is facilitated too and hopefully that will convert your shoppers into customers!

Well, owning a blogshop and wish to upgrade? Head over to webShaper to setup your own branded online store for as low as RM 1 per day!

Image credit: webShaper

Whale Done - Build Trust

2009-11-26T16:46:00.003+08:00

This is the second episode and the most watched one among the self development videos that I uploaded to YouTube.

In short, it is about building relationship and trust by being sincere and honest, using killer whale training as an example.

Watch it if you have time to spare, or you can just skip to the selected excerpts after the video.

I think if you are not going to put 100% into somebody, if you are not 100% sincere and honest with him, they are not going to give anything back to you either.

So, I think it is important to always be honest and sincere, and if you give 100% they will give 100% back.

So the foundation for building relationships is building trust, and for you and me that means when we are working with people, we have to be sincere and honest.

We have to do our best to make sure our words and actions do no harm.

Remember, when you criticize a person's performance, you harmed the relationship, keep it up and you poison the relationship.

And we have to have the patience, and invest the time it takes to really earn the trust of the people we work with.

If we can do that, believe me some really amazing connections can happen.

Personally, I still prefer the Stephen Covey's Trim Tab video though. Watch it if you haven't done so, it's worth your time. :)