Birthday bash: Lazada will be having its Birthday Sale from March 15-18 with discounts up to 75%
Despite increased competition, online marketplace Lazada intends to hold onto its lead by concentrating on customer experience.
Enhancing customer experience means better delivery time, and Lazada is working on that to be more efficient by making its delivery on the day orders are made, especially to East Malaysia.
“We want our customers on the top of Mount Kinabalu to receive their package in two days!” says Hans-Peter Ressel Lazada Malaysia CEO.
He says being in business for four years has taught the company many lessons, including how to provide the best online experience. To celebrate its fourth anniversary, Lazada launched its Birthday Sale on March 7 with the main events happening on March 15 to 18.
Lazada Malaysia chief marketing officer Andrew Gnananantham says the company’s three main focuses on delivering value are adapting to customers’ social needs, maintaining brand exclusiveness and, most importantly, having extensive partnerships.
Last year, Lazada partnered with Foodpanda, HappyFresh, Uber and Zalora for its first-ever joint online sale called Unity Sale.
It has also expanded its infrastructure in the region and now has 10 fulfillment centres, over 80 distribution hubs, a delivery fleet of more than 2,000 vehicles, 100 third-party logistics companies in the region, and a new warehouse that is 16 times bigger.
With its extensive reach in the region and ties with global companies, Lazada hopes to cut down long haul shipping times from six weeks to less than 20 days.
However, it has not been smooth sailing for the company – in December 2014, the company recorded 10 million visitors, causing its sites to go down in many regions for one to three hours.
Since that time, Ressel and his team have focused on “over-investing” in technology to stop the problem from happening again.
This investment in technology also includes releasing a mobile app – with customers increasingly using smartphones to shop, some 60% of its gross merchandise volume is from mobile sales.
The Lazada app has been downloaded about three million times on the Google Play Store and one million on the Apple App Store.
