27 Sep 2024 | By - Sudha Mariappan

A Case Study in One of the Biggest E-Commerce Companies:

From being an online bookshop in 2007, Flipkart, India's most dominant e-commerce is now a multi-billion dollar e-commerce business and a giant in the Indian e-commerce market offering various products and services to millions nationwide.

Innovative marketing strategies have been one of the reasons behind Flipkart's success, majorly its annual Big Billion Days sale.

• Flipkart's Big Billion sale is live!!
  Date: 27th September to 6th October.
• The plus members will get early access, that is, from 26th September.

How Flipkart became the biggest online shopping website:

When Flipkart was first started, the founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal came up with the idea of a company. Then, they decided to conceptualize it as an online bookshop in the year 2007.

However, they soon realized the massive potential of e-commerce in India and took advantage of their platform to change their offering into a wide product range including electronics, fashion & Lifestyle, home appliances, and groceries, etc.

Customer experience has also been the most significant thing that has emerged as a strong differentiators of Flipkart. The company went heavy in terms of developing the logistics network and providing ease of payment through cash-on-delivery options, among others. These efforts helped the company build a concrete customer base and eventually reach the position of being an absolute brand name in the Indian market.

The aggressive marketing strategy also catered to the massive success of Flipkart. Recently, Flipkart started massive innovative marketing campaigns, such as " 10 Minute Delivery" and "Flipkart Plus," which attracted new customers and increased sales, but the Big Billion Days sale brought Flipkart to the top of the Indian e-commerce market.

Flipkart's Strong Brand and Brand Image:

Flipkart's Big Billion Days sale is an event that lasts for seven days, normally during the month of September, and now is the time it's live. Featuring tremendous discounts across products, this sale is one of the most-awaited events in the calendar of e-commerce companies in India.

Who doesn't love a sale? The Big Billion Days sale has had a huge impact on Flipkart ever since it was started, which in turn has grown into a strong brand and reputation. People love having discounted products that would otherwise be very costly if not for sale.

This event brings a lot of buzz and excitement among consumers, and it has been a catalyst for bringing in more customers. Flipkart differentiates from its competitors very well through this sale, while keeping its position as the ultimate affordable destination for online shoppers.

Read Also: A step-by-step Guide to Buzz-worthy Marketing Strategy

The Big Billion Days Sale Evolution:

The Big Billion Days sale has evolved so much since it was created. Early sales were mainly based on discounts on electronics and other high-value products. The sales grew and changed over time to be one of the biggest surveys for Flipkart in terms of categories such as fashion, home appliances and groceries.

Flipkart has also introduced many new features and initiatives in the last few years to make the sales experience during Big Billion Days even better. Launching exclusive products and brands available only at this time is one of them. It also offers attractive deals and cashback offers with several banks and payment gateways it has engaged with.

The Big Billion Days sale has also impacted the Indian e-commerce market at large. It helped in creating awareness about online shopping which has attracted more people towards shopping online. More than that it put pressure on Flipkart's competitors to offer competitive deals during the event.

The Big Billion Days Marketing Strategy:

Their marketing campaign objective is mainly to increase sales and brand awareness, among other tactics.

• Increase Sales: Flipkart has a motive of earning a good amount of revenue share by driving sales for the company as well as for its sellers. In that connection, Flipkart gives whopping discounts and exclusive deals to attract customers to their website and puts themselves at the forefront of the sales race.
• Building brand awareness: The sale they drive is also a very good medium through which brand awareness can be built and stay solid in the market. All this hype and excitement made by such an event further helped Flipkart to be the only true e-commerce portal available in the market.
• Knowing the Target Audience: To reach the customers during its Big Billion Days sale efficiently, Flipkart uses data analytics and insight into its customer resources. The company knows very well who the target group is - including their demographics, preferences, or shopping patterns. All this information helps Flipkart customize messages and offers to the appropriate customer segments.
• Using Customer Data: Flipkart does improve its sales by using customer data. They do this by personalizing the buying experience during the Big Billion Days sale. The personalization includes suggesting products to the customers they may be interested in based on their browsing and purchase history.
• Urgency and Excitement: All those sales strategies build excitement and a sense of urgency to not miss out on any good products. This is why Flipkart stays strong in the game each year. Here, customers are made to feel that they absolutely need to shop during the sale; creating a feeling of FOMO, some of the ways they use include time-bound offers by the company creating Flipkart exclusive deals and discounts only for a short period.
• Countdown timers: Flipkart applies countdown timers on every listing of deals. This way, customers will be able to see the time remaining, and there is a huge fear of missing deals as customers used to order before the deadline, leading to a customer rush for deals at the last moment.
• Social media campaigns: Flipkart uses social media platforms to let everyone know about the upcoming sale, through creative content. This content generates curiosity and excitement among the customers about the sale through Influencer Marketing and various other social media marketing.

Engaging customers through Interactive Experiences:

For the last few years, Flipkart has also been engaging customers through interactive experiences during the Big Billion Days sale. This includes:

• Unique shopping: In the total shopping experience of the customers, Flipkart has introduced elements like a quiz, lucky draws, and reward points. These elements enhance the sales and give fun to them.
• Virtual try-on: Flipkart offers virtual try-ons for fashion products so that customers do not have to try clothes out on themselves.
• Live streaming: Flipkart has recently started the live streaming of product demos and fashion shows during the Big Billion Days Sale. It makes the customers more engrossed in shopping.

Strategic Partnerships and Collaborations:

Flipkart collaborates with brands, banks, and payment gateways to expand the sale. The ease to pay whenever we can provides customers with cashback, discounts, and EMI options during the sale. It also partners with reputed brands and popular companies such as sportswear and high-fashion brands further enhancing the credibility of the sale.

Big Billion Day Sale strategizes and monitors its marketing efforts to measure the success of the event, with key performance indicators like website traffic, sales conversions, customer satisfaction surveys and social media engagement.

These numbers are an assessment tool for the company, to understand where it needs to improve based on the marketing strategy that it uses for future sales.

Flipkart's Big Billion Days sale is a well-thought-out marketing campaign that brings a series of techniques together to help sell more and increase brand awareness. Awareness of its target audience, using customer data, and giving interesting experiences have enabled Flipkart to make the Big Billion Days sale a real success.

Multi-Channel Marketing Strategies Used by Flipkart:

Flipkart's Big Billion Days sale has managed to captivate millions of shoppers across India. But what marketing channels does the e-commerce giant use to create such an unforgettable event?

Social Media Marketing for Big Billion Days:

A platform very important for Flipkart's marketing strategy is social media. The company is always communicating with its audience on every social networking site, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, among others.

In the Big Billion Days sale, Flipkart posts interesting content, conducts contests, and gives promotional deals on social media. This is how they create suspense and buzz and get people on the website.

Email Marketing:

Email marketing is yet another powerful tool for Flipkart. The company sends emails to its subscribers with the best deals, exclusive offers, and countdown timers to the sale.

Flipkart also personalizes the shopping experience based on the kind of preference and purchase history of the customers through email marketing.

TV and Digital Advertising:

Flipkart uses both traditional means of advertisement through TV and digital forms of advertisements to reach a large number of customers. In fact, Flipkart runs advertisements for Big Billion Days on television commercials during the sale, concentrating on popular celebrities and presenting the best deals offered.

The recent Ad for the 2024 Big Billion Day Sale is a solid example. The Ad " Math of Big Billion Day Sales" sarcastically explains that savings from 100 Big Billion sales can fund you a mansion.

Furthermore, the company spends extensively on digital advertisements such as display ads, video ads, as well as social media ads that result in greater brand visibility and increased traffic to the website.

Influencer Marketing:

Influencer marketing is one of the major components of Flipkart's marketing strategy. The company has collaborated with several popular influencers in the fashion, technology, and lifestyle categories and so on for mainly Gen Z audiences.

It can reach out to a large audience and cultivate trust among its potential customers. In the Big Billion Days sale, the influencers create some sponsored content, unboxing, and reviews that promote the sale event as well as the products.

Read Also: Has influencer marketing become the newest obsession for reaching new audiences?

Offline Promotions:

Although Flipkart is basically an e-retail store, it also conducts some events to be physically present through:

• Billboards and hoardings: Flipkart puts up its billboards and hoardings throughout the nation to publicize the sale, Big Billion Days.
• Print advertisements: The company further runs print ads in newspapers and magazines to widen its outreach.
• Radio advertisements: Flipkart uses radio advertisements to show a target specific market and to form the brand image.

This is the reason an all-round marketing approach gains brand visibility and creates excitement among the target audience, therefore, improving sales tremendously.

Flipkart's Big Billion Day Sale Challenges:

The challenges are prevalent even though the Big Billion Day sale is a huge success.

So what were those challenges and how did the well-known e-commerce company overcome them?

Inventory and Logistics Management:

Huge amounts of products are required when millions are shopping at once. So there has to be an inflow of product supply along with delivery on time. Flipkart has invested heavily in building a strong logistics network and inventory management system for this purpose.

Case Study: Users have been severely criticizing Flipkart for taking far too long to deliver orders during the Big Billion Days sale in 2019. For this the company invested heavily in expanding its delivery vehicle and improved its warehouse infrastructure. This helped Flipkart reduce the delivery times drastically for continuous sales and increase the customer's satisfaction level.

Managing Peak Loads and Demands:

Flipkart's servers can slow down due to congestion traffic to their website. To manage this risk, it heavily invested in cloud infrastructure and load-balancing technologies.

Case Study: In 2017, Flipkart's site crashed because it faced heavy traffic during the period of the Big Billion Days Sale. To avoid that again, the company upgraded its servers and added more advanced load-balancing techniques.

Customer Feedback and Satisfaction:

The Big Billion Days' mantra for success is to make sure that there is customer satisfaction. Huge volumes of queries, complaints, and feedback pour into Flipkart from its customers during such sales events. The company has invested a lot in the customer support channels available through phone, e-mail, and social media.

Case Study: Flipkart was criticized for very poor customer service as its Big Billion Days sale was approached. It addressed the problem by expanding the customer support team and introducing new tools and technologies to improve response time and efficiently resolve complaints against its products.

The Big Billion Success:

Despite all odds, Flipkart has come out successful in its Big Billion Days sale every year. It served to be an overwhelming success event that made Flipkart one of the leading e-commerce portals in India and helped record revenues for the company. The event also went on to improve the Indian economy and created many employment opportunities.

How this unique strategy impacted the Indian E-commerce Market?

Flipkart's Big Billion Day Sale has forever changed the industry game:

The Big Billion Day sale for sure has compelled other Indian e-commerce players to play competitively. Amazon, Myntra, and Snapdeal have recently come up with super sales; thus, increased competition with Flipkart has led the way to more innovation with better deals, faster delivery, and superior customer services.

It also has further increased the confidence of customers in shopping online through just a website in India. This is evident by offering such huge discounts and products that many people will first give a try to online shopping. As a result, the number of Indian online shoppers has increased substantially.

With all of this success happening, it's obvious that more and more people will shop during the Big Billion Days sale. This will make them use more digital devices, which will aid them in digital literacy. Thus, they have slowly connected the digital divide among people in the country and have made sure of a better-educated population in terms of digitization.

Flipkart's Big Billion Day Sale Challenges:

A report by Statista states that the revenue of the e-commerce market will reach up to US$58.97bn in 2024. For sure, the Big Billion Days sales event has played its part in achieving this growth.

In the year 2024, Flipkart registered a historic sales tally at the event, when millions of customers made the most of the discounted sale.

Conclusion: Flipkart's Big Billion Days sale is a game-changer for the Indian e-commerce market. It will continue to be the foundation of the marketing strategy of Flipkart going forward.

However, the company needs to stay in pace with the shift in consumer trends and step up its competition to stay ahead.

The future of the Big Billion Day Sale:

Like all companies that thrive to be in the market, Flipkart will also have its annual "sale" strategy to be bigger and more spectacular. It will take up a lot of fresh ventures and will offer more products.

It is possible that the company may discover more mediums of marketing that will make customers visit the site again and again.

When the Indian e-commerce market gets more mature, The Big Billion Days sale might turn into a much bigger event that will attract lots of shoppers and bring in better sales.
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