26% difference in consumer uptake of offers online vs offline: Report

Kantar launches ‘Uncovering Consumer Decision Making in Digital Commerce’ a comprehensive report collating multiple studies done across various categories, to help marketers formulate winning strategies for digital commerce.

The research reveals a significant difference in availing offers online and offline by consumers. 86% of online consumers are willing to take up offers while the offline offer uptake stands at 60% which is a wide gap. Online buyers are more price sensitive and avail more offers compared to offline buyers. Therefore, it is important for marketers to optimise discount and promotion offers (own and with partners) considering channel dynamics and to understand the psychological thresholds to pricing.

As per the report, when it comes to selecting a digital payment instrument, Brand reputation dominates as the primary factor, standing at the highest (index of 100) while other parameters such as ‘interest on earning’, ‘platform fee & charges’ and ‘cashbacks on all transactions’, lags behind at 47, 43 and 18 (indexed to Brand reputation) respectively.

Additionally, while selecting the e-commerce platform for online purchases, consumers’ look for foundational needs being met and hence delivery type & delivery charges stand highest (index of 100), followed by ‘discounts’ and ‘delivery time’ (61 and 52 respectively- indexed to delivery type & charges). This gives a clear indication to brands to keep a stronghold on these basics for customer loyalty and understand consumer’s maximum thresholds for delivery charges, delivery time and minimum thresholds for discounts.

While consumers may expect to have many services and features available on the app, they would be willing to pay only for the services and features which fulfils an unmet need or have a tangible benefit. Kantar points out that it is important to estimate consumer’s willingness to pay for each service and feature, in order to construct subscription packages and to monetize profitably.

A key aspect of consumer decision making on digital platforms is Priced offers vis- a – vis Free service/content. The report points out that while constructing and pricing subscription packages / offer bundles and monetizing services and features in digital commerce space, it is important to consider (and not ignore) free services and content available on the web as real competition because in consumer’s mind, these are relevant options and something they can easily switch back to. Explaining this further, the report highlights that discounts on medicines are already available on many sites and thus, willingness to pay for it in a subscription plan is very low. Same is true for services such as nutritional / diet advice which are available for free on many health-related sites and platforms.

Lastly the report points out that loyalty program subscribers expect higher tangible rewards in return. This can vary by category. For one category, the expectation from conversion rate for reward points to cash for loyalty program subscribers was 1.17 times that of conversion rate for regular users and for another it was 1.31. Kantar recommends that in order to balance between consumer loyalty, rewards payout based on loyalty programs and profitability, it is important to estimate and optimize the reward to cash ratio and benefit from the difference in these expectations across program subscribers and regular users (to get them onboard) by different categories.

Commenting on the report, Soumya Mohanty, MD & Chief Client Officer, Insights Division, South Asia, Kantar, said, “India's online shopper base is to be the 2nd largest globally by 2030, with nearly 500-600 Mn shoppers, as per Invest India*. To capitalize this massive growth and be future-ready, it becomes even more important to listen to what consumers want from your category, brand and those you partner with."