When it comes to the festive shopping season, Amazon is not wasting any time. Amazon is already releasing early discounts ahead of Black Friday, which falls on November 25, following the retailer’s Prime Day event in October.
The finest savings are available through Amazon Black Friday sales this year, and they’re starting sooner than ever. If it isn’t already on sale, there is a significant probability that it will be, if you’re looking for gifts (for yourself or your friends).
The largest retailer in the world, Amazon, was established more than 20 years ago and now partners with businesses of all sizes, from small independent vendors to giant multinational corporations, to sell virtually every popular product and offer services across all categories. Presently, Amazon sells approximately 12 million items. The total number of items for sale increases to approximately 353 million when platform merchants are included. With so many choices, it is quite confusing to find the best ones but you can get the hottest Amazon KSA codes for Black Friday Sale. Keep reading to find some ways to find these leads.
Amazon often provides incredible Countdown to Black Friday discounts beginning around November 1 as well as mind-blowing Cyber Week deals, in addition to discounts throughout the week of Black Friday. The finest Amazon Black Friday offers to wind up on many buyers’ Christmas shopping lists because they provide so many desired products at such competitive costs.
Extra Deals with Newsletter Signup
Join the Amazon email today to receive the most recent discounts and a free book each month before it is released, among other benefits which include coupon codes related to the Black Friday Sale.
Bargain Finds
There’s a special section of amazon.com called bargain finds. And these prices include standard shipping, and of course, the rates may differ depending on the location to which the products are to be shipped. Many of the products range from $3 to about $20 in this very section, which is way cheaper than the same products on the main Amazon page.
You might know that you can trade in pre-existing devices, and Amazon will handle the return shipping to them for free. And then you’ll get that credit toward an additional device. But you might not know that they actually run promotions on a special version of the trading page. So, for example, if you were to trade in an old E-reader, you get 20% off a new Kindle E-reader and that’s on top of getting cash back for the E-reader you’re already trading in. And the whole trading process is actually seamless. You get to select what it is you want to trade in.
For example, if I have a first-generation old used indoor home security system, I’ll answer a few questions about it. And not only am I getting 50 bucks back for trading in my old system, but I could get an additional discount on the second generation if I choose to buy it for that respective product line.
Amazon Prime Student
Prime Student, the student-friendly equivalent of Amazon Prime, is a low-cost program for, as the name suggests, students. People with a valid edu email address can avail of this benefit. The student-members can get free shipping within two days on some purchases for the first six months of membership and access to Prime Photos, Prime Video, and many more services. After the first 6 months of student membership, one has to pay $7.49 per month for access to all the normal Amazon Prime services. One can also avail $10 for introducing a friend to an Amazon Student membership.
Woot Section
Once you’re in the Amazon warehouse section, keep an eye out for Woot offers. Woot was once a daily deal website until Amazon bought it. Currently, the website offers a variety of daily specials. Although many of these are refurbished and used goods, they are still worth a look.
Coupon Platforms
At the end of the day, you should always check the discount codes offered on the websites of various coupon platform firms, such as Almowafir, before checking out an item to place your order. One of the best websites for discovering coupons, deals, and discounts is Almowafir with thousands of discounts and promotions from the best brands.
The largest online shopping site in the world, Amazon KSA, is operated by the US corporation Amazon, one of the most successful businesses in the world. Amazon Global and Amazon UAE both integrate creators, advertising, and merchants with website visitors who are making purchases. These websites let sellers set their prices for their items, encouraging competition and driving down costs to the lowest level that can be sustained. Almowafir offers Amazon codes and Amazon coupons for KSA, which enable you to save money on Amazon KSA.
Do you want to buy yourself the best products and save money at the same time?
If yes, then you should install these chrome extensions that are specially made for shopping.
Using these extensions you would be able to analyze the price fluctuations of the product over a period of time and get exciting coupon codes that maximize your savings.
Without further ado, let’s see the best Chrome extensions to help you save money when shopping online.
Now, I am going off-topic but I want to tell you the possible reason why PayPal paid such a humongous money to acquire Honey.
If you are not interested in knowing the reason jump to the features part.
Now, let us first understand all the functionalities of Honey. This will help in finding out why PayPal bought Honey.
Honey at its core provides coupons to its users and also tells you the best deals on other sites.
For example, if you are buying products on Amazon if the extension finds a better deal on Nike it will tell you to buy from Nike to help you save the maximum amount of money.
Secondly, they have tied up with 30,000 merchants. So, when you are buying from Amazon if the extension finds a better deal with another merchant it will notify you.
Honey also has a mobile app through which users can add products from different retailers to their cart and pay for them all at once.
So, instead of using the Amazon app for shopping, you can directly use the Honey app to buy products from Amazon.
PayPal as we all know is an online payment system through which you can pay money. As you can see PayPal is at the bottom of the funnel.
People only use PayPal at the end of their buying journey.
Acquiring Honey allows the company to move upwards in the consumer’s purchasing decision.
Secondly, PayPal could integrate Honey with its child company, Venmo which is a digital wallet through which you can pay and request money from your friends.
The only difference between them is that PayPal is targeted toward businesses while Venmo serves personal transactions.
So, PayPal can integrate Honey with Venmo and allow their customers to buy products from the app itself.
Features:
The extension will find the best deals from 30,000+ sites and apply promo codes automatically at checkout.
You can add the items to the Droplist and Honey will email you if it detects a price drop.
The extension gives you the lowest price at Amazon factoring in estimated shipping costs and Prime status to help you save maximum money.
See current and historical pricing.
Get cash back.
How to Use Honey and Save Money When You Shop Online
FlipShope
Chrome Extension
FlipShope – Price Tracker Extension
Website
flipshope.com
Users
80,000+
Ratings
4.6
FlipShope Extension
FlipShope is a comprehensive shopping chrome extension that you will enjoy using.
It applies the best coupons and promo codes available on your shopping platform.
And also works as a reminder of the price drop on desired products in the coming days.
If you have your eyes on something particular and you are waiting for the discounts, surely you can take help from FlipShope.
Features:
Track price fluctuations using the historical price graph.
Add the products that you want to buy to the watchlist and the extension will notify you when their price drops.
If you buy products from Flipkart then this extension is a must-have.
They allow you to have maximum savings by providing you with the complete details required while shopping including things like price comparison, coupons or promo codes available, and cashback.
Features:
See the product’s price history for 3 months.
Compare prices with other stores.
Get an alert via email when the costs of your favourite products drop.
Automatically apply coupon codes at the checkout.
Get coupons and free shipping codes.
Displays user ratings scores which help you in deciding if the product is worth the purchase.
If you wish to be notified of the deals and price changes each day, Keepa can help you with your demand.
It catches the price change in any of your preferred products to get you updated while also mentioning the lightning deals of every day.
Features:
The extension shows you the price history charts for over 2.5 billion Amazon products.
Find products with the highest drop in price.
Import your whole wishlist.
Gives you the best deals every day.
CouponDunia
Chrome Extension
CouponDunia Shopping Assistant
Website
www.coupondunia.in
Users
5,000+
Ratings
4.1
CouponDunia Extension
Using this extension you will get cashback, coupons, and the best offers all in one place.
It allows the easy method of price comparison while behaving as a shopping assistant that will cover up your cashback and coupons for you.
Features:
Get cashback alerts when you shop online.
View cashback rates and similar offers.
Receive real-time cashback status updates.
Automatically apply coupon codes at the checkout.
Capital One Shopping
Chrome Extension
Capital One Shopping: Add to Chrome for Free
Website
capitaloneshopping.com
Users
7,000,000+
Ratings
4.8
Capital One Shopping Extension
This extension won’t work for Indian users but, if you live in the United States then the extension will solve many of your shopping problems.
Using Capital One Shopping you can find coupon codes, compare product prices among different e-commerce sites and receive gift cards.
Features:
It helps you to save money by automatically searching and applying the best coupon codes at the time of checkout.
Compares product prices including the shipping costs and membership pricing with over 30,000 other retailers.
When you shop using this extension it gives you Capital One Shopping Credits which you can redeem for gift cards at top retailers like Walmart, eBay, and many more.
To use this extension you don’t need to be a Capital One customer.
Conclusion
We hope that by using these extensions, your shopping experience will get smoother and more fruitful.
If you use these extensions, you don’t have to waste your precious time in finding the best deals and coupon codes.
Everything gets automated!
Since these Chrome extensions are very easy to use, you can start buying products right away.
FAQs
What app is better than Honey?
The alternative to Honey is Coupons at Checkout, Shopper.com, and Wikibuy.
What is a chrome extension with coupons?
Chrome extensions with coupons are the Google Chrome Extensions that helps shopper by providing them with different coupons that can be applied while checking out from the shopping websites in order to save some money.
What is the best browser for shopping?
Some of the best browsers for shopping are Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, and Microsoft Edge.
Are shopping browser extensions safe?
There is no particular answer to this. For consideration, many browser extensions are safe to use. Whereas on the other side of the coin, there are malicious extensions also found on the web.
Ecommerce has flourished rapidly in recent years. The pandemic further enhanced it as people had to shop online during lockdown periods.
Along with the latest technologies and refinements in the industry, Ecommerce itself has experienced crucial modifications. And this is, to be honest, just the beginning.
A recent survey found that 76% of online buyers purchased on websites outside their home nations. It indicates more Ecommerce companies will develop on a global scale.
By the year 2026, revenue in the Ecommerce market is predicted to reach $6.43 trillion in revenue. But the rapidly growing Ecommerce market is developing just as quickly as it’s extending. And because of rapid invention and creation in this space, the future’s Ecommerce landscape could look extensively different from the existing one.
We cannot predict the future accurately, but there are some indicative signs of what can follow. Some trends for the forthcoming years are already part of our daily lives, but they will evolve and become stronger. Others are nearly on the brink of becoming a reality, and some will likely need time to settle down, but it is better to stay prepared. Some of the trends are:
1. Projection of Revenue
Nothing is more effective than starting with data and statistics to discuss the future of Ecommerce.
The expected global Ecommerce market revenue will be $3.61 trillion in 2022. According to projections, this amount will increase by 12.25% over the following years, reaching about $6.43 trillion by 2027.
Also, the predicted global retail Ecommerce market revenue will be $5.7 trillion in 2022. This amount will increase by 56% over the next years, attaining about $8.1 trillion by 2026.
2. Drones for Delivery
Amazon’s drone delivery
Without a doubt, delivery drones will play an important role in Ecommerce in the future. And it appears to be approaching fast.
Drone deliveries are in testing in many industries, including the food industry. Delivery drones are capable of shipping on various scales without the involvement of humans.
3. Multichannel experience
Nike multichannel demonstration
Offering a multichannel experience (also known as omnichannel) for the customer is crucial and is a growing trend. This will be standard procedure in the future of Ecommerce.
Although statistics indicate that more people are using online services, physical retail will still be around because it is convenient and not just an option. The client responds in what initially appears to be the simple and most logical way.
4. Diverse payment options
Myntra providing diverse payment options
In the line with talking about trends in Ecommerce, another strong trend in Ecommerce is to give different payment choices to the customer, especially speedy payments, making the checkout process more comfortable and more agile. As the pandemic taught us, it is important to set up accepting payments online. Online payments provide customers with the flexibility to pay from anywhere and at any time.
5. Rising mobile commerce
Mcommerce sales have doubled in 2022 since 2019 and are projected to reach $710 Bn in 2025
Mobile commerce, which already accounts for more than 70% of online retail, will undoubtedly continue to grow in the years to come.
In the United States, expected mobile retail commerce sales are $430 billion in 2022. By 2025, it is to account for 10% or more of all retail sales in the US.
6. Personalized experience
Amazon using browsing history for personalised experience
Customization of the experience will be essential in many ways for Ecommerce in the future as customers value personalized and customized services more and more.
Online retailers have a recommendation system that suggests comparable and closely related products for each customer to purchase in the intelligent shop windows.
7. Visible stimulus
We are currently in a highly visual phase, and as technology develops, the influence of visual and visible stimuli on decision-making during purchases will increase.
The benefit is the ability to inspect a product from various angles using a VR headset, whether inside or outside. It is unquestionably much more impressive and realistic-looking than viewing 2D images virtually.
8. Automated service
Automatic attendance systems, like chatbots, are already widely used but will become even more common in Ecommerce. The machines can learn what the customer needs. They can interact with the customer quickly and assertively by implementing specific keywords and even using artificial intelligence.
Automation contributes to business growth by saving time, increasing sales, and making marketing effective.
9. Social responsibility and Sustainability
Adidas’ participation in Sustainability
Customers are becoming more concerned with and appreciative of businesses that value sustainable consumption and uphold social responsibility.
Hence numerous large corporations are working to reduce the use of harmful materials like plastic and the use of natural resources with awareness. Additionally, they make investments in environmentally friendly practices like planting trees.
Another emerging trend is support for social causes, such as giving to NGOs. Companies connect to social projects, and customers can opt for an action for which a part of the payment goes to a donation. Many businesses have already used the service and obtained a higher retention and conversion rate, proving that the customers approve of this type of conduct.
10. Voice commerce and audio search
Voice technology is developing very quickly. They are already a part of daily commerce’s operations and are likely to be present in the next generation of online shopping.
The fastest-growing sales channel in the US is voice commerce, also known as voice shopping. Voice assistants like Google Assistant, Siri, and Alexa are in use for shopping. This trend will quickly roll out to other nations.
Customers frequently enter search engines like Google and Yahoo and conduct voice searches for goods abroad and here.
Forecasts indicate that by 2024, there will be more digital voice assistants than people on the planet (8.4 billion units).
Conclusion
Long-term technological and infrastructure developments suggest that Ecommerce will continue to grow more vibrant and scalable. It’s critical to stay up to date and be prepared to deal with the challenges caused by changes in Ecommerce. However, by following the trends described here, somebody surely will be on the right track to success.
FAQs
Is Ecommerce growing as we expected it to?
Yes, the Ecommerce market is rapidly growing and is developing just as quickly as it’s extending. By the year 2026, revenue in the Ecommerce market is predicted to reach $6.43 trillion in revenue.
What are some of the trends of Ecommerce?
Some of the trends of Ecommerce are:
Projection of Revenue
Drones for Delivery
Multichannel experience
Diverse payment options
Rising mobile commerce
Personalized experience
Visible stimulus
Automated service
Social responsibility and Sustainability
Voice commerce and audio search
Which Ecommerce type is the most successful?
The B2C is the most successful Ecommerce type. You can sell your products directly to diverse customers and make a good profit.
Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) was formed on 31st December 2021. However, the initial pilot phase of this program was launched on 29th April 2022. The target behind the introduction of this platform in India is to bring scalability and accessibility to the field of e-commerce.
The initial idea of ONDC came from the Piyush Goyal-led Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT).
The project is moving forward under the leadership of T Koshy (CEO), who was a former partner at the consulting firm EY, along with a 9-member advisory council that consists of names like Nandan Nilekani, the co-founder of software powerhouse Infosys Ltd, National Health Authority’s RS Sharma and more.
Nilekani has also earlier helped the Indian government in developing Aadhar biometric ID system. As per him, ONDC is meant to democratize digital commerce in India.
As per a survey, India in 2021 had around 289.1 million digital buyers. This number is expected to increase and reach around 377.6 million in 2025.
Number of Digital Buyers in India
To date, the maximum share of eCommerce in India is in the hands of a few big companies. However, the growing number of buyers invokes the need of including small sellers from remote places to become a part of this huge market.
To help resolve this issue with the aim of bringing more retailers and sellers online government brought forward the concept of Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC).
Impact of ONDC on the E-commerce Industry of India
What is ONDC?
ONDC Logo
Before understanding how the government will implement this and what are its benefits, let us first understand clearly what ONDC is.
Until now, digital commerce across India is abiding by the platform-centric model. This means there are different platforms available online through which a seller can sell his product and a buyer can purchase them by registering on the same platform.
This means that the buyer and seller have to be on the same platform for an online deal to occur.
The idea behind ONDC is to bring e-commerce to the open network model instead of the platform-centric model. This will make e-commerce approachable for all types of buyers and sellers.
The idea is to bring the buyers and sellers from different platforms into each other’s approach without any of them having to register on the platform on which the other exists.
It will allow the buyers and sellers from different platforms to connect with each other, provided that both the platforms are linked to ONDC. This is similar to the role UPI plays in terms of transactions. UPI is a fitting example of the concept that ONDC is working on. This is because where UPI united the banking partners and the merchants/users, via a single unified platform connected through the mobile number, ONDC is pivoting on a similar concept that will unite the buyers, sellers, logistics providers aggregators, payment gateways, and more on a single platform, which will make buying and selling easier for everyone in the ecosystem.
Therefore, the ONDC network allows the buyer to connect with the seller and make transactions to settle the deal irrespective of which applications they are using for buying or selling the products.
UPI and ONDC | What’s the Difference?
Often during the ideation and the development of the ONDC product, we have heard people, businesses, and media placing ONDC and UPI systems side by side. While both the systems are based on a similar idea, which is to link people and make things in the Indian market easier, they are poles apart really in terms of the functionality, complexity, magnitude, people, segments and markets involved, and more.
For example, the UPI system was involved in the secure transfer of finances, the main objective of which was to facilitate the transfer of funds, and keep the same secure between banks, merchants and customers. However, when it comes to ONDC, the concept of ONDC does not involve a direct transfer of goods and services but is related to the same.
Besides, ONDC also has a list of subjective variables, which the UPI doesn’t have. For instance, ONDC has to look after the quality of the products being sold, onboarding sellers and shops, making the communication between them easier, overlook the reliability of both the sellers and the buyers, looking after the speed of delivery and more.
Also, when it comes to the UPI system, nothing was dependent on physical interaction, which stands in sharp contrast to the ONDC system, where the latter is significantly dependent on the offline steps after the matchmaking is done online.
The first option is to create its own website. This might require some technical support. Further, this is a cost-intensive process as it involves a lot of extra charges such as website creation and management costs, logistic charges, etc.
Also, even after the website is built and functional, the seller will have to invest a lot of money in advertising for his website in order to attract buyers.
The second option is to sell the products on aggregator platforms or so-called online marketplaces. Although this system appears quite convenient in comparison to building a website, it has its own issues.
The two top players in this field i.e. Amazon and Flipkart are both US-based companies. They keep a large share of profit in return for displaying and selling your products on their platform. In addition, sometimes, there have been complaints of brand preferences where these platforms are said to exhibit favoritism towards a few brands.
Moreover, sometimes these marketplaces collect data from the sellers and depending on the market inclination, introduce their own products, to stay ahead of the curve.
Another main concern associated with e-commerce is the lagging of small retailers, merchants, MSMEs, etc. Owing to the limited reach of e-commerce in small towns and villages, these small businessmen are deprived of the benefits associated with e-commerce.
Most of them have not been able to begin their online journey on these digital selling platforms due to restricted technical knowledge and the small number of options available.
To counter these problems and take digital commerce to a whole new level, ONDC has been formed. The aim is to make e-commerce reachable even for small retailers and merchants.
The ONDC platform is an idea that is focused on increasing 3 major things that most buyers and sellers dream of:
Discoverability – The ONDC platform will help both the buyers and the sellers maximise their discoverability.
Transparency – ONDC will offer clear visibility and the benefits of comparing everyone and everything that is listed on it. This will make things transparent enough for everyone and everything related to eCommerce.
Interoperability – The ONDC network will have the buyers, sellers, aggregators, delivery partners, logistics providers, and more, and all of them will be operating freely with each other, forming a stable and trustworthy network for maximum benefits.
How will ONDC impact the e-commerce industry in India?
The introduction of ONDC will encourage small retailers to step foot into e-commerce. ONDC will result in bringing separate buyer-centric and seller-centric apps that will be beneficial for anyone who is invested in e-commerce.
The new apps that may appear in the market can help resolve other issues for buyers as well as sellers. For example, it may help the sellers with logistics solutions while the buyers may be benefitted by shopping from the nearest available or cheapest store in town.
The main benefits expected out of ONDC are as follows:
Formalization and democratization of e-commerce.
Large scope for discovering prices and comparing them.
Auxiliary support and services for both buyers and sellers.
Enhanced business opportunities owing to the open platform.
Option to outsource for both buyers and sellers.
Reducing the monopoly of big shots in e-commerce.
Rational process of business.
Some of the areas/industries that ONDC is expected to disrupt are:
Cab services – Two major players driving the cab services in India are Ola and Uber. However, whether it is their drivers or the Indian customers, all are dissatisfied with the policies and the management of the companies. Here, the ONDC platform can come as a respite for the users, who can get the services they ask for at lower costs, while on the other hand, the cab drivers can freely sign in with ONDC to get a bigger and better reach.
Food delivery – The food delivery ecosystem of India has been largely controlled by Zomato and Swiggy, where both the customers and the restaurant providers are at the mercy of these two foodtech giants. Many restaurant partners have earlier thought of delivering directly, but they failed. The ONDC can now empower them better to bring in the change!
Quick commerce – Quick commerce, which is looked up to as the next big thing in India, was earlier in the hands of the Kirana stores, who were the original quick commerce players. However, they seemed to have lost the battle against the able quick commerce players like Zepto, Dunzo, Instamart, Blinkit, and more. This new initiative of ONDC can, therefore, gear up the Kirana stores and their owners to serve their customers faster and better.
For the first couple of years, ONDC has set a budget of Rs 150-200 crore, mentioned by T Koshy, in a report dated July 2, 2022. CEO Koshy said that it has already raised 85% of its funding for the first phase of the operation. The platform had earlier chosen 20 institutions and asked them to put Rs 10 crore each from their funds. It has been earlier reported that the ONDC platform has raised over Rs 155 crore with the help of some of the largest banks of India – SBI, Axis, PNB, HDFC, Bank of Baroda, and Kotak Mahindra Bank, and some of the financial institutions like NSE, NPCI, NABARD, and SIDBI. T Koshy has further specified that ONDC has got 17 such investors to fund them with Rs 10 crore each by March 31, 2022, while the remaining organisations will extend their funds to ONDC by August 2022.
Speaking about the ownership of ONDC, T Koshy mentioned that no investor would be allowed to hold more than 50% of the ONDC stakes.
Tracing the Growth of ONDC
The ONDC platform is on the brink of completion and pilot have already started in a selected list of Indian cities. A trial run of ONDC has been conducted in 6 cities in India including Bengaluru, Shillong, Lucknow, and Coimbatore.
ONDC Onboarding Grows!
With players like Walmart-owned Flipkart, Reliance Retail-backed Dunzo, Alibaba-backed Paytm, and more already joining the revolutionary platform, and Amazon willing to join it ahead, ONDC is already creating waves. Many other seller platforms, buyer platforms, logistics providers, and payment gateways are also signing up with the ONDC concept. As per the latest news, nearly 24 startups, like Meesho, and numerous other subsidiaries of Flipkart have joined ONDC. The ONDC platform is looking to onboard around 200 companies ahead, as per reports dated July 19, 2022. Snapdeal has already signed the agreement with ONDC earlier in July 2022, and will likely be integrating with the platform by the end of August 2022.
After Dunzo, another Reliance Retail-owned startup Grab joined the ONDC platform, as per reports dated August 1, 2022. 80% of Grab shares are currently owned by Reliance Retail. Grab is a 9+ years old startup that offers a wide range of services including on-demand, reverse deliveries services, and first and last-mile logistics to clients including FedEx, Blinkit, Paytm, BigBasket, Myntra, Amazon, and Swiggy.
Dunzo’s B2B logistics arm, Dunzo for Business (D4B) has collaborated with ONDC with an aim to provide last-mile delivery services to local enterprises on the ONDC network, as per reports dated August 5, 2022.
Microsoft has become the first international company to join the ONDC platform. The American software giant will reportedly bring a social commerce platform or one that will allow a group buying feature for its Indian users. This association would enable Microsoft to connect with Indian users without depending on any e-commerce platforms. This partnership with Microsoft reveals the credibility attached to the ONDC platform of India, mentioned T Koshy.
ONDC Inked MoU with the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI)
ONDC inked a Memorandum of Understanding with SIDBI to onboard small and medium-sized businesses on the ONDC platform, which would help ONDC improve ecommerce participation. Signed between the CMD of SIDBI Sivasubramanian Ramann, and the Managing Director and CEO of ONDC, T Koshy, this agreement would lead both the entities to encourage the MSMEs access the open network ecommerce platform.
The ONDC platform is not here to challenge the big players like Flipkart and Amazon. The ONDC CBO Shireesh Joshi confirmed that the platform will stay essentially as “eCommerce enablers helping the small retailers leverage the digitisation of commerce through our network.”
The penetration of the eCommerce industry has only been 4-5% so far, as per July 2022 reports. To boost the same by increasing the number of retailers is one of the main objectives of the ONDC network. Joshi further revealed that the bigger players like Flipkart and Amazon will reap major benefits if this objective is fulfilled.
The ONDC platform will be launched in 75-100 more cities in India by August-September and will be open to the public during the same time in 2022, mentioned T Koshy, the CEO of ONDC, as per the reports dated July 2, 2022.
Koshy has added that the ONDC will be opened to be public whenever it will find that there are enough sellers in a pin code area. Launching the service in these cities ahead will help the initiative lay a foundation on which the network can grow in the times upcoming, organically. The ONDC platform is expected to see a “hockey stick-like growth”. The CEO of the platform also pointed out that if it gains the support of the CSC SPVs (common service centre – special purpose vehicles), which are designed to spread the government’s e-services to rural areas and remote places, then that can help ONDC reach at least half of the Indian villages.
Marquee investors like Sequoia India and SoftBank have advised their portfolio companies to join the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), as per reports dated July 20, 2022.
ONDC Challenges
ONDC has come up as a revolutionary product that will transform the Indian market in the times upcoming. However, due to the complex design of the product, it has already started to face numerous implementation challenges. In comparison to the UPI system, ONDC is way tougher to both design and implement.
Conclusion
With the schemes like digital India, no doubt e-commerce is the future of the Indian market. This is also clear from the fact that the Indian e-commerce industry is expected to rise from $46.20 billion in 2020 to $200 billion in 2026. Here, the ONDC can easily be identified as a new-age idea that has a huge market ahead.
At this stage, the e-commerce platforms, being totally captured by a few large companies can certainly impact the small businessmen from the remote areas of the country, who still are unable to utilize this amazing platform.
This is sure to have an adverse effect on the economy with these small retailers losing their business to a few big players.
The introduction of the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) at this point is certainly a great initiative by the government to help these small businessmen to maintain their position in the race.
This will also give them the opportunity to escalate their businesses to a larger scale by making their products reach a larger audience.
FAQs
What is ONDC?
Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) is a non-profit organisation in collaboration with the Government of India that brings e-commerce to the open network model instead of the platform-centric model. This will make e-commerce approachable for all types of buyers and sellers.
Who owns ONDC?
ONDC is owned by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade.
Who is developing ONDC Project?
T Koshy of EY is leading the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) project, supported by a 9-member advisory council consisting of names like Nandan Nilekani, the co-founder of Infosys Ltd., and others.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Amazon.
Online shopping has become a part of daily life for most of us today. A recent survey in 2022 reveals that over 2.14 billion people worldwide shops online, which makes 27.6% of the people out of 7.74 billion people in the world. Thus, it can be concluded that more than one out of four people shops online now.
While the number of e-commerce companies worldwide is growing fast, there are a few pioneer companies that have established themselves as the market leader in the sector, and one of them is Amazon.
Starting in the year 1994 from the founder Jeff Bezos’ garage, Amazon is one of the few companies that joined the 1 trillion valuation club.
Let’s have a look into the startup story of the e-commerce giant, Amazon along with it, discover Amazon’s Revenue, Funding, History, Growth, Competitors and more.
Amazon.com, Inc was launched in 1994 by Jeff Bezos in the United States. Later, it stepped into other countries to increase its market. Amazon India was started in June 2013, and sooner it became one of the biggest eCommerce platforms in India. Initially, the company started by selling books and it expanded to sell electronics, households, software, food, jewellery, and a lot more.
Amazon India Website
Currently, other than being an e-commerce company, Amazon has diversified into a number of domains including cloud computing, Publishing, on-demand music, video streaming, AI, consumer electronics, etc and the company is constantly on the lookout to enter new segments.
Amazon Studios, Amazon Publishing, Amazon Music, and Amazon Web Services are some of its other subsidiaries. In its bid to grow, Amazon has acquired over 100 companies to date.Apart from being the biggest E-Commerce platform, Amazon also offers some pretty exciting and good services and they are:
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
AWS is the web services platform of Amazon, which offers IT infrastructure services to businesses in the form of web services, which is commonly referred to as cloud computing. AWS was launched in 2006, and on March 2, 2021, it was selected by PGA TOUR as its official cloud provider.
Amazon Go
Amazon Go Logo
Amazon Go is a chain of convenience stores that is run under Amazon which was started in the year 2018. The stores are mainly present in the United States and the United Kingdom, the main concept of these stores is that there are no cashiers in the store with whom customers have to deal. Everything is automated there and they have self-checkout stations where customers can pay for their supplies after picking them up from the store. As of now, there are 42+ Amazon Go stores.
Amazon Prime
Amazon Prime Logo
This is the OTT video streaming platform offered by Amazon, it is a subscription-based platform where movies, television series, web series, and other video content are provided for the audience to watch. Amazon Prime was launched worldwide in 2016, however, some countries were excluded then, like North Korea, Mainland China, Syria, Cuba, and Iran. Amazon Prime Video made history as the first streaming service to secure an Exclusive National Broadcast Package from the NFL on March 18, 2021.
“We recognize the need for in-game content by mobile gamers to enhance their playing experience and are delighted to provide access to this content free to Prime members. We will continue to add new in-game content for other popular games, with frequent content refreshes.” –Akshay Sahi, Director and Head of Prime, Amazon India
Amazon Pay
Amazon Pay Logo
This is the online payment processing service provided by Amazon. It was launched in the year 2007. Through this payment service, one can pay from their Amazon account, for goods and services. The payment service is supported by fraud protection technology through which you can complete any transaction securely. Amazon Pay launched Smart Stores on June 26, 2020. The Smart Stores of Amazon Pay is an India-specific programme that would enable the physical stores to serve the customers with a wide range of products that they can easily avail of and pay for just by scanning the QR codes.
“Amazon Pay is already accepted at millions of local shops, we are trying to make customers buying experience at local shops more convenient and safe through Smart Stores.” -Mahendra Nerukar, Amazon Pay CEO
Smart Stores is also coming up with a feature in which a digital store will be available for the customers in which customers can go through the products that the shop is having, can read and update the reviews of the product, and avail many offers which can provide them benefits, and a new type of shopping experience. Many shops have signed up for Amazon Pay Smart Stores and came forward as they have found a new hope to bring their business back on track. Big brands such as Big Bazaar and MedPlus have come forward and have taken a part in this new initiative.
Smart Commerce Initiative
Amazon has announced its Smart Commerce initiative in India, as far as May 18, 2022 reports go. With this initiative, Amazon India has plans to transform the local stores into “Digital Dukaans“. Amazon announced during the 3rd edition of Amazon Smbhav that the company will be fuelling its plans to digitise 1 crore small businesses by 2025 via the launch of its Smart Commerce.
Amazon – Founder & Team
Jeff Bezos (Founder & Former CEO, Amazon)
Jeff Bezos
Amazon was founded by Jeff Bezos (Jeffrey Preston Bezos) in 1994. He is an American entrepreneur and industrialist. After graduating from Princeton University with a degree in electrical engineering and computer science in 1986, Bezos worked for ‘Fitel’ ( a fintech telecommunication startup), where he was working on building a network for international trade. Later Bezos was promoted to head of development and director of customer service at ‘Fitel’.
Jeff Bezos- Amazon Founder
Jeff Bezos stepped down as CEO of Amazon and will be the executive chairman of Amazon. Andy Jassy -The Cloud Computing Chief has been appointed as the new CEO of Amazon.
Andy Jassy (Cloud Computing Chief & CEO of Amazon)
Andy Jassy
Jassy joined Amazon in 1997. He has an MBA from Harvard Business School. It was Andy Jassy who founded Amazon Web Services (AWS), a cloud platform with millions of users. Andy Jassy’s promotion from being a Cloud Computing Chief to the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) of Amazon is remarkable and highlights the importance of web services to Amazon’s future. Andy Jassy has taken over the position of Amazon CEO.
Andy Jassy- Amazon CEO
Amazon – Startup Story
Jeff Bezos jokingly describes founding Amazon as a ‘Regret Minimization Framework’. Jeff did not want to regret not taking advantage of the internet boom that had then started to slowly take the world by storm. Hence in 1994, Jeff left his job as vice president of D.E Shaw & Co. to start his own venture.
Jeff Bezos wrote his company’s first business plan on a cross-country drive from New York to Seattle. Initially, Amazon was registered as Cadabra, Inc. However, when Jeff found out that people misheard the name Cadabra as ‘cadaver’ (cadaver means corpse), he decided to change the name and bought the domain name relentless.com. But that too was changed as his friends did not quite like the name and finally named his company ‘Amazon’.
Jeff listed 20 products that can be sold online, out of which he decided to start with selling books. The first to invest in Amazon was Jeff Bezos’ parents, who invested $250,000 in the venture. By 1997, Amazon had 2.5 million titles.
In 1998, Amazon acquired Junglee Corporation ( provider of database technology to help consumers find products on the Internet) and ‘Planet All’ a social networking, calendaring, and address book site, and with it, the company also started expanding its offerings beyond books.
In 2005 Amazon also entered the crowd-sourcing business with ‘Amazon Mechanical Turk’.
In 2006, Amazon entered the cloud computing sector with ‘Amazon Web Services (AWS) realizing the great scope that the sector holds. In 2006, Amazon entered the video-on-demand sector with ‘Amazon Unbox’.
In November 2007, Amazon released Kindle, its first e-reader, which became quite popular among users. In 2007, Amazon launched Amazon Music.
Another Amazon product that has gained popularity is ‘Alexa’, which is a virtual assistant AI technology developed by Amazon.
Amazon – Name & Logo
Amazon being the largest river in the world, the company was named ‘Amazon’ as Jeff Bezos envisioned his company to be the largest.
Amazon Logo
Amazon’s current logo which the company has been using since the year 2000, has an arrow leading from A to Z, which reflects the company’s goal to provide every product a customer needs. The arrow forms a smile, which represents customer satisfaction.
Amazon – Growth & Revenue
What started as a small online book store has become the world’s largest online marketplace today. Ever since Amazon was launched, it simply grew from strength to strength. The company diversified and explored many horizons, and most importantly, it cemented its position regardless of where it went.
Amazon India marketplace, which is run by Amazon Seller Services, has posted a 49% rise in its revenue from operations that have been recorded at Rs 16,200 crore during FY21 and was last recorded at Rs 10,847.6 crore. The eCommerce giant in India also witnessed a decrease in its losses, which declined from Rs 5849 crore to Rs 4748 crore. However, another unit of Amazon called Amazon Wholesale (India), has scaled down during FY21, posting a 7% drop in its revenue from operations, which decreased from Rs 3384 crore (FY20) to Rs 3131 crore (FY21).
Looking at the sales, Amazon’s sales also skyrocketed at an unimaginable pace, which has significantly contributed to the growth of the business. One another thing is the diversification of its products and the realization of the future of the online shopping and eCommerce businesses at an early stage, which helped Amazon scale leaps and bounds.
Let’s take a detailed look at the Amazon’s funding history. The company has received a total funding amount of $108 million over two rounds. Amazon went public in 1997. Amazon is funded by 2 investors, AOL and Kleiner Perkins.
Investors
Date
Stage
Amount
Investors
July 2001
Funding Round
$100M
–
June 1996
Series A
$8M
Kleiner Perkins
Amazon – Investments
Amazon invested in numerous organisations, keeping a track of which is really difficult if not impossible. The Bezos-founded company has over 118 investments to date.
The Andy Jassy-led company is looking to buy majority stakes in Ecom Express for $500-600 mn. Amazon doesn’t own an in-house logistics and delivery system unlike its rival Flipkart, and to match the Walmart-backed company, Amazon is planning to own an ecommerce logistics and delivery unit. Though both Amazon and Ecom Express are in the preliminary stages of talks, the ecommerce behemoth will likely pick up 51% stakes in the latter, thereby leading Warburg Pincus to quit.
Here we have managed to present to you some of the recent investments of Amazon. Check them out below:
Date of Investment
Name of the Company
Funding Round
Lead Investor
April 22, 2022
Agility Robotics
Series B
–
April 21, 2022
Modjoul
Venture Round
Yes
April 21, 2022
BionicHive
Venture Round
Yes
April 21, 2022
Mantis Robotics
Seed Round
Yes
April 21, 2022
VIMAAN
Venture Round
Yes
January 6, 2022
LeedPay
Pre-Seed Round
–
December 14, 2021
Amogy
Series A
–
December 3, 2021
Dibbs
Corporate Round
Yes
November 9, 2021
MyGlamm
Series D
–
October 19, 2021
Pismo
Series B
Yes
Amazon – Acquisitions
Amazon has had a list of acquisitions since 1994 when it started. The tech giant boasts of 94+ acquisitions and counting. Here’s a list of some of the prominent acquisitions that Amazon made recently:
Date
Name of the Company
Deal Value
April 22, 2022
GlowRoad
–
March 7, 2022
Veeqo
–
December 22, 2021
Prione
–
May 26, 2021
MGM Studios
$8.5 bn
March 30, 2021
Perpule
$14.36 mn
February 16, 2021
Selz
–
June 26, 2020
Zoox
$1.2 bn
October 24, 2019
Health Navigator
–
September 25, 2019
INLT
–
July 31, 2019
E8 Storage
–
Amazon – Business & Revenue Model
Amazon primarily runs an E-commerce business, which runs on an E-commerce business model. The company also has other wings, which run on an array of business models. Besides, Amazon also manufactures numerous products that are sold online and via retail stores across the world.
Amazon Customer Segment
Amazon customers can be divided into:
Sellers – They sell their products to a wide audience using the Amazon platform.
Buyers – They buy from a wide selection of Amazon products and services.
Developers – There are numerous communities involved with the Amazon Web Services (AWS), which include both Amazon customers, partners, businesses, and individuals.
Amazon Value Proposition
The business model of the company, as per the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, depends on 3 value propositions:
Low price
Fast delivery
Wide selection of products
Amazon Channels
The most important channel of Amazon is the Amazon website itself. Some other notable channels of Amazon include Amazon Prime, the Amazon app, and more.
A major portion of Amazon’s revenue comes from its E-commerce business. Besides, Amazon also has 526+ brick and mortar retail outlets, which forms a good source of revenue.
It also makes a huge revenue through Kindle, an electronic device to read books, subscription fee of ‘Amazon Prime’, third-party seller services, advertising revenues, and revenue from Amazon Web Services.
Here are the prominent revenue channels of Amazon:
Sales for one-time
Sales commissions
Advertising
Subscriptions like that of Amazon Prime and the app itself
Web Services (AWS)
Licenses
Patents
Pay-Per-Use and Support Subscription
Amazon – Competitors
Amazon has a lot of competitors in segments such as merchandise, web services, electronics, and media. some of the main competitors of Amazon in its different fields.
Amazon is planning to venture into the health-tech and food delivery business soon. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has revealed plans to introduce ‘Amazon Prime Air Drone Delivery Service’, whereby lighter packages will be delivered to customers through drones. The company is also making efforts to make its delivery system more eco-friendly, by including electric vehicles in its delivery services.
Regarding Amazon’s plan in India, the company is planning to create 1 million new jobs in India by 2025. In January 2020, Jeff Bezos announced that Amazon will invest $1 billion in India to help 10 million traders and MSMEs businesses in India to go online. The company is envisioning to enable exports worth $10 billion via Amazon by 2025.
Amazon has announced to facilitate $20 billion worth of exports of Indian goods in the next 3 years, as per Amazon Exports Digest 2022. On average, it makes the company exported Indian goods would have to be $2 billion a year since 2015.
FAQs
What is Amazon’s Funding History?
Amazon received a total funding of $108 million over two rounds. Amazon went public in 1997.
When was Amazon Founded in India?
Amazon launched its operations in India in June 2013. Amazon was founded in July 1994.
Who is Amazon’s CEO?
Andy Jassy is theCEO of Amazon. Jeff Bezos was the former CEO of Amazon.
How much is Amazon’s Revenue?
Amazon India marketplace posted Rs 16,200 crore as its revenue from operations in FY21, which was a 49% increase from Rs 10,847.6, which it saw in FY20. On the other hand, the Amazon Wholesale business of India has witnessed a 7% drop in its operational revenue, which was recorded at Rs 3384 crore in FY20 and became Rs 3131 crore during FY21.
What are Amazon’s keys to success?
A huge number of SKUs, Table of Contents, Free Shipping and Returns, Overnight Delivery, Incredible Customer Service, and Talented Management is the Amazon’s keys to success.
How long did it take Amazon to make a profit?
It took Amazon more than 14 years—58 quarters after its initial public offering to make, as much profit as it produced in the latest quarter.
What is Amazon’s launch year?
Amazon was launched in 1994.
Who is the founder of Amazon?
The founder of Amazon is Jeff Bezos, who is also known as the creator of Amazon.
Amazon is an e-commerce-based company generally responsible for fulfilling the need of shopping in many places across the globe. With the help of Amazon Supply Chain India, it has successfully become a billion-dollar company.
Amazon was first founded in the year 1994 with hardly a single product as its base. It was first invented to sell books. With passing time, Amazon started selling several items and essential things. Across the period of its being active in the industry, Amazon has seen a definite growth in its popularity.
With increasing demand, Amazon is required to have a proper process of shipping and logistics to prevent failures. The needed push was given by pandemics to the e-commerce business. From there only, Amazon got more and more essential as a day-to-day service.
The other best service provided by Amazon is its prime membership facility. To maintain the same level of trust amongst people, Amazon needs to have a proper number of warehouses and a smooth shipping process. The whole procedure of Amazon from the start of placing an order to the receiving of the order is divided into a few parts.
Warehouses are used by Amazon company as a place to store their products. Amazon has its warehouse management preplanned in a way to provide a smooth functioning for its business. For a country like India, there must be several warehouses set up to provide services at all places.
There are approximately 60 warehouses of Amazon in India all at different places. The biggest warehouse of Amazon is placed in the city of Bengaluru with an area of approximately 2.4 million cubic feet. Another great initiative taken by Amazon was installing a fulfillment center or warehouse in Patna that will be helpful for almost 11,000 sellers.
The places decided by Amazon to be its warehouse are also based on a few conditions. Amazon is known to set up its warehouses, especially near metropolitan cities. It is known to use a pure push strategy as its location selection technique. The warehouse is needed for the storing of products and distributing, the products for delivery purposes.
Amazon Warehouse Technique
Another strategy used by Amazon concerning the warehouse is the use of a chaotic system. With the mention of a warehouse system idea, the first thought that crosses the mind is a neatly packed storage place with its shelves all in order and labeled. But for Amazon, the warehouse is rather chaotic than organized.
Amazon follows the principle of keeping things in a chaotic manner by allocating a product to any available position in its warehouse. This system is primely helpful and useful because of the barcodes stocked on them.
The unique fact about the Amazon warehouse system is that the workspace is shared by the robots and human beings cordially. Amazon started using robots from the year 2012 after the acquisition of a company named Kiva.
From then on, Amazon has reportedly known to increase the count of robots roughly by 15,000 in tally. Amazon products are kept randomly in the warehouse but with the introduction of barcodes on them. These barcodes are then scanned by the robots for use.
This information is then transferred over to the inventory system making it possible to have an exact count of products present in the warehouse. At the present time, almost all processes are done by Artificial Intelligence.
Use of Robots in Amazon Warehouse
Amazon warehouses can be found at famous locations such as Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, Delhi, Ludhiana, etc. There is a proper warehouse management system installed by Amazon to have a smooth working process.
Apart from warehouses, there are about 25 specialized locations specially assigned for supplying fresh things such as fruits and vegetables along with groceries and daily essentials.
Amazon Centre Locations Across India as per the source MWPVL International
Role of Logistics in Amazon Supply Chain
Amazon logistics has the prime role of managing inventory. It keeps a good check on the items placed inside a warehouse. Amazon logistics are responsible to decide the warehouse in which a product has to be sent or from where to ship a product.
Amazon is known to have a chaotic arrangement of goods, the logistics are only responsible for the proper tracking of a particular product location in such a bug warehouse. When an order is placed by any customer, the arrangement of shipping that product to its nearby shipping center. All this comes under the logistics of Amazon.
The selection of suitable methods for even transportation comes under the role of Amazon Logistics.
The segregation of products with different storing conditions and placing them accordingly is also an important role of Amazon Logistics.
The Simplification of Complex Amazon Logistic Process
The Basic Process of Amazon Supply Chain
It is very important to simplify the complex process of shipping and logistics for the early delivery of products. With the availability of prime service, people tend to get their order within 2 days.
To avail and follow the such practice, it is very important to have a system in place. Amazon is known to store its product in warehouses. Warehouses are nothing but messy places full of different products.
Each product is assigned with a different barcode on them, which enables easy identification of inside products. The products from each seller are shipped into nearby warehouses or warehouses assigned. Once the product has been accepted inside the warehouse, they are kept at any available place.
When a customer places an order, the order is tracked back to the warehouse, and entry is checked about the place of that particular product. Which is rechecked through barcode scanning again.
From there, the product is picked up and sent to customers’ nearby allocated shipping centers. The shipping center has blocks assigned for particular places. There is an installment of another sticker on the product parcel in the shipping center. From here, the product is dispatched by the area code given on it and the facility available for it.
Amazon Shipping Options
Prime Air- An Amazon Planned Delivery Step
Sometimes, some sellers recommend shipping orders through their service only. This is also allowed in Amazon terms and conditions. Amazon uses many shipping partners for easy work, some of them are FedEx shipping, Gati, Indian Postal Service, Bluedart, etc.
Along with these postal services, Amazon is known to have its postal service developed in India. Amazon also owns a transportation service named Amazon Transportation Service [ATS].
The prime service which enables its user to receive its products within 2 days, sometimes also gets the use of Airway to achieve its goal. According to the area and the place of shipment, the most suitable ride option is then selected by Amazon shipping. There are about 20 airports all over the world to help in the fast shipping of products with the help of cargo.
Conclusion
Today, Amazon is considered one of the greatest e-commerce companies. To maintain such a big company and to give its customers satisfactory services, there have been multiple guidelines and techniques used for its shipping and logistics.
To carry out services in the least time possible, Amazon uses different available techniques for storage and shipping from a warehouse, and then it uses the best suitable method for the transportation of its products. With all the aspects in place, Amazon keeps its shipping and logistics at their best.
FAQs
How does Amazon’s supply chain work in India?
After a customer clicks buy, Amazon receives products at the fulfillment center. The product passes through quality checks that are done at a large scale and with innovation including humans and robots. The order is packed and hence shipped through its logistic partners.
What logistics does Amazon use in India?
The majority, of Amazon, uses its logistics for delivery. Apart from that other partners includes, BlueDart, FedEx, Delhivery, eCom Express, Aramex, Indian Post Service & Gati.
Does Amazon have its logistics in India?
Amazon has set up its own logistics branch in India. A U.S.-based subsidiary of Amazon.com. Amazon Transportation Services Private Limited (ATSL) will ship products from sellers they sell through the e-commerce giant’s platform.
Tax is a liability that almost every citizen of a country has to bear if he/she makes an income within the taxable limit. Normally, progressive taxation on many taxes such as the income tax is implemented in every country, the more you earn the more you pay in tax.
So by the above-mentioned logic, a highly successful multinational company, say Apple pays way more amounts of money in tax than an average higher middle-class citizen right? Surprisingly, the answer is surprising No, as a matter of fact, Big Companies avoid paying taxes altogether in many cases
Is it illegal for them to not pay taxes? If yes, how are they getting away with it? Why the government is not intervening? In order to find the answer to all these questions, we need the answer to a crucial one first which is what exactly is Tax Avoidance and Tax Evasion.
Although these two terms are always used as a substitute for each other there are a lot of differences between them.
Tax Avoidance is the use of various loopholes and elements in the tax code to minimize or in some cases completely avoid taxable incomes together. Some examples are using Deductions and Tax Credits as prescribed under the tax code. To sum it all up Tax Avoidance is LEGAL.
Shifting Subsidiaries to tax-free zones is a practice followed by many MNCs
Tax Evasion is the use of malpractices such as income misrepresentation, deduction inflation, and hiding of income to avoid paying taxes. Tax Evasion is ILLEGAL.
So the Large MNCs follow Tax Avoidance which is completely legal as it uses loopholes within the tax code to avoid paying taxes. Let’s take an example to better understand the various aspects of Tax Avoidance.
Tax Evasion is a bigger issue than Tax Avoidance
Example: Amazon 2018
Amazon paid exactly $0 in federal income tax for the year 2018 on an income of $11 Billion and they did it legally. As per the Tax Code in most countries, companies don’t have to pay taxes if they incur losses for that financial year, and for the first 6 years, Amazon’s business operated entirely on losses as they invested a lot of their earnings into the company growth and research & development overheads which are also nontaxable and acts as tax credits.
The income tax receipt shows that amazon made revenue of $11.2 billion yet they paid 0$ federal tax as federal taxes are based on profits and not on revenue
Furthermore, they set up subsidiaries and factories in countries where the corporate tax was much lower than in the USA (which has the highest corporate tax in the world at 21%, reduced from the previous rate of 35%). They also relocated their products to tax-free zones like Bermuda thus avoiding other taxes. After claiming more deductions, their net tax liability amounted to $0.
Reasons Behind Tax Avoidance
While the MNCs resort to loopholes in order to avoid paying high rates of taxes, the countries which act as their tax-free subsidiaries also have their own reasons.
Firstly, having a factory of a company like Apple or Amazon set up in their country is always a welcome sight as it helps in boosting their employment and growth rate and gives them exposure to the latest technological side of the market and after every successful venture more and more companies set up their factories in these countries. Bermuda is a prime example of how helpful it is to have large companies on board.
Other than being less taxable, these countries also have cheap labor and material costs so naturally, large companies gravitate towards developing nations for subsidiary purposes.
Possible Solutions
Although these tactics have a lot of advantages for both parties, there is an extreme amount of taxable income for the parent countries which gets completely nullified due to Tax Avoidance. So what possible solutions are there?
Lowering corporate tax is the first step, and although this may lead to fewer taxes in the initial stages, this opens up the door for the large companies to set up factories in the home country itself rather than shifting abroad. Let’s take an example to better understand the situation.
Suppose Company A is a small company that makes $20000 profit per year and pays a corporate tax of 20% which amounts to $4000. Another company B earns a profit of $200000 per year and in order to avoid paying high tax rates, it sets up all its factories in lesser countries and thus pays no tax at all. So the total tax is just $4000.
Now if the home country lowers its tax rate to 10%, this would encourage the large company B to set its other factories in the home country itself, so the total tax here will be (10% of 4000) + (10% of 200000) which amounts to a total of $24000, which is 6 times the previous amount despite being half the tax rate.
Another method involves the Unitary Model of Taxation whereby the taxes on charged at the place where the economic activity takes place rather than where it is reported. Many different methods of avoiding tax avoidance are being implemented but as of now, it seems like the situation will stay as it is.
Countries with the largest tax avoidance amount in the Us billion dollars
Tax rules differ from country to country with their amount and eligibility criteria also. However, it is one of the main responsibilities handed over to the citizens. Denying to pay the tax can result in criminal offenses and law charges. However, when we talk about the tax paid by multinational companies, it is astounding to notice that their tax is quite different from what we have imagined.
They take the help of possible loopholes in the tax code and minimize their tax amount. The above article includes information about how multinational companies avoid paying taxes.
FAQs
How do companies legally avoid paying taxes?
There are many ways companies can implement to avoid paying taxes or reduce their tax amount. Some of them can be opening offshore accounts, making use of loopholes in tax codes, getting paid in stocks rather than money, and many others.
What is not paying taxes called?
The term used to describe the group of people who deliberately deny paying the tax is known as “Tax Evaders”. And the term that describes the situation is called tax evasion.
What are tax-free countries?
Tax-free countries are those countries that have no rule of paying taxes or have a very little amount as their taxes. Some of the tax-free countries across the globe are Oman, Qatar, Panama, etc.
Which business is tax-free in India?
India is known for its agriculture business for a very long time. Hence, any business involving agriculture work is tax-free in India. For instance, the selling and processing of agricultural crops are tax-free.
The American multinational technology company, Amazon, which engages in e-commerce, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and digital streaming, has recently announced that it is reducing some of its items. The brand is cutting down the products that sell under its brand like Amazon Basics.
This leader in the e-commerce market mentions to the Wall Street Journal, “We never seriously considered closing our private label business and we continue to invest in this area, just as our many retail competitors have done for decades and continue to do today”.
To find more, this article highlights the reason why Amazon took such a decision to reduce selling its own private-label business.
The giant e-commerce brand, Amazon started having its own brands like Pinzon, Amazon Basics, Mama Bear, Wag, Amazon elements, and more in 2009. Amazon decided to have in-house brands to boost increase margins and reduce competition, however, some of its brands are not doing well in the market for which they are reducing the items. One of its private label brand Amazon Basics is going to have less number of items to be sold.
This change in the system that Amazon is going to adopt is due to ‘weak sales’. However, they are not going to completely shut their private-label business, they will just reduce the number of items. As per some reports, Amazon has asked its team for the past six months to chop off some of its items and not to further go for reordering.
There are statements that Amazon finally came to this decision after Dave Clark, an ex-amazon executive made a review of how business is done by Amazon. Amazon claimed that Dave Clark made decisions that led to over-staffing at Amazon fulfillment centers and refrained from union progress.
Unfair Treatment of Third-Party Merchants
In 2020, the European Commission charged Amazon for using its power and data to push up its products for its benefit over other rival merchants. This was disclosed during a press conference on an anti-trust case with Amazon at the European Commission (2020) held in Brussels.
In addition to accusations, the European Commission has also opened up an investigation to look into the matter that if Amazon gives exceptional treatment to its products and to vendors who use its delivery benefits.
The controversy does not end here, as the Commission has also put up statements that Amazon has no right to use third-party’s activity and data to its benefit since they are its competitors.
The dualism act by Amazon has also drawn scrutiny issues in the USA. They had been asked to defend themselves from these allegations in writing, with which they had disagreed.
In their defense, Amazon claimed that the company has always been helpful to other merchants. The brand made several statements in its defense that they only represent 1% of the world’s retail market. Furthermore, they have also claimed the brand has supported small businesses for the past 20 years in comparison to any other retailer.
In efforts to ease the regulatory pressure, Amazon is now reducing the sale of its products. Amazon is doing all of this to resolve its two anti-trust cases issued by the European Commission.
The other case which was opened by the EU is to investigate whether the giant retailer favors those merchants that use its logistics and delivery system over other sellers.
Although as per reports, Amazon has contradicted these allegations, however, to settle down it has come to a concrete conclusion to make things transparent with the European Commission and keeping in view of their trust issues it is aiming to serve the European consumers and the 185,000 plus European small and medium-sized enterprises who are selling through their platform.
These investigations compelled Amazon a fine of up to 10% of its annual revenue worldwide.
Amazon has also made statements concerning its defence claims, that they are finding the new EU digital regulations, the Digital Markets Act completely one-sided. They have made remarks like, “unfairly targeting Amazon and a few other American companies.”
To come out of these accusations, Amazon now has taken up the step to refrain from using its competitor’s data and use it for its own purpose. The brand is now accepting to give equal status to other sellers while ranking their products with the feature, “buy box”. This feature allows shoppers the liberty to add items directly to their shopping bags.
Conclusion
This massive e-commerce performer, Amazon, is facing some difficulties right now. The company’s decision to reduce the selling of its products shows us that they plan to keep things ethical for other third-party merchants. Amazon is now looking for ways to give full access to other sellers on its marketplace.
FAQs
What is Amazon’s private label?
Amazon sells its products using its in-house brands which are its private labels. Some of the examples are Amazon Basics, Solimo, Happy Belly, and Amazon Fresh.
Is Amazon closing down its private label brands?
No, Amazon has decided to sell fewer items by its private labels due to low sales and due to anti-trust issues.
Amazon is the largest online retailer across the world. In 2020, it generated revenue of US$ 120,968 million becoming the leading e-commerce market, globally.
Approximately 197 million people use Amazon worldwide. In the U.S. alone 95 million people have Amazon Prime membership and spend an average of around $ 1400 each year.
Therefore, advertising and listing your products on Amazon gives you an unmatched opportunity to create awareness and visibility of your products and boost sales. Moreover, as Amazon is trusted by millions of users seeing your product or brand advertisement on Amazon makes them appear more authentic and reliable.
Hence, advertising on Amazon becomes a very important part of your marketing strategy. However, a number of people complain that they are unable to derive the desired returns.
They claim to spend a huge amount of money on advertising but cannot get enough customers. If this is happening with you as well then this blog is meant just for you.
Advertising your products on Amazon and increasing your sales through it can be complicated. In this blog, we will share the tips and tricks that will help you throughout this process and help bring more sales.
But, before we tell you about the tips to follow for a successful advertisement strategy, let us first discuss in brief how Amazon ads are created.
Advertising on Amazon is a great way especially for the new sellers to create brand awareness. Let us see how to create and run ad campaigns on Amazon.
Amazon allows you to create two types of advertisement campaigns. They have sponsored brand campaigns and sponsored product campaigns. The first can only be created by the sellers who have registered a brand with Amazon while the latter can be run by any seller.
Amazon Sponsored Product Ads
Both these campaigns are meant to increase product or brand awareness and visibility that in turn increase the sales of the product.
The next thing you need to understand to run an advertisement campaign is bidding. Amazon does not charge you for running ads but as soon as a user clicks on your product to see the details an advertisement expense is deducted irrespective of whether or not the visitor buys the product.
This amount depends on the bid that you place while setting your advertisement campaign. In case two sellers are selling similar products, the product of the seller who has placed a higher bid will be shown on the top.
Now let us see the step-by-step process of how to run advertisements on Amazon.
Creating Campaign
First of all, log in to the Amazon Seller Panel.
On the top of your screen, you will see a number of options such as catalog, inventory, pricing, etc. Click on the Advertising option. A list of options will come down. Click on the Campaign Manager option.
On the next screen, you will find a tab “Create Campaign”, click on this.
The next screen will ask you to choose your campaign type. This includes the two options as stated earlier i.e. sponsored products and sponsored brands.
You can choose the option suitable for you. For reference here, we will go with sponsored product option.
As soon as you click continue the next screen will open that has multiple questions related to running the advertisement campaign.
The first column is the campaign name. You can choose any name that may help you in easy identification later as this will only be visible to you.
The second column asks you about the start and end date of your advertisement campaign, you can choose this as per your convenience.
Setting the Budget
The next option requires setting the daily budget of your advertisement campaign. This is the amount that you are willing to pay every day to run the campaign. Amazon desires this amount to be greater than Rs. 50 per day.
As explained earlier Amazon only charges the advertisement expense when a user clicks on your product to view details. Hence, the daily budget amount also depends on your per-click bid. For example, if you have set the bid at Rs 5 per click and the daily budget at Rs. 100, as soon as 20 users click on your product, your daily budget will exhaust. Therefore, the higher the daily budget the longer your product will be visible to the customers. Mostly, it is suggested to keep the daily budget around Rs. 500 as it runs throughout the day.
Targeting
The next option is targeting. Here, you will find two options i.e. automatic and manual targeting.
In manual targeting, you will have to choose the keywords through which your product will be displayed to the viewers while in automatic targeting Amazon decides the keywords on its own.
If you are a beginner it is better to choose automatic targeting to see the viewer response first.
The next option is a campaign bidding strategy. There are three options to choose from viz. dynamic bid – down only, dynamic bid – up and down, and fixed bids.
The first option lowers your bid when the ads are less likely to convert into sales. The second option raises or lowers the bid in real-time depending on the possibility of conversions. The third option keeps the bid fixed.
Now, you will have to create an ad group. You can add multiple ad groups in a single campaign.
The first column is to select the name of your ad group which will only be visible to you.
The next option is to choose the product for your advertisement. Here, we would suggest choosing the product from a single category while in a particular ad group.
Now, you will have to choose the automatic targeting where you will find two options set default bid and set bid by targeting group.
We recommend choosing the first option if you are just a beginner and also choosing your bid as suggested by Amazon as this increases the chances of sales.
Next column negative keyword targeting is optional. You can leave this option blank if you are just beginning.
After a month or more of running your advertisement campaign, you can add the keywords in this column that do not bring any sales to your product.
The final step is to click the “Launch Campaign” button. Your advertisement campaign will be launched as soon as you click this option.
Now, when we know how to run an advertisement campaign on Amazon we can now move forward to understand how to make our advertisement campaign successful.
What Should You Know Before Running Ads on Amazon?
Even when Amazon offers you a broad platform to create brand awareness and visibility, not all advertisement campaigns running on Amazon can be called successful.
The reason for this is the money spent on these campaigns, which is quite high in comparison to the sales brought through them.
As per a survey, the annual advertisement cost on Amazon increased from 16.9 billion U.S. dollars in 2014 to 10.9 billion U.S. dollars in 2021.
Annual Advertising Costs of Amazon
This indicates that more and more retailers on Amazon are now opting to run advertisement campaigns. This has obviously increased the price of advertising but the sales are also increasing at an equal speed.
However, many vendors still cannot get the conversion rates they desire. They should understand that advertising for different brands and products is different and requires a unique strategy.
Types of Advertising Campaigns on Amazon
Amazon offers six different types of advertising campaigns. They are:
Amazon Sponsored Ads
As explained above these are the pay-per-click and keyword-targeted ads. These are displayed on the top of the page when a viewer searches for a product.
Amazon Headline Search Ads
Also known as the sponsored brand campaign these are the keyword-targeted ads that are displayed alongside the search results.
Amazon Product Display Ads
These are also the pay-per-click ads that appear on customer review pages, product detail pages, below the search results, and on top of the offer listing pages.
Amazon Native Ads
These are of three types viz. recommendation ads, search ads, and custom ads. These ads can be displayed on your brand’s own website.
Amazon Video Ads
These ads can be placed on Amazon-owned sites and devices such as IMDb, Amazon.com, Amazon fire TV, etc.
Amazon Stores
These are the multi-page online stores on Amazon that can be used by the seller to promote their brands.
Each of these campaigns is meant to grab the attention of viewers and increase the conversion rate of the product. You will have to choose the advertising strategy best suited for your product or brand.
Also, your work is not over just by choosing the strategy and launching a campaign. A routine and thorough analysis of your campaign, including the new trending keywords and discarding the old ones, and making other required changes regularly should be an essential part of your advertising campaign.
After all, this, remember that every marketing strategy is different and every product or brand requires unique advertising practices to get noticed there are certain basic rules that make a difference.
Tips to Create and Run a Successful Ad Campaign on Amazon
Below we have mentioned the 6 tips to create and run a successful advertisement campaign and boost your sales on Amazon.
Identify your goals
Are you trying to boost your conversion rates or just increase your brand awareness? Whatever your target be it should be clear to you so you can choose the right marketing strategy and implement it correctly.
This will also help you identify the right metric to measure your success. For example, if you are focusing on increasing your sales Advertising Cost of Sales (ACoS) can be the right metric. Similarly, if you are here to create brand awareness customer impressions can be a perfect fit for you.
The product page of Amazon is divided into objectives to help you easily choose the best-suited advertisement strategy for your brand or product.
Advertise the best of your products
As explained earlier Amazon only charges the advertisement fee when a user clicks on your ad to view the product details. To make every click count you must advertise the best of your products so that maximum numbers of clicks turn into sales.
You must also ensure time and again that the advertised products are available in stock and competitively priced.
It is also advised to choose the products that display the featured offer on Amazon. When several brands are selling the same product, Amazon combines them into one product detail page.
If your product becomes a part of a featured offer, it will definitely increase the visibility and sales of your product.
You can use a number of measures to make your product the featured offer such as pricing your product reasonably, including multiple shipping options or free shipping wherever possible, offering support services to ensure happy and satisfied customers, and reviewing your inventory.
Strong title and compelling details
This is one of the most ignored but impactful steps. The title of your product is the first impression for the potential customers. Therefore, it should be strong and catchy.
You can include details such as brand name, product type, size, color, material, key features, quantity, etc. in the title. The best titles are usually 60 characters long, easy to read, and informative.
It is always a good idea to include multiple bullet points in the description of your product. The shoppers today are smart and capable of making informed decisions. Your responsibility as a seller is to guide them in making the right choice.
The product description must provide the details such as uses, content, dimensions, origin, operational considerations, etc. of the product.
The product description is the small narrative of your product so it must be crisp and clear including all the necessary details. Apply the unique voice of your brand while writing the description. This will help you create a positive user experience.
You must also include high-quality, zoomable images of your product. This will help provide the user with a clear picture of what to expect. If possible also include a short demo video highlighting important features and details of the product.
Select the right channel to advertise:
Amazon offers multiple options for you to display your product advertisement. For example, voice ads can be put on Alexa-enabled devices.
Choose the right channel to advertise your product.
Get creative with your ads and give them a unique positive tone that reaches the customer and rings a bell.
Also, you must choose the right advertising campaign for your product between sponsored brand and sponsored product. While the first type of advertisement is meant to increase brand awareness the latter helps you boost the individual product sales.
Category-specific targeting
While looking for products on Amazon you must have seen the heading “Product you might be interested in”. This is category-specific targeting.
Basically, the advanced targeting functionality feature of Amazon gives you the opportunity to display your products along with the other products belonging to the same category. This helps you enhance the effectiveness of your ads.
Displaying your products alongside the other famous brands and top-rated products makes them look more reliable and allows you to increase brand recognition.
Choose keywords wisely
Keywords are the essence of your advertisement so it is highly crucial to choose them wisely. The right keywords can really make your brand popular.
Choose specific keywords that are likely to be used by high-intent people. Include important details of the product as keywords that may be of interest to the target audience.
Also, it is equally important to get rid of negative keywords that do not serve the purpose of your product. These keywords just increase your ad spend without bringing any traffic.
You must regularly check the viewer response to include the new trending keywords in your advertisement strategy and remove the old redundant ones.
Amazon being the largest online marketplace worldwide provides you with the platform to reach a much wider than possible through any other way. However, without an impactful marketing strategy, it can be difficult to create brand awareness or boost sales through this great platform.
By using the simple tips for running a successful advertising campaign on Amazon mentioned in this blog you can definitely increase the visibility and sales of your product on Amazon. You can thank us later.
FAQs
Can you run ads for Amazon products?
Yes, you can run ads on Amazon for your products. Amazon ads are a great way to increase the visibility of your product and get on the front page of Amazon.
Is it free to advertise on Amazon?
Ads on Amazon work on cost-per-click ads, if a user clicks on the ad Amazon charges you.
German retailer Metro AG which is trying to sell its Indian cash-and-carry operations for around $1.5-1.75 billion has caught the attention of a lot of big companies.
Companies like Reliance Retail, Amazon, TATA Group, Avenue Supermarts — which runs the DMart chain, Thailand’s Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group, Swiggy, Lulu Group, and PE fund Samara Capital are in the race to buy the Indian unit of Metro AG.
But, why are these companies eyeing Metro AG? What does Metro AG exactly do? To find answers to these questions, keep reading this article till the end.
Relative Market Share of Metro Cash and Carry India from FY17 to FY20
Metro AG is a German international specialist in wholesale and food retail which has made its footprints in 34 countries. The headquarters of this company is in Düsseldorf, Germany. The company operates under the cash and carry wholesale business model.
In the cash and carry model, retailers, caterers, hotels, restaurants and other special businesses purchase the goods from a wholesale warehouse and pay the invoice on the spot in cash. Customers have to arrange the transport of the goods themselves.
The Indian subsidiary of Metro was established in 2003 when the Indian government allowed 100% foreign direct investment in wholesale trade on a cash and carry business model.
The company has a chain of 31 cash-and-carry stores in India under the brand, Metro Wholesale. Only business customers can buy goods from these wholesale centres.
Main Products and Services of Metro AG
Metro Cash and Carry India provides 7,000 products to its business customers across various categories like fruits & vegetables, dairy, frozen and bakery products, general grocery, health and beauty products, media and electronics, confectionery, detergents and cleaning supplies, household goods and apparel – all under one warehouse at wholesale prices.
Target Audience of Metro AG
On Metro’s official website, the company has mentioned that its core customers in the Indian market include small retailers and Kirana stores, SMEs, and all types of offices, companies and institutions. The company also targets HoReCa- Hotels, Restaurants and Caterers.
Why Metro AG Wants to Exit the Indian Market?
Metro AG India
Metro AG generated a whopping revenue of $898 million in FY21 (Oct-Sept) and is likely to close the current fiscal year with more than $1 billion in revenues with an EBITDA growth of 30-40%. Last fiscal the EBITDA growth was 50%.
Even after earning so much revenue, why does the company want to exit the Indian market? The reason is increased competition. When Metro AG entered the Indian market in 2013, there were not a lot of players. But, now the situation has completely changed. Metro AG is facing tough competition from Reliance and Udaan.
To fight the competitors the company has to spend $300 million to stay relevant in the market in the short term. But, the parent company METRO is not ready to spend this huge amount to beat its competitors.
Although tough competition is not the only reason for the company to surrender their Indian unit.
“Selling below cost and free delivery of goods are the issues. Most competitors are operating at negative 20-25% EBITDA,” said an industry veteran who doesn’t want his name mentioned in the article.
“At Metro, we regularly assess our international portfolio, such as our market position in the respective country, the life cycle of our operations, and the growth potential of our business. This is a general approach and normal business applied to all countries, including India,” said Gerd Koslowski, the company’s global director of corporate communications.
Metro wants a profitable business in India which is not possible in the near future and that’s why the company is selling its Indian unit.
Last year the company exited Japan and Myanmar due to increased competition. The company has also closed its business in Russia due to its war with Ukraine.
The company has appointed JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, the most respected investment banks, to find a buyer for their business.
According to Statista, the Indian retail market in 2020 was worth 800 billion USD. By 2026, this figure will reach 1.7 trillion USD. The Indian quick commerce market will reach $5 billion by 2025.
Since Metro AG already has a huge chain of warehouses, wholesalers and retailers, this gives these companies a big chance to tap into the booming retail and quick commerce market. This is the very reason why all of the big companies are fighting to buy the Metro AG.
The company which is trying to disrupt the retail and quick commerce segment is Reliance. The company has already made huge efforts since 2021 to build a large number of wholesale centres for food and grocery, apparel, electronics, and medicines. Reliance is also integrating numerous small shops into its business strategy. Mukesh Ambani has said that they are planning to onboard more than 10 million merchant partners over the next three years.
The main goal of the company is to supply a range of products to consumers through its eCommerce platform JioMart. Reliance already has a huge chain of warehouses and if they acquire Metro AG they would achieve this goal really fast.
But, let’s look at the bigger picture. Reliance is trying to build its own ecosystem. The company wants Indians to use its services from the morning to the night. Consumers can buy products from their eCommerce platform, JioMart using Jio’s mobile or WiFi networks, watch movies on Jio Cinema and pay the money via Jio wallet. Like this, the customers will stay in their eco-system for a long period of time.
Another company that wants to leverage the retail and quick commerce segment is Swiggy. The company wants to expand its current food delivery business model to the quick commerce segment. By acquiring Metro AG the company wants to accelerate Instamart’s growth.
“Swiggy has evinced interest in the acquisition, and a potential deal would enable Metro Cash & Carry’s wholesale stores to feed Swiggy’s Instamart delivery model,” one of the executives said.
“The idea is to create a hub-and-spoke model where Metro stores will supply to Instamart stores, which could be delivery-only or even stores where consumers can walk in.”
Conclusion
All the companies know the bright future of the retail business and quick commerce segment. The companies know that if they acquire Metro AG, they would be able to capture the market quickly. Now, it’s very tough to predict which company will buy Metro AG but, this race would be quite interesting to watch.
Big players in the quick commerce segment like Zomato and Swiggy are not making huge profits. But, if the companies build a smart business model then the quick commerce field can help generate huge profits for any company.
FAQs
What is a cash and carry store?
In cash and carry stores customers buy products from warehouses and settle the invoice in cash and carry the goods with them. Customers have to arrange the transport of the goods themselves. Usually, these customers are retailers, caterers, hotels and restaurants.
Is Metro cash and carry closing in India?
Yes, Metro cash and carry is exiting the Indian market by selling its Indian operations for $1.5-1.75 billion.
How many Metro wholesale stores are there in India?
Metro has 31 wholesale stores in India.
Is Metro an Indian brand?
Metro AG is a German international specialist in wholesale and food retail which has made its footprints in 34 countries. The headquarters of this company is in Düsseldorf, Germany. The company operates under the cash and carry wholesale business model.
Abinaya Arangarajan
