A significant portion of traditionalists and early starters are going to shift from “See online and buy retail” trend to the “digital aspirant” group for more than a couple of items in next 12 months, said a recent study.
LightCastle Partners – a business management consulting firm – unearthed the findings in its recent report titled “The Rise of Digital Consumer Class in Bangladesh”.
The report – which was based on an online study over 450 respondents in Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet – was launched at a press conference held at the EMK Centre in the capital recently.
Roughly 4% of the consumers surveyed said they already purchase consumer electronics and grocery items online.
The respondents with monthly income between $251 and $650 represent an emerging middle, middle and affluent class backgrounds.
The study focuses on technology users and the rise of digital consumers in the country.
However, considering the current consumption trend, these are the categories accumulating the highest growth rate in the near future.
The report said conversion rate for consumers seeking digitised food services remains almost similar - indicating a need for expanding business in emerging regions as a long-term business strategy.
It mentioned that people are willing to move online for high-value purchase or leasing such as home or apartment as well. Traditional real estate businesses could consider this as an important indicator for some transformation.
The report also said despite having long exposure to social media and online review platforms, digital consumers still get influenced by “offline peer review” as 83.8% of the consumers said they would “trust” or “strongly trust” product or service review given offline by friends and relatives.
The report mentioned that 51% of the respondents are early start-ups while 26% from Chittagong and the rest from established areas in Dhaka.
The next big influencer is certifications obtained by organisations (BSTI approval is a good example for that).
According to report, the product information found on official company website persuades 69.5% of the population and traditional media advertisements affect only 30% of the consumers.
In-house store promotions also work with the same credibility level as TV commercials.
Fifty seven per cent of the consumers purchasing products online were “indifferent” or rated the service “bad.”
These consumers prefer quality over price, and are loyal to brand name rather than aesthetic aspects.
The study findings indicate that the Bangladeshi consumers are primarily information or review seekers on the digital space as is represented by 74% of respondents.
Starting from gadgets to fall fashion collection to online contents, this population has a wide spectrum of interests. However, consumers awareness level and interests level tend to vary between product categories.
While Bangladeshi consumers’ interest in smart-phones can be compared with the likes of Italy and Germany, restaurant search patterns are mostly for smart-phone information are more brand conscious than consumers looking for restaurants on internet.
It also said thousands of Facebook enabled outlets, personal clothing and accessories are some of the popular items the “digital consumers” are purchasing online.
Online food service platforms like Foodpanda and HungryNaki have also gained attraction as 25% of the respondents admitted having subscribing to these services for at least once a month.
Comparing current trend for online purchase with the intention to go digital in the future over different product categories gave the study some interesting insights, the report said.
When asked about the report, Rezwanul Haque Jami, general secretary of E-commerce Association of Bangladesh, “E-commerce business is growing rapidly in Bangladesh. In last six months, selling trend was very high comparing with last year.”
“As we are able to achieve people’s trust, this was one of the important reasons for selling rate. Even we were able to overcome loss due to suspension of Facebook,” Jami said.