eCommerce the Road ahead

Amazon for the first time in its history has topped the Brand Intimacy report for UAE published by MBLM. Brand Intimacy is emotional science that measure the bonds we form with the brands we use. Amazon to the best of our knowledge has never advertised offline in the region.

The retail is going through a though time with Al Hokair of Saudi Arabia dropping franchises like Marks and Spencer and other non-performing one.

All this is pointing towards one data set; the current GDP contribution of eCommerce in the GCC region is around 3% which is set to increase to over 10% like the European continent in the coming few years. Bain & Co. is especially optimistic with the expectation of 3.5X increase in the next 3 years that will see eCommerce sales top the 28 Billion USD mark.

So if your business is slow, do not blame the market; it is fundamentally changing. With millennials spending increasing by 15% in 2020 and baby boomers decreasing by 10% (Global Figures).

While heading Centric; we have seen it all too common that clients were offered wrong ‘advice’ on the investment required for a successful eCommerce platform. These people spent years and countless hours with sub-standard partners trying to save pennies while losing on profit opportunity as well as first movers advantage.

So what should your eCommerce budgets ideally be ? We are mapping for you retail store costs with the eCommerce store.

Retail	eCommerce
Store Fit-Out cost (to be done every 3 or 4 years)	eCommerce Platform design and development cost
Rental Cost	Marketing Costs (Brand awareness)
Store man-power cost	Content development cost for site as well special landing pages and social media
Electricity / Cooling bills	Hosting cost
Revenue sharing with Mall	Marketing Costs (15% to 25% of lifetime value of your customer – eCommerce conversion marketing)
Other Miscellaneous Costs	Free shipments
Additional Budget	eCommerce across the region; the budgets need to be distributed as per the markets.

Centric has successfully helped many clients in their eCommerce journey; starting from Strategic consulting, warehousing strategy, payment gateway consulting as well as design, build, operate and market.

Ready to make your business ready for the 21^st Century ? Lets get in touch.