New Delhi, January, 28,2013: Online shopping in India has hit a tipping point and is expected to see exponential growth in 2013, finds a study by Google Trends and TNS Australia). From only 40% growth in 2010 to 2011, Online shopping in India, saw 128% growth in interest from the consumers from 2011 to 2012.
Consumer electronics (34%) was King and is expected to become bigger than consumer electronics in 2013 in terms of absolute query volumes. Apparels & accessories (30%) emerged as the second biggest product category followed by Books (15%), Beauty & Personal care (10%), Home & furnishing (6%), Baby products (2%) and Healthcare (3%).
The report also highlights massive growth in niche product categories: Home & furnishing, & healthcare saw over 2x growth in 2011-2012 on Google search.
Rajan Anandan, VP & Managing Director of Google India, said at a media event in Delhi: “With approximately 8 million Indians shopping online in 2012, online shopping industry in India is growing rapidly and will continue to see exponential growth. We expect 2013 to be a strong growth year for players who’re focussed on fast growing categories like apparels & accessories and niche product categories like baby products, home furnishings & health-nutrition. We expect the growth to come from outside of top 8 metros as was evident in our recently concluded “Great Online Shopping festival’ which saw over 51% of traffic from non-metros.”
As mobile internet user base grows in India, mobile phones are also becoming a contributor in the surge for online shopping with Google witnessing 2X growth in number of queries from mobile phones in the year 2011 to 2012. Currently, 30% of all shopping queries in India come from mobile phones. These trends were also validated with the help of an online research conducted by TNS Australia of the internet users in the age group 18 to 50 from Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad & Pune. The study found 90% of online shoppers are planning to buy more products online which reflects on the positive experience of the users. In terms of top product categories ever purchased online, apparels & accessories was among the top category (84%), followed by electronics (71%), beauty & personal care (64%), books (62%) and household products (61%). The research also highlighted that baby products (39%), health & nutrition (43%) product category were also becoming popular with online buyers.
The frequency of purchase was also higher for categories like apparels & accessories (34%), beauty & personal care (33%) products in comparison to electronics (28%), which also makes these categories more profitable because of repeat purchase. In terms of converting more users to shop online, online ticketing emerged as the gateway, as it was easier to convert online ticket buyers to shop online. Online ticket consumers were also likely to spend higher average amount of Rs 2347 on their first product purchase in comparison to INR 1626 for internet users. Online ticket buyers were also seen to be more comfortable with the use of debit cards (24%), credit card (19%) and cash on delivery (55%). For regular internet users - cash on delivery was the most preferred mode of payment (74%), followed by debit card (18%) & credit card (5%).
The report was compiled by combining data from Google Trends and online research conducted by TNS Australia with a sample size of 800 respondents on behalf of Google India in November 2012.Gender: Male (63%), Female (37%), age group (18 to 50) with 71% respondents in the age group of (18 to 35). 89% users were heavy users of the Internet with 67% users having access to their own money and 33% having access to someone else’s money. The sample size had a monthly average household income of INR 55,051/-. The respondents were spread across Delhi (22%), Mumbai (24%), Kolkata (9%), Bangalore (17%), Ahmedabad (6%), Hyderabad (12%), Pune (7%) & others (2%).