Online buying flourishes

Motorbikes, clothing, handbags, shoes – these kinds of consumer items were being increasingly bought online in Viet Nam over the last few years, thus the product and services range has widened considerably since.

Online purchases can now include gift hampers, house cleaning, carpet washing, changing bank notes into crisp, new smaller denominations and car rentals.

A few years ago most Vietnamese residents were unfamiliar with online shopping. However, thanks to aggressive development of the e-ecommerce industry, online shopping has gained increasing popularity, and this is clearly seen in the increased rush during the Tet (Lunar New Year) festival season.

Marketing manager of the online shopping website 123mua.com.vn (123-buy) Phan Thi Nhat Linh said her website had about 15,000 e-stores, each stocking more than 100 products.

She said the number of products offered through her website had increased significantly for the Tet festival.

Ho Tan Duong of sieuthinhanh.com (quick supermarket) said online orders from customers living in HCM City usually took only a day to process and deliver. Without the overheads of renting retail space and hiring shop assistants, the prices of his products were lower than those at traditional shops, he said.

Duong said there were currently more than 500 stores on his website, offering cosmetics, shoes, bags, household commodities and electronic products. All products are discounted by 5 to 50 per cent, with some including gifts with purchase incentives, he said.

“There is now a more diversified collection of online goods compared to a few years ago. In particular we are offering many new products and services to meet our customers’needs for this Tet,” he said. “That allows shopping site owners to launch a lot of promotional campaigns to increase competitiveness and attract more visitors.”

Other sales website like Vatgia.com, muare.vn, rongbay.com and enbac.com are also offering a diverse range of products and services that can meet most consumers’ Tet needs, including sausages, glutinous rice square cakes, flowers and bonsais.

Vatgia.com representative Nguyen Hoa Binh said that his website now had over 400 shops specialising in selling products for Tet with the participation of over 250 suppliers.

To attract more customers, Vatgia.com has introduced many sales promotions as well as insurance to ensure online buyers can receive quality products at reasonable prices.

Rongbay.com is offering the exchange of old banknotes for new ones for commissions of 1 to 7 per cent of the value. On muare.vn, customers can buy peach blossom branches or plants.

Website owners said gift baskets costing between VND150,000 ($7.1) and VND2 million ($95.2) were most looked for by online customers.

Market watchdogs said that payment safety as well as suppliers’ reputation were key to the success of online trading.

“While online shopping can help people save time, the shoppers do not have the opportunity to see the goods with their own eyes to check their quality. So ensuring high product quality will gain the trust of customers,” they said.

Establishing intermediary internet payment gateways between sellers and buyers via banks was also very necessary to ensure the security of buyers’ payments, they added.

Online payment gateways also encourage enterprises to further invest in online sales channels that are said to have great potential for development in the coming time.

Tags: Vietnam E-commerce