12 things I learnt in the last 12 months

On the 17th of May 2022, I completed 1 year at ND Commerce (Net Distribution Services Pvt. Ltd.) one of India’s leading full service Ecommerce Enablers. I had dabbled in a few ecommerce projects prior to joining ND Commerce like setting up an Ecommerce portal KidsMojo.com back in 2016 e-tailing kids merchandise & memorabilia and more recently Gheedepot.com in 2020 an initiative to help Indian artisanal farmers to sell their produce online and even tap international markets, but ND Commerce helped me expand on my previous learnings and hone my business skills. While there’s still miles and miles to go, its worth pausing for a quick catch up on what I’ve learnt in the last 12 months and documenting the same.

Here are the Top 12 things I learnt at ND Commerce over the past 12 months:

1. Ecommerce is BIG: And post pandemic has gotten Bigger – According the www.ibef.org In 2022, the Indian e-commerce market is predicted to increase by 21.5%, and touch US$ 74.8 billion. Much of it is thanks to the booming mobile phone penetration especially in Tier 2 and Tier 3 towns. The number of internet connections in 2021 increased significantly to 830 million.

2. Age is just a number – I work with a team of millennials who are just as accomplished and quick witted as many seasoned professionals I’ve come across in my previous stints. What they lack in tenure, they make up for in hunger and curiosity. This past year I’ve learnt to reset my mindset and shed all past baggage that corporate titles load you with. My reporting boss is 10 years younger than me in years, but not in experience. He is a formidable ecommerce professional with over 6 years experience in this space and is a bonafide go getter not afraid of overseeing million dollar accounts. Well respected by clients and his team mates alike, he has great communication skills and is very protective about his team. They love to work hard and party harder!

3. You need to speak the lingo - Every industry has its own terminology that one has to master to be able to hold forte. When I was in television, it was TRPs & GRPs, in telecom it was MOU, GSM, CDMA, ARPU, in licensing it was royalties and commissions and in e-commerce its RTO (Return to Origin), RTV (return to Vendor), Buffer logic (managing inventory to avoid Out Of Stock), ROAS (Return on Ad Spend), Forward logistics (from Warehouse to consumer) Reverse logistics (from consumer to Warehouse), QC (Quality Check), OOS (Out Of Stock) and more

4. You need to excel at excel - while I had decent skills prior to joining ND Commerce, I soon realised that I had to up my game to keep up with the amount of data coursing through my email everyday. From daily sales reports that had to be studied and understood to creating pivots and running vlookup tables to compare and prepare merchandising reports for clients. My excel skills have certainly improved substantially.

5. Nobody knows the right answer except the consumer - while data can give you a trend line and help you project, ensuring that you are constantly part of the customer feedback loop is very important. Customer Reviews, feedback through customer support via calls and emails and listening to social media comments are just some of the ways to stay on top of where the market is moving.

6. Trust for online is on the rise - we have customers who purchase speakers worth Rs. 2 lakhs on one of our brand stores and white goods worth Rs. 3.5 lakhs on another on a single transaction. This points to the fact that IF the brand is trustworthy, the customer is willing to swipe their card.

7. It takes an army to deliver one pair of shoes to you - Everything about this business from receiving an order to processing it to finally delivering the end Product to the end consumer works only at scale. Website development, content curation, Warehousing, order processing, Logistics, customer service all have to work together in a medley to seamlessly deliver a product to the end customer. Any breaks in the chain could lead to a catastrophe and a substandard e-commerce experience.

8. E-commerce is a 24/7 business - Our Webstores or market places are always OPEN, orders are constantly coming in. I have the Shopify app on my phone which buzzes every time there is a sale. Initially it was a disturbance. Now its one of the most beautiful sounds to my ears!

9. Having fun is mandatory - the e-commerce business is extremely fast paced and every minute you have a new wave of data coming your way. It’s important to mix in fun and lighten the mood. I’m a bit serious by nature, but spending time with my teammates has taught me the importance of switching off. We have a favourite hangout called Sirocco in Versova which has a chilled-out vibe, and the team likes to visit the place to catch a few chilled beers! They very graciously invited me to join them until I realised the restaurant practise of awarding a discount based on the oldest guest’s age! Fortunately, the oldest person doesn’t have to pick up the tab and we always dutch it after one of the team members works her excel skills and splits the bill down equally, taxes included.

10. Communication is Key - A majority of one’s time is spent communicating with internal and external stakeholders. Key tools used include Email, whatsApp, Teams or good old phone calls. It all depends on the urgency of the situation and the need to document. Our tech team prefer calls/messages via Teams or just raising tasks on the internal ticketing software called Teamwork which helps assign tasks and maintain a record of the same. I remember raising my first task and assigning it to myself! Most of our clients however prefer to communicate via WhatsApp and we have dedicated groups for each account to help faster resolution of matters

11. “Indian consumers are a different kettle of fish” - this was a remark made by one of our clients who oversees ecommerce for an international brand. His observation was that the Indian consumer has been spoilt with free delivery and zero questions returns policy. Nowhere else in the world is this still the practise. But then india is one of the most competitive and lucrative markets in the world. So it comes with the territory.

12. Finally, I’ve learnt that customers buy experiences not just products. Because there is no touch and feel involved compared to traditional retail, the customer largely relies on what s/he is shown on the website. Sure, the discounts do matter, but so does the delivery time, returns process and customer support, if required. This is the key to whether a customer will purchase again online or just walk across to the nearest shop and purchase the product offline.

I’m well into Year 2 and already have a whole new bunch of experiences to report.

Would love to say a HUGE thanks to Ajay Miglani, Mukund Malagi & Ranjit Pai for inviting me on this ride. Looking forward to setting new records in the next 12.