Project Description
Enabling Small Businesses Adopt Social Commerce In India
User research on social sellers in India.
Background
The client is a major global E-commerce platform based in North America. The client provides tools to start and run an E-commerce business for its customers across the globe, including India.
They have been observing the growing prominence of social commerce among the merchants and entrepreneurial segments in India. Social commerce is defined as the use of social media channels (such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram) to buy and sell products.
The client was looking for more understanding of what might be the potential business opportunity for them concerning social commerce in India.
Brief
The client was interested in having a better understanding of the social sellers, i.e. sellers who sell products via social media channels, in India. The client was also interested in understanding the social sellers’ business model, their motivations and needs.
Ethnity was tasked with executing the user research to take place in India and bring insights to the client.
Methodology
The research planning involved reviewing the interview guide to make adjustments to make it culturally/ regionally relevant for Indian participants.
The research involved in-depth interviews in various Indian languages with participants from across Indian states. Local UX research consultants who could speak various Indian languages were onboarded for this project. The consultants were selected based on their language capabilities and availability and brought the necessary local knowledge required for the frictionless running of the project.
The research involved twenty-six individual interviews over five days, the team from the client side was able to listen to the interviews remotely via web conferencing tool to give feedback to the researcher and gain insight first hand. After the interviews, the client was presented with a high-level recap of the interviews covering major highlights. The high-level recap was followed by analysis and reporting.
Quick Facts
- User Research targeting major Indian languages such as Hindi, Marathi and Telugu
- Users’ online behaviour, motivations and needs
- Local team with local knowledge
- 26 one-to-one interviews
Results
The in-depth research was encapsulated into a detailed report structured to the client’s specific requirements and including competition analysis combined user experience insight.
Key findings included:
- How Indian social sellers interact with their customers
- The motivations and needs of Indian social sellers
- The main challenges of doing business via social media
- The channels Indian social sellers utilise to procure the supply
Ethnity’s local team of UX researchers provided a detailed analysis of these key findings and others along with recommendations that were relevant and specific to the Indian market.
