Top 7 E-Commerce Websites in India

Recent years have seen an exceptional evolution in the way India trades and shops. E-commerce is one of the rapidly growing sectors, stimulating an entire generation of entrepreneurs, large scale manufacturing of small and medium-sized enterprises. E-commerce has enabled helped reduce barriers and bring the manufacturer closer to the customer. The presence of a virtual store on e-commerce websites has helped millions of business flourish in India and has led to more employment opportunities as well.

Today, technology has advanced at a rapid pace and with the use of smart phones, the online shopping experience has become seamless for customers. With easy to use mobile apps with elaborate store catalogs, e-commerce has ushered new opportunities for both traders and consumers.

India is one of the largest markets of e-commerce players. With giants like Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, and Myntra, new entrants like PayTm Mall, Shopclues, etc are also establishing a strong hold in the Indian market.

1. Amazon

Amazon is one of the biggest online stores with a global presence. It not only provides a variety of product choices but also provides a great user experience and splendid customer service. Besides putting prominence to personalization, Amazon also monitors user’s browsing and purchase patterns in order to provide them recommended products for future purchases. It operates in India as a marketplace rather than a retailer.

Amazon has started two new initiatives for sellers in India: the ‘Self Service Registration (SSR)’ and ‘Amazon Easy Ship’.

Amazon SSR allows sellers to self register in Amazon marketplace, irrespective of location and size of the catalog. It enables sellers to start selling within a day without any third party intervention. For sellers managing multiple accounts or operating across regions, tools like Multilogin can help securely separate browser profiles and avoid detection issues. With Amazon Easy Ship, the seller has to pack the shipment and confirm to Amazon that they are ready to ship. Additionally, many premium IT companies offer tools and services to enhance the selling experience, helping sellers optimize their operations and reach a wider audience. Amazon Logistics ensures that the pack is delivered to the customers within two to three working days. With new features such as Amazon Prime, customers can receive delivery of products within 24 hours. By reducing the shipping time, Amazon keeps both retailers and customers happy and increases customer stickiness on the website.

Right from mobile phones, to fashion products, electrical appliances, books, and grocery, Amazon has become a one-stop shop for all consumer needs.

2. Flipkart

Flipkart is an Indian based e-commerce venture and over the years, it has garnered a lot of interest in the minds of Indian consumers. It has opened up the scope for Indian e-tail market in a tremendous way. It started out as an online bookstore and now it has a gamut of products ranging from: books, apparels, electronics, digital music, home care and beauty. Moreover, it has now become a mega marketplace.

Flipkart’s fundamental differentiator is its supply chain efficiency— definitive delivery of goods. It has been continuously developing and improving the customer experience. The website is easy to browse, hassle-free, and convenient.

Two of the most important reasons for Flipkart’s grand success are the discounts and the option of Cash- on- Delivery which makes consumers more confident in purchasing products. Flipkart has an amazing customer retention rate with 70% of repeat customers.

Apart from the shopping experience, Flipkart’s biggest online shopping festival – Big Billion Days is one of the most successful campaigns and it churns out millions of orders during that shopping season.

3. Jabong

Jabong came into the e-commerce market with a bang and created a revolution within 6 to 7 months of launch. Besides selling products on their own through inventories, Jabong is also an online marketplace for third-party sellers. They predominantly cater to apparel, footwear, jewelry, and accessories and catalog more than 50,000 products across 700 brands.

Jabong is known for its own logistics network that ensures fast delivery. If you are in a city like Delhi, you are bound to receive the product within 24 hours of order placement. Jabong is also trying to expand its international presence through its site ‘JabongWorld.com’. It ships Indian products to international customers.

One of Jabong’s uniqueness lies in its new idea of a fashion magazine— “The Juice”an interesting blend of fashion, people, trends and pop culture. The magazine has everything in it that readers would love to read in a fashion magazine. Jabong has also collaborated with films such as “Bhaag Milkha Bhaag”, “Main Tera Hero”, and “Humpty Sharma ki Dulhaniya” to offer exclusive products inspired by the movie.

The various payment gateways offered by Jabong have made it convenient for consumers to order products from the website. In 2016, Jabong was acquired by Myntra.

4. Snapdeal

Snapdeal is a successful e-commerce portal catering to customer’s buying needs at a much wider aspect. As one of the best e-commerce platform, it was established with the concept of making products available to customers at discounted rates through offers and Snapdeal coupons.

It gives you the best deals in a particular city in various service categories ranging from: restaurants, spas and salons, apparel, footwear, baby care, home and décor. It has adopted the marketplace business model. Snapdeal came up with a unique idea of permitting local vendors and manufacturers to publish their product catalog and sell it on the Snapdeal portal. This avoids expensive costs involved in building own inventory.

Snapdeal’s business model was awarded with mammoth funding to scale up their products, business and operations. It focuses on logistics and efficient delivery to customers.  It operates in such a fast pace that a new product is added in every 30 seconds.

5. Myntra

Myntra is one of the largest shopping e-tailers in fashion and lifestyle merchandise. It supplies a wide range of products from clothing to footwear and accessories. It focuses on bringing the most fashionable brands for its customers. In 2014, Myntra was acquired by Flipkart.

Myntra has created a niche in the territory of e-commerce and subtle trust from people. Additionally, from discounts to Cash-on-Delivery benefits, the Myntra success mantra belongs to its hybrid logistics model. It takes uttermost care of its supply chain management and employs delivery agents with high experience.

Myntra has also come up with a complete guide to your everyday fashion and latest style trends. The “MyntraLookGood” is a daily fix of style tips, beauty tricks, celeb fashion, and non-stop entertainment. The tie-ups with celebrities and events are an outstanding strategy by Myntra to represent that fashion is in its DNA. Myntra has many celebrity brands— Hrithik Roshan’s HRX, Salman Khan’s Being Human, Deepika Padukone’s All About You, and Farhan Akhtar’s MARD. They believe that Bollywood influences fashion and frequent tie-up with celebrities helps to bring customers closer to Myntra.

6. Shopclues

Shopclues is the latest addition to the top e-commerce websites in India. Unlike Amazon and Flipkart, Shopclues is a market place that focuses on unstructured categories of home, electrical, fashion, and daily utility items.  The mass market of shopclues comes from tier 2 and tier 3 cities and most of its business comes from smaller cities. Shopclues helps give brands from unstructured markets a voice of its own.

Shopclues has a comparatively larger merchant base. It focuses on small and medium sized traders located in smaller cities and helps them take their business online. With over 50 million visitors on its website, one of the major revenue generating categories has been the home and kitchen appliances category.

7. PayTm

PayTm is the second largest e-commerce platform in India and has also made its way to the list of unicorn startups. Primarily started as a mobile wallet, in 2016, PayTm entered the Best e-commerce platform with PayTm Mall. As the name suggests, it is an online market place for products ranging from electronics to daily consumer needs.

One of the attractive features of PayTm has been its cashback feature. Consumers are given a variety of discount coupons to chose from and also provide good savings on the purchase of goods. With close to 120 million buyers on the platform, PayTm Mall is finding new ways to enhance the buying experience. It is also collaborating with retail brick-and-motor stores and with use of its mobile app and QR codes, it takes the customer through an online shopping experience with attractive discounts.

Thus, India is a growing marketplace and e-commerce industries are bound to flourish. But with the right technology and design strategy, new entrants can have a competitive edge.

8. E-Commerce Content Creation With Dresma

As we initially talked about how technology has advanced in recent years, now it is easier for sellers to get high-quality product photos for their e-commerce storefront too!

Meet an eCommerce content creation platform – Dresma – that empowers the sellers with Generative AI to get professional-grade and personalized content for their brand. Likewise, python web development helps eCommerce sites modifying customer data and regulate and maintain it effectively.

Their mission? To make high quality content accessible and affordable to all.

Be it a website, a mobile app, or even building a market place software from scratch, GoodWorkLabs has helped clients in the retail, real estate, and fashion industry build powerful e-commerce applications for their business.

Have a business idea and want to discuss the best solutions for your e-commerce business? Reach out to us and our team will discuss further about your requirements. Email us at – contact@goodworklabs.com or call at +91- 9863077000

LetEmbrace is a social project whose vision is to become the first worldwide company that will create a social platform for protection, especially for women. GoodWorkLabs designed a beautiful responsive website and a custom backend CMS for the initiative that scales on different screen sizes and devices. Visit LetEmbrace website and support the cause.

Contact GoodWorkLabs to build your custom responsive website and CMS.

ChatterBox is a cool new chat application concept for iOS and Android designed by GoodWorkLabs. It is a customisable theme that you can be used to suit your chat app requirements, be it integrating into your existing mobile app or creating a stand alone chat mobile app.

Here are the key features –

1. Sign up / Sign in with phone number

2. Invite friends / contacts to chat. Block users if required.

3. Profile picture, settings, get push notifications

4. Create group and have group conversations

5. Contacts – search quickly, add new, see recent conversations

6. Status – update status and broadcast

7. Share pictures, video, audio – with just few taps

8. Stickers – select cool stickers and add a dash of fun to your conversations

9. Settings – manage notifications depending on the group, contact, etc.

Contact GoodWorkLabs to create your custom chat application.

Java has gained substantial traction as a holistic development ecosystem over the last few years. With this level of adoption and popularity comes the need for better development tools. Changing user preferences, better business viability for Java and increased market demand means the need for faster development. In order to cope better with the fast turnaround, it is critical to have the right testing tools so that none of the errors are skipped through in the fast paced development environment.

Here is a rundown of some of the best error tracking tools for Java

1. Takipi – Unlike other testing tools, Takipi can scan multiple methods, modules and machines. It then reports when a production code has encountered an error break and the reason for the same.
Some key characteristics –
a. It handles caught and uncaught exceptions, as well as HTTP and logged errors
b. You can also get to know if the error is a new or edited code or if it is a recurring issue
c. It has the ability to overlay error in variable state over actual program
http://www.takipi.com

2. Stack Hunter – It allows developers to track exceptions on a self-hosted platform. They can now know about exceptions as soon as they happen in a well laid out centralized location.
Some key characteristics –
a. It provides a standalone, self-hosted, web-based interface for exception and error tracking
b. It collates and shows critical metrics such as user affected and session affected exceptions in addition to overall listing of exceptions
c. It also groups different exception by root cause thus allowing for batch-wise resolution
http://stackhunter.com

3. Raygun – App exception tracking is made convenient with help of Raygun, a simple web based tool for tracking and managing errors on desktop, web or mobile app development languages. It also facilitates error handling through APIs.
Some key characteristics –
a. Allows text search of error groups and individual exceptions
b. Facilitates third party integration with GitHub, Gira and HipChat
c. All occurrences of error is presented within groups with access to all instances and methods including stack trace.
https://raygun.io

4. Sentry – With a web interface, this open source tool helps in real-time error tracking, grouping and simplified error management. It helps gauge uncaught errors based on impact and recurrence to help priority based resolution.
Some key characteristics –
a. Developers get to see how new deployment impacts the overall project in real time
b. Great for payment and financial transactions with its alerts on high number of failures in purchase or authentication
c. Facilitates easy integration with third party applications such as GitHub and Heroku
http://getsentry.com

5. Airbrake – Developed by Rackspace, the tool provides application specific view over the web for easy error handling and management. If you use Ruby, Java or PHP, then this tool is meant only for you.
Some key characteristics –
a. Detailed grouping by parameters such as user type, error type, and environment variables
b. Facilitates greater team collaboration by knowing who is causing the error in which module of the project.
https://airbrake.io

Hope these tools help you in successful and timely deployment of your Java application. Write in to us and let us know if you had experience in any of these.

Delicious is a beautiful, easy-to-use and unbelievably useful restaurant finder mobile app, which also lets you order food just with a few taps of your finger. The app can be used to find restaurant reviews, ratings, menus, prices, cuisines and the most happening places in your city.

Features –

1. Find restaurants in your area or search

2. Get restaurant listing, ratings, location info

3. See what’s trending

4. Browse through food and beverages menus and prices

5. Place your order and check out

6. Make instant payment or choose cash on delivery

7. Get SMS and/or email to get order confirmation

8. Rate or review a particular restaurant or bar

9. See where your network is dining and what are their favourite hangouts

To create a restaurant app or food delivery app, contact GoodWorkLabs – the leader in high-end mobile app and product development.

You must have encountered multiple instances of swiping your card at a store to conclude your purchase. Now imagine this scenario in an online world. What changes here is that payment gateway replaces the credit card transaction setup. While the end user sees a seamless movement from shopping cart to the bank and back to the shopping site, what actually happens is, a series of complex actions that allow this seamless transition and successful payment made. This is enabled by payment gateways that bridge the gap between the customer, the merchant and the financial institution/ bank. All this while it also keeps a tab on the security of the extremely confidential credit card/ net banking information that passes through different channels.

With our experience in designing highly functional e-commerce solutions, today we present a few types of payment gateways and its workflow.

1. Hosted payment gateways – this takes the customer out of merchant site to payment service provider (PSP) site. Once the payment is done, the customer will be re-directed to the merchant site.

Pros –

a. Card and financial details are kept secure at PSP end

b. Merchant simply worries about core operations and leaves all security and integrity responsibilities to the PSP

c. Merchant logo and design can be added on PSP site for providing confidence to customer

Cons – An end-to-end experience is missing as the customer has to leave merchant site during the checkout.

Example sites – Paypal Standard, Setcom, Payza

2. Self-hosted payment gateways – Here the customer has to provide details on merchant site itself. The site then routes the data to PSP for further processing.

Pros – Total customization of the look and feel of the page for consistent user experience.

Cons – It is the merchant’s responsibility to maintain the security and confidentiality of the customer details. He will also need to maintain the PCI DSS protocols.

Example sites – Authorize.net ARP, Paypal Pro payment

3. API based non-hosted gateways – In this one, the merchant has full control over the payment process. Right from cart checkout, card authentication, payment details and payment confirmation, everything is carried out on merchant site itself

Pros –

a. The merchant has full control over the checkout process and this gives his customers more confidence to shop with complete peace of mind.

b. By using an API, the merchant can expand the coverage of the payment gateway to other devices such as smartphones and tablets

Cons – The merchant is solely responsible for the security of the transaction. He may have to invest in additional SSL certificates for enhanced security.

Example sites – Braintree, Authorize.net CIM, Stripe

4. Platform based payment gateway – This type of gateway provides a medium to sell goods online directly from their own server. When customer surfs online for a product it is done on the merchant site, but when it the transaction reaches checkout stage, it is re-directed to the payment gateway site.

Pros – Customer can view local language and currency, which in turn, improves overall customer experience

Cons – Offers limited customizability as it is a totally separate platform from the merchant site

Write in to us and leave us a word on which payment gateway do you employ in your e-commerce website.

Coupon Shopping App is a refreshing new design concept created by GoodWorkLabs to assist clients to quickly get up and running with their e-commerce / m-commerce mobile apps by customising it according to their needs. Available on iOS and Android.

Key Features mentioned below –

1. Customer account
2. Offers, discounts, promotions
3. Categories
4. Catalog pages
5. Product detail pages
6. Shopping cart
7. Wishlists / favourites
8. New arrivals and other classification of products
9. Payment process
   • User account
   • Shipping address
   • Delivery options
   • Payment gateway
   • Coupons / Gift vouchers / Promo codes
10. Order tracking
11. Contact details for customer support

GoodWorkLabs specialises in designing, building, maintaining and scaling e-commerce /m-commerce websites and mobile apps. Contact us today for a free quote and consultation to start your e-commerce business.

Last week (https://goodworklabs.com/avoid-cross-platform-app-design-mistakes-by-knowing-more-about-these-distinct-android-elements-part-1/) we had an interesting look at how the spurt in demand for Android operating system has spawned a whole new generation of developers seeking to gain expertise in this challenging yet captivating domain. We continued by looking at how developers tend to re-use iOS app design elements in Android app design and how the common design element unique to Android need to be considered in order to provide an enriching user experience to Android app users.

Some of the common design elements that are found only in Android ecosystem and not in the same form in iOS will include

1. Distinct back navigation
2. Spinner choice selection element
3. Tab navigation
4. Flexibility in screen size

While we covered point1 in our earlier blog (https://goodworklabs.com/avoid-cross-platform-app-design-mistakes-by-knowing-more-about-these-distinct-android-elements-part-1/), we will now continue with other Android-specific design elements that developers need to be careful while porting iOS design elements to Android –

2. Spinners – In Android, selection out of multiple options is enabled by the spinner element. They are extremely easy and versatile to use, and can be used across a multitude of functionalities within an app. One common usage is for data selection in form. For instance if you’re looking to fill up ‘State’ information is US, you might be presented with a spinner that reads a list starting from ‘Alabama’ and ending with ‘Wyoming’. Of these states, you can select one that pertains to your details. In iOS, this is taken care of by iOS action sheet. An example is the calendar that shows different design for Android and iOS.

3. Tab navigation – The key difference between iOS and Android in tab navigation is the placement. While iOS recommends placing it at the bottom of the page, Android suggests keeping the tabs at the top. Remember the different tabs that come up in Google Play Store – ‘Top Free’, Top Paid’ or ‘Featured’? These are the tabs placed on top in Android that allows relevant navigation.

4. Screen size – Since iOS develops apps only for Apple devices, the screen sizes are pretty much standardized (though the advent of iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, change just change all that in Apple). Thus, when using iOS elements, developers need to ensure that they also work on a mind-boggling variety of Android device screen sizes – from 3.5 inch to 7 inch. This huge fragmentation of screen size and device capability brings is own set of design challenges. Android developers need to ensure that their designs are fluid and supple to suit all screen sizes on Android.

Our take on this – Of course development costs do matter, but it should never be at the expense of UI/UX needs of the Android user. When it comes to deriving top class user experience, it is not an option but rather a necessity. Android itself has a great user experience to offer, and extracting the maximum from these unique Android-only elements/functionalities is a good way to enable this. Let us know if you know of any other element that is singularly unique to Android and which needs to be altered specifically if taken from iOS environment.

As of Q3 2013, Android commanded a staggering 81.3% of global smartphone shipments¹. With such a huge market, it is certainly a rewarding career opportunity as an Android app developer. An Android app development company has a challenging task of keeping up with industry evolutions and shifts in customer preferences.

Also, iOS and Android together commanding a mind-boggling 94.7% of market share in Q3 2013¹ in terms of operating systems. Considering this fact, it is no surprise that companies will look to port their existing Android app development proficiencies in making iOS app too or other way round. Many developers tend to begin their app development project by assuming that they will devise an app for iOS too concurrently. While this does work to some extent in bringing down development costs, what if the expenses of cross platform app design mistakes is higher than the benefits provided?

This is precisely what we witness when we try to do too many things at one time. It is a common pitfall to try using a previously designed iOS and simply trying to tweak the iOS experience to suit the Android ecosystem. Though there are similarities in navigation or basic elements of UI, the actual modality in achieving native UI/UX experience is what convinces us to treat Android as a separate development project altogether.

Our take on this – If we know the common mistakes that occur by using iOS designs for Android, and take care to avoid/repeat the same, we can still achieve a distinct look for both iOS and Android app by using most of the elements/components from one platform to another. Today, in this first part of a 2-part blog, we look at some such unique elements in Android that is completely different from iOS and should be accounted for specifically, when porting iOS elements.

1. Back navigation – The iOS comes with its unique and quite visible ‘back’ button. It usually appears on top left corner when user navigates one level above. The rectangular box with left side in form of an arrow shows the name of the ‘one-level-below’ folder as label. Tapping on this takes the user to the previous page or to the earlier level. In Android the same effect is achieved by a curved ‘back’ arrow usually appearing on the bottom left corner. In addition it also has a similar top left placed ‘up’ button on action bar where the main app icon is located. So what do these buttons do exactly?

The ‘back’ bottom button navigates to previous screens and continues doing so till it reaches the Android home screen, even it means traversing across multiple apps in the process. In the ‘up’ arrow however, it will go back one level only till the time it reaches the main view / first view of the app.

Next up in the 2^nd and concluding part, we continue with some more Android-specific elements that need to be looked into when executing cross-platform app design to achieve a fabulous native Android app experience.

1 – http://thenextweb.com/mobile/2013/10/31/strategy-analytics-android-smartphone-shipments-81-3-q3-2013-ios-13-4-windows-phone-4-1/