The Mumbai-based O-LINE-O Nexus Pvt Ltd has been launched to help the traditional retail stores to revive, survive and grow in the midst of competition from the big online retailers like Amazon, Flipkart, Alibaba, etc. O-Line-O is driven by the unique concept that helps the consumers to purchase products from the offline stores with or without physically visiting the stores. If the customer wants to purchase a product, O-Line-O will direct the nearest retail store or a store the customer wants to deliver him the product. And if the customer personally wants to visit the retail store, he can do so. In an interaction with Mobility, Vibhooti Prasad, Director, O-LINE-O, shares his companies business-logic, policy, mission and vision.
Vibhooti Prasad shares, “Customers usually want to purchase online thinking that it will save them time and effort. On the other hand, they also have apprehensions about the online purchases as they are not sure if they get what they want and what the online portals actually promise—in terms of quality and originality of the product and the service. Through our platform, the products will be delivered from our connected-store nearest to the customer’s address. There will be no delivery charges and the customers will be charged the same price which they pay if they physically visit the store.”
Vibhooti Prasad adds, “When customers purchase mobile products from retailers, they are always suspicious if they get right products and service. We wanted bridge this trust gap and create a retail platform that help them feel confident that they can trust that they will get the products they need at fair price and they get reliable service. Customers usually want to know what discounts, offers, schemes, etc are available on different products they want to buy. Individual retailers, due to limited resources at their disposal, often find it difficult to market or publicize their products and offers to the customers on larger scale. Usually consumers survey the retail stores within 3 km range where they live; they rarely go beyond those limits. Millennial customers (those born after 1990), if not satisfied with retailers, usually go and purchase online. To help offline retailers, under the prevailing conditions, we thought it is necessary to create a single platform to empower retailers where they can promote their products and services in a more engaging and effective manner to the customers. We also focus on training the individual retailers how to present their products to the consumers and how to improve the look, feel and makeover of their stores. We groom them how to act as advisors to the customers than being simple sellers, which in the long-run help them to do better and sustainable business. The principle is sell what the customer needs, than simply pushing products that give higher margins. For all our services, we charge a nominal fee from the retailers.”
In a nutshell, O-LINE-O merges the online shopping experience with an extended offline service; brings the retail at your doorstep with the services curated particularly for the customers along with the friendly neighbourhood expert to help them. Other benefits include no-cost EMIs, zero down-payment, exclusive offers and more.
“Recently, we held training session on Zoom which was attended by nearly 400 retailers and their employees. Our training is focused not just on how sell to the customers, but by making the customer happy that he will come for repurchase or recommend your retail store to their friends and others. We also train the retailers how to other inexpensive support accessories like mobile holders which could delight the consumers. The whole focus is on how to modernize the traditional channel in a way they can survive and flourish. Several brands do not feel comfortable to deal directly with the retailers. So we have tie-up with several big brands and we act as a transit point to reroute the products to the retailers. Currently we have 75 retailers in our membership. By 2022, we want to rope in 5000 retailers. We are getting very good response from the retailers in Mumbai (Chamund Electronics-Bhandup (W); Hari Om Electronics—Cotton Green (W); Nice Electronics, Vikroli (E). We recently added three more stores to our network. Right now we are present well in Mumbai, and we are also expanding into other cities in Maharashtra soon,” concludes Vibuti Prasad.