Zopper Goes Multi Platform, Launches Desktop Site

Zopper, a Delhi-based hyperlocal marketplace has launched its desktop site. The move aims to enhance user-friendliness and appeal, across all online touch points including its mobile app, m-site and the desktop website, as well as improve the product and price discovery experience for its users.

The major reasons cited for the launch of a dedicated website is the increasing consumer preference for bigger screens to view images, especially for high-value purchases like electronics, something which was not possible through the mobile app.

The company will build website content for its desktop platform in order to streamline its users’ discovery journey through retailer ratings, consumer reviews & feedback, expert product reviews and retailer social reviews. This will help users in identifying the best product to buy, the best price on offer and the best seller to buy from, bringing the online purchase experience much closer to the offline world.

Zopper’s hyperlocal approach will also ensure that products ordered through its website will have the faster delivery as compared to other ecommerce websites. The portal will additionally update its website content with helpful product information, articles, blogs, newsletters and company announcements in order to add greater value to the user experience.

Zopper was founded by serial entrepreneurs Surjendu Kulia and Neeraj Jain in 2011. It has to date raised over $27 Mn in venture funding, with the recent $20 Mn Series B in June last year. It is backed by investors such as Blume Ventures, Ventureast, Nirvana Ventures and Tiger Global. It is currently featuring over 15,000+ offline retailers on it mobile marketplace. It also acquired point of sale (PoS) software company EasyPOS for $5 Mn in March this year.

Recently, in May this year, Myntra also ditched its mobile-only strategy and relaunched the desktop site.

For most users a majority of time is spent on checking social media sites, emails and chatting with friends on Smartphones. However, when it comes to ecommerce purchases, it is seen that Smartphone add-to-cart and conversion rates are much lower than for desktop. Globally, an estimated 8.52% of desktop users add to cart and an estimated 2.78% convert to sales. This is much higher than Smartphone conversion rates with an estimated 4.70% add to cart rate and an estimated 0.80% sales conversion rate. This could be a indication that we are getting back to the basics?