BigShoeBazaar is an interesting startup that has setup an online store to buy branded shoes. The store currently boasts of 30 brands (right fro
m Bata, Woodlands, Reebok to Red Tape/Mardi Grass and more), 2500+ designs and a huge inventory of 14,750+ shoes.
BigShoeBazaar has build cool set of features to get pass the Indian consumer’s skepticism towards buying lifestyle products on the Internet:
- Multi-angled photography / six times zoom – so that you can view the shoes from all possible angle and get a “touch and feel” experience!
- If you aren’t too sure of the shoe size, get the measurement chart and find out your shoe size (such mini-features definitely removes the barrier to explore the site/shoes; and encourages customers to “try out” the product)
- If you are still not sure whether to order size 8 or 9, BugShoeBazaar recommends it’s customers to buy both the pairs and return the misfit one.
- Live chat with the support team: one of the major reasons for shopping cart abortion has been the lack of interactivity with the store; and live chat is the most efficient solution to get the customer query resolved while she is in the buying decision stage.
Overall, the site is very well AJAXed (has some issues with FireFox) and I am really impressed with the ease of selection/navigation.
But the bigger question is that unlike grocery shopping (which is a chore activity), buying branded shoes is still considered as lifestyle shopping experience. And I am not too convinced whether an online store can replace the offline experience, or should even attempt to!
Like InfiBeam, I too believe in lead generation model (for online retailers who are in lifestyle products). But times, they are a changing (and I might be completely wrong)!
What’s your take on BigShoeBazaar?
- Will you buy shoes from their online store?, or
- Instead go to the nearest shopping mall and try out different brands/styles?, or
- Will you use BigShoeBazaar’s site to get a “feel” of shoes (price/style etc), finalize few specific options in your mind and then go the nearest shopping mall and buy the shoes?
I’d love to know your opinion.
Recommended read: Report: eCommerce in India
I would just use the site to compare prices, then go to a showroom and buy.. am not convinced tat people would be buying shoes online; Even in the showrooms, after trying out many ones, many people are confused, no way they would buy online…
How can i know that the Choosen shoe fits with my foot size and as there lot of gol-mal in duplicate sole attached with shoe, which happned me last week. There is less chance to buy online [esp physical wearing materials]. Ppl like to touch-feel-experience scenario. Arvind is right here.
I believe the business can be successful with people having more disposable incomes and less time to buy. The next step for bigshoebazaar should be to have an offline presence and a well known brand Amabassador. Not that they can be substitutes for word of mouth but will help people to be able to trust them…
Not sure how many people plan their shoe buying in advance. Its usually impulsive or last minute buying for me. The internet is the last place I would go looking for shoes. Besides, its not just the size but the fit that matters – who wants to go through the hassle of returning a pair after finding that they arent as comfortable. On another note, how many pairs of shoes does one buy in a year? So the repeat customer angle wont work – which means they will have to spend moolah on new customer acquisition. Also, if you want to gift someone a pair of shoes, its way to inconvenient to purchase them online (what if the person receiving them wants to exchange) – so BSB is losing out on that segment of customers as well.
They have a good framework and should possibly consider adding more products to their kitty (other designer brand products like sunglasses, watches, beddings, etc) – those for which a registered customer can consider visiting the site 2-3 times a year or more. Not sure how easy the return process is – but that could a major factor as well in BSB’s success. All you need is a few bad experiences in the returns process to generate negative PR.
I think this is an AWESOME site. I loved their “Take 2 Keep 1″ policy. Thats confidence !!
Also, I love the mouse-over marquess and the relatively clean website.
And guys, I think online retailing is here to stay. Check out Zappos. Its doing great and I hate their website.
Here’s a Zappos case study and an article on how they became No.1 shoe online retailers.
I think BigshoeBazaar are going the right way and if they are true to their “customer-centricism” I think they will do good. I loved the small details like the Shoe-size table, the option of getting a size-corrector , etc.
As far as apprehensions for buying online stuff is considered, you will find that people from even the remote villages of India are buying apprels like Sarees and Kurtas from sites like Futurebazaar (source : Kiruba Podcast interview with FutureBazaar CEO)
I don’t see why I won’t buy from here !!! Thumbs up from my side.
One BIG complaint to the bigShoeBazaar guys though. The website is not browser agnostic. I could not zoom or rotate the shoe from my Firefox browser from Linux. And I DON’T use Windows at all and I can say the same for a few thousand friends of mine.
One of the first issues i noticed with the site is that the home page is very Busy. There are multiple items of information jostling for the user’s attention and there is no direct Call to Action to the user.
I wanted to browser using categories and it took me a 1-2 minutes to figure out where to get started. Most users will bail out by that time.
Weirdly enough, clicking on the “Place your Order” button takes the user to a page that says – “Your shopping Cart is empty”… continue Shopping. Seems like a bug.
AT this time, I would not be able to buy something from the site, even if I wanted to.
Its a fraud website ….just waste of money and ur precious time calling up them daily .
No way am I going to buy shoes online. online is fine for standard items like Books, Movie Tickets, Travel and to a certain extent grocery, flowers etc – but definitely not for shoes!!!