Tapping the Indian shopper’s discount psyche

When it comes to shopping, most Indians love to strike a hard bargain and prefer to shop where they can negotiate a good discount on a product or service. GoPaisa.com, an online cash back Web site launched by Aman Jain and his cousin Sugam Jain in December 2012, targets precisely this basic instinct of an Indian shopper.

The site offers cash back and discount coupons on a wide range of products and services spanning travel, lifestyle, apparel, electronics, books, to name a few and has over 300 popular registered online retailers on board. A shopper who logs onto GoPaisa and wants to shop at Myntra or Jabong for instance, will receive whatever discounts are available from the two retailers plus an additional cash back from GoPaisa on his/her purchase.

“Online retailers who are on board with us give us a commission for every sale that we generate. We keep 10 per cent of that commission and pass on the rest to the customer in the form of a cash back. Shopping through GoPaisa will not just get you the best offers from online retailers but also amazing cash back on those purchases, allowing for maximum savings,” explained Aman.

As soon as the retailer confirms your purchase, the cash back on the purchase will be transferred to your GoPaisa account. Shoppers can either request for a cheque or redeem cash back or rewards through the following options — mobile/DTH recharge, movie/event ticket and shopping vouchers. A minimum processing fee of ₹100 on the shoppers’ first cash out, once a year will be charged.

“As the cost of new customer acquisition rises every year, online retailers are only too happy to give us commissions or flat discounts because they get guaranteed sales,” said Aman. At present, we offer a flat cash back of ₹360 on very purchase made on LimeRoad, ₹20 on every purchase on Domino’s and 7.5 per cent reward on every transaction on Flipkart, excluding electronics for which we offer a flat 3 per cent reward, he said.

To get started, sign up on GoPaisa.com to create your account, and browse through your favourite online stores for the best deals.

The fledgling site which counts Expedia, Jabong, Fashionara, Yatra, CromaRetail, HomeShop18, eBay, Fabfurnish and many others as its online retail partners, has already attracted over 2.5 lakh registered users largely in the age group of 20-30, of which 25 per cent are women. The site adds 1,000 new registered users every day. Aman and Sugam started GoPaisa with a curated list of 35,000–40,000 online shoppers which they acquired over the last 10 years through their affiliate marketing efforts to customers in the US, Europe and India, while still in school.

The Web site was bootstrapped with the duo’s combined personal savings — a little under ₹1 crore. The team of 17 has received two firm offers from big private equity companies, which are keen to invest in the GoPaisa proposition. “Although we are still in investing mode, we don’t need any external investors yet,” said Aman, who believes sky is the limit for growth and is confident that the total transaction value at GoPaisa will increase from ₹25 crore today to ₹300 crore by December 2015.

“The total online spend in India is approximately $13 billion of which $10 billion is on travel alone. Online spend is all set to increase from $3 billion at present to $50 billion by 2020. Compare this with China’s online spend which stands at $200 billion today and you can see how online spend in India can grow,” he said.

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