OBJECTIVE: To achieve 5% market share in Stainless Steel market by 2022 and establish Amazon.

in as leading
player in the industry with around 1 lakh listed assortments

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The approach to achieving 5 percent market share would focus on identifying different
customer segments and catering to their needs. We have divided the target customers into three profiles and the
entire marketing phase would comprise on targeting each profile differently. The recommendations cater to the
specific issues and changes required in the Stainless-steel market to grow online. The Business impact of these
strategies are quantified and expected growth figures are calculated based on past data and .

BACKGROUND: Amazon.in wish to unlock the growth trajectory for the stainless steel (B2C) market. SS is currently
15,000 Cr industry in India with close to 6000 organized and unorganized manufacturers. Market share of Amazon
in 2018 was less than 1 % with limited assortments. Despite thousands of steel traders, very few are listing their
product online.

KEY ISSUES
 Currently, majority of SS sales takes place through offline channels because customers want to evaluate the
utensils on weight, feel of the surface, thickness, shine, design etc. and sellers are also flexible enough to sell
products in loose. Challenge is to bring these offline customers online as these features are not available online
 Very few traders are trying to list their products online (primarily due to digital illiteracy). They believe e-
commerce to be complex and time consuming
 SS products are long duration products, so retention of customers is another issue
 The purchase experience for the stainless-steel product on Amazon does not provide the customer with an
insight on the shape, size, holding capacity and purpose of the product

RECOMMENDATIONS
Target customer are to be classified into three targets groups profiled below. These profiles are to be targeted
with unique and different marketing strategies.

METRO MILLENIALS URBAN MILLENIALS MATURE CUSTOMERS

Age Range: 22-35 Age Range: 22-35 Age Range: 22-50
Gender: ALL Gender: ALL Gender: ALL
Geographic location: Metro and Geographic location: Tier 2 and Geographic location: Tier1, Tier 2
Tier 1 cities Tier 3 and Tier 3 cities
Income Range: Rs.25k p.m. and above Income Range: Rs.20k p.m. and above Income Range: Rs.25k p.m. and
Occupation: Engineers, Lawyers, Occupation: Engineers, Lawyers, above
Young Managers Young Managers Occupation: Engineers, Lawyers,
Frequent buyers, buy day to day Frequent buyers, buy day to day Managers, Corporate workers
products online products online Online customers who occasionally
Approx Value in this category who buy Approx Value in this category who buy products online, generally in sales
online: 9.1 million buy online: 4.13 million Approx Value in this category who
buy online: 10.8 million

Some recommendations for the issues listed above that could be adopted are:
 To get offline customers online, Amazon’s assisted E commerce project UDAAN could be so that the customers
could have an experience of online buying along with feel, weight etc. other parameters of the product. Once
the customers are comfortable with this model, marketing strategies to shift them completely online would be
implemented as they will get the confidence in Amazon’s online products. This provides a chance to expand the
reach
 A campaign, ‘Steel on Wheels’ that provides a bunch of services such as registration on Amazon, sales training,
cataloging etc. for the traders, to get more traders sell their products online.
 Steps that would incentivize the traders to sell online:
 Older inventory to be sold off first that is increasing the inventory cost for the traders
 Increased number of assortments
 Assured increase in sales to be promoted
 The customer who bought online would be prompted to buy SS gift sets for marriage
and similar occasions to keep them engaged

 Enhancing Purchase Experience: Use of Augmented Reality so that the customer

could get insight on the shape, size and look of the product (Similar to Magnolia
Double Click to play image (AR)
Market and IKEA space). The listing of the products on the website needs to be
categorized in terms of assortments under kitchenware section as follows:
Home, Kitchen & Pets  Kitchen & Dining  Stainless Steel Products  (Listed Assortments)

Marketing Strategies:

 Direct marketing: promotion on events like MasterChef and similar events etc. on television
 Building the omni-channel presence: execution through Online to Offline (O2O) marketing (eg: use of AR)
 Using Digital Marketing techniques such as Content marketing, Retargeting Ad, Influencer marketing, Social
Media marketing, Email Marketing, Affiliate Marketing to retain customers and acquire new customers

Department of Management Studies, IIT Delhi (TEAM CASA)

 TIMELINE AND EXECUTION

Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3

•Target customers: Metro
2019 millenials
•Marketing strategies:
Personalised social media
marketing using analytics to
pitch products according to the
customer profile on their social
media handles
•Expected new customer: 15
Lakhs approx
•Expected market share: 1.8%
•Target customers: Urban
2020 Millenials, Mature Customers
•Marketing strategies:Direct
marketing techniques, Freedom
day sales and Prime day sales
•Expected new customer: 34
lakhs approx
•Expected market share: 3.5%
•Target customers: All online
2021 customers 2022
•Marketing strategies: Direct and
Personalised marketing
•Expected new customers: 29
lakhs approx
•Expected market share: 5.1%

The first phase focusses on targeting the Metro Millennials as these are the ones buying online on a day to day basis and are easier
to pitch new products. This phase also focused on exploring the Assisted E commerce market space and campaigns for the traders
The next phase is focused on occasional buyers with sales and discount offers. This is the phase to expand the product line, bring
more and more traders to sell online and get maximum new buyers. To retain existing customers, gifting stainless steel products for
marriage and similar occasions needs to be targeted.
The last phase is about getting all possible customers into the segment and retaining the old customers while providing them with
amazing purchasing experience and other benefits.

FINANCIAL AND BUSINESS IMPACT

Year (All values in crores) 2020 2021 2022

Total Market Share of Stainless Steel*(A) 15650 16300 16900
Expected Amazon’s Market Share of Stainless Steel
Expected Number of users buying Stainless steel online
for first time$(B) 0.1573 0.3399 0.2964
Average per capita spending on Stainless Steel products by
users buying SS online for first time & (C) 750 775 810
Total Spending by users buying Stainless steel online for
first time(D= B * C) 118.2 263.45 240.1
Total Spending by users who bought stainless steel
products earlier%(E) 163.5 307.05 621.8
Total Market Share (F = D + E) 281.7 570.5 861.9
Total Market Share in % (G = (F/A) * 100) 1.8 3.5 5.1
Note: * -- Per capita consumption of stainless steel is expected to grow at an CAGR of 4.1%. Source: IBEF
$ -- Calculated based on new Customer Acquisition Rate for each segment.
& -- Extrapolation based on the analysis of past spending data on Amazon. Used Google Analytics and
Time series Techniques
% -- Extrapolation based on the analysis of past spending data on Amazon combined with increase in
listing of assortments and marketing techniques. Used Google Analytics and Time series Techniques. Expected
growth 9%.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323485628_Buying_Behavior_of_Amazonin_Consumers
https://www.ibef.org/download/E-Commerce-Report-Oct-2018.pdf
https://www.shopify.com/enterprise/augmented-reality-ecommerce-magnolia-market
https://hbr.org/2016/07/how-amazon-adapted-its-business-model-to-india
https://www.ibef.org/industry/steel-presentation
http://www.stainlessindia.org/