Thailand: Lazada, Shopee turn to celebrity ploys

• Apr 24, 2018

Lazada and Shopee are trying to attract millennial consumers, with the former hiring Bella Ranee as brand ambassador while Shopee introduces a series of celebrities on its platform. 
“Local e-commerce competition will become more intense, so Lazada plans to continue to improve our services and reduce e-commerce roadblocks in Thailand — payment and logistics,” said Thanida Suiwatana, newly appointed chief of marketing for Lazada Thailand. 
Thailand’s online retail commerce accounts for 5% of total retail to date, and this figure is likely to increase. 
The company introduced Lazada Wallet, another cashless alternative payment service, along with a rebate programme and special privileges designed to build customer loyalty in the long term. 
“We decided to have Bella as brand ambassador because she is a real user who can speak to the mobile app experience and bring the brand to new generation users,” said Ms Thanida. 
Ms Bella was also the face of the brand’s 11.11 festival sales last year. 
The company plans to launch its same-day delivery service to serve the needs of younger buyers. 
Moreover, Lazada will increase its product categories to serve the 18-25 demographic. Previously its target customer group was adults and office workers. 
Lazada has introduced Chinese products from Alibaba’s Taobao merchants. “We also embrace big data analytics to provide a personalised experience to users,” Ms Thanida said. 
Alessandro Piscini, chief executive of Lazada Thailand, said Jack Ma, the executive chairman and co-founder of Alibaba who visited last week, has proven the significance of the e-commerce market in Thailand. Lazada is the No.1 website visited in Southeast Asia with 100 million visits and 19 million mobile app installations. 
The site has 300 million local and international products. In 2017, at least 75% of Lazada transactions come from mobile devices and 25% from PCs. 
To celebrate its sixth anniversary, the company has offered a special discount of up to 90% during April 25-27. 
Shopee, the Singapore-based e-commerce platform, recently launched the “Shopee Celebrity Club”, which allows celebrities to curate their favourite products for consumers to choose from, ranging from cosmetics and food supplements to facial and body care products, and more. 
Agatha Soh, head of marketing at Shopee, said the launch of celebrity shops is aimed at engaging with users at a greater level, particularly users who are fans of Thai celebrity. 
A recent global study by Carat1 found celebrities are more effective at driving product recall than influencers, at 84% to 73%. 

Source: https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/news/1451438/lazada-shopee-turn-to-celebrity-ploys