by William Low | 8th of June 2021
E-commerce in Malaysia has accelerated to a higher pace despite the already high growth rate that was forecasted before the covid-19 pandemic.
The pandemic has shifted how everyone lives even the way we shop, especially for those who have yet to jump onto the shopping online bandwagon. Not just the way shop for products but also the way buy take-aways and many others.
The pandemic did accelerate all other digitalisation efforts from food ordering to the online parking system. And this is also the first time that a government enforces a law that one must download an app to manage the covid-19 pandemic, the MySejahtera app. I see more happenings coming for the MySejahtera. I do see huge potential coming from the MySejahtera system infrastructure and also the ready habitualised users of the app.
I would like to point out is that digitalisation is accelerating, and it is even getting faster now. But what I would be discussing today is the e-commerce pillar.
E-commerce is picking up, and we would like to share some of the insights that we have gathered while we are continuously improving ourselves, which we would like to share with our followers
The revised growth rate
The e-commerce growth rate is forecasted to grow at 17% until 2023 despite pressure on overall economic sectors and activities.
Penetration rate
Malaysia has one of the highest penetration rate in South East Asia, beating neighbouring countries. However the penetration growth has slowled down, has come to an inflection point, considering the current high penetration rate. Do not mistake penetration to overall e-commerce growth rate.
Mobile commerce
Mobile commerce a subset of overall e-commerce is also taking the lead. It is growing at close to 20% CAGR vs overall growth of 17%, which makes m-commerce an USD8.9 billion market. The report shows that 52% of buyers in Malaysia chooses mobile devices over desktop, which is slightly lower than China and Singapore which represents 60% and 78% respectively.
Social media
Social media also playing an important role in e-commerce. Out of the 57% e-commerce transaction that are done on a mobile device, 62% are complete in an app. The report also shows that Facebook is still the preferred social media platform followed by Instagram and ⅙ of Malaysian spend 9 hours on social media. Basically this presents an opportunity to e-commerce integrating with social media.
Payment gateway
What is a great insight is that the primacy choice of payment in e-commerce is bank transfer rather than credit or debit cards. Out of total transaction 44% are done via bank transfers as oppose to 39% by cards.
We hope that these insights that we have gathered have given some ideas to your e-commerce strategies.
In our views, Synagics propose to get selling online now. Start fast and simple. Either on the e-marketplace like Lazada or shopee or your own e-commerce website.
You don’t really need an e-commerce website actually to start selling, but that e-commerce website is your base, your headquarters, your brand and your customer relationship management. You can do much more with your e-commerce website for your customers.
Implement a payment gateway that accepts bank transfers. Most of the payment gateway today does accept bank transfers.
Establish a team for continuous improvement, for example on areas like lifetime value, marketing, reach, offer and designs and visuals.
How to establish a team, can be done either by hiring a team that already has the know-how, which can be costly to start or train the existing team to have the capabilities.
Alternatively, you can also choose an partnering agency to work with that can able to complement your existing team.
In Synagics, we work with our clients on their goals and objectives. We have a complete team that can provide the necessary skills and strategies for your e-commerce journey. On top of that, we also provide training solutions to help you establish a team internally for the long run.
If you need assistance on what was discussed, feel free to reach out to Synagics. We can have a discussion over coffee.