Dukaan aiding small businesses to go digital
Dukaan has over 32 lakh stores created online, with over 5 million products that have been listed across 200 business categories.
Hyderabad: Dukaan, a Made in India app, which enables local stores to become digital and use social media channels to sell their products or services through smartphones, has on boarded over 4 lakh sellers from Telangana. The State is among top markets for the company and continues to show traction.
Pan-India, Dukaan has over 32 lakh stores created online, with over 5 million products that have been listed across 200 business categories. So far, more than nine lakh orders have been received through the platform.
Each seller gets a custom store link where they can showcase all their products or services and the link of the store can be shared with customers using WhatsApp or any other social media platforms for placing direct orders.
The app caters to a wide range of businesses ranging-grocery stores, restaurants, fruits and vegetable stores, electronics shops, jewellery and furniture stores. Businesses can add new categories from time to time making the listing flexible and easy.
Suumit Shah, CEO, Dukaan, told Telangana Today, “Unlike competitors who are focusing on individual verticals such as neighbourhood stores or food industry, we are going horizontal and bringing features to suit each segment or category. Groceries account for just 15 percent of our portfolio as we serve beyond this category. More than 70 per cent of our users are from tier-2 and tier-3 cities. And in the next one year, we want to add 10 million merchants on the platform.”
He added, “We are training the merchants and small business owners how to use the technology platform and increase their revenues by listing out their products and services and connecting them to their target customers. We may explore annual subscription model later for each category. Several e-commerce companies have eventually launched their own brands of products that have high demand, affecting the small businesses who tied up with the platforms for the same products. We will not do this.”
On use of technology, he said, the company is using artificial intelligence and data analytics to understand consumer insights so that merchants understand the demand patterns and plan their inventory accordingly. There are plans to bring together hyperlocal delivery companies to take care of the logistics needs of merchants and businesses.
The company which raised $6.2 million in the last round is keen to remain asset-light focusing on enhancing the digital platform, without getting into spending on any physical infrastructure such as warehouses.
The platform is also going to be available for merchants in several major vernacular languages. Works have begun on five north Indian languages and more will be added in due course of time.
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