MKAG15203 Information Technology for Corporations

1.0 Introduction/background of the product

Knitting products never goes out of fashion, our toys and novelties knitting patterns are
fun to make and are the perfect gift to a friend or loved one. We have a unique variety of
toys and novelty knitting patterns including teddies, cuddly animal toys, festive friends,
knits for dolls, hand puppets, home accessories and even a knitted advent calendar. In
consideration of expanding businesses and attract new customers, the products called as
Adorable Handknit Amigurumi Miffy is selling through online platform and gaining
positive feedback from the customers.

1.1 Benefits/Justifications for going online

Selling direct online increases the chances reach to consumers. By going online platform,
our products are never again constrained by the quantity of clients and we could sell
crosswise over towns, states, and even crosswise over outskirts, expelling every single
geographical limitation. The online platform also allows us to cater to shoppers who find
it more convenient to browse and buy at times when retail locations are not traditionally
open. Online shopping can save time for both the consumers and seller, reducing phone
calls about availability, specifications, hours of operation or other information easily
obtains from the product pages.

On the other hand, online platform provides real time data and analytics about products
and customers. “Products ratings” allows to see how people interact with the site, what
products interest them, what they left in their cart and how much the average purchase
was. This valuable metrics allow seller to make adjustments to meet customer’s needs.
By having the products listed online, the platform improves the chances of appearing in
search engine results pages and draw local buyers attention. And best of all, the website is
always selling, which is open 24/7/365 with virtually none of the overhead of a brick-
and-mortar location.

1.2 SWOT analysis

A SWOT analysis is a framework that is used to analyze a company’s competitive
positioning in its business environment. This will involve the identification of its internal

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Strengths (S) and Weaknesses (W) followed by the identification of the Opportunities (O)
and Threats (T) it faces in its extensive business environment.

1.2.1 Strengths
Children's toys and games constantly evolve. Intertwined with technology, most toys are
more advanced than computers were two decades ago. Video games are also being used
by younger children.

i)Market growth and lower overhead costs

The rise in disposable income and the growth of online sales are the primary drivers of
the growth of this market. Many international and local vendors sell toys and games
through e-retailing that helps in promotion of their brands. The prices offered to a
customer are often lower online due to the reduction in overhead costs. The rising
demand for eco-friendly toys is also expected to boost the market growth. Eco-friendly
toys are made from the materials like wood, cardboard, and organic cotton.

ii)High Barriers Entries and Limited Competition

Knitted toys are unique products and its availability is limited. Our handmade toys
materials consists of 80% cotton and 20% milk fiber and the material components subject
to the customer’s needs. Due to the product uniqueness, a special skill sets is required and
time range is needed to finish a knitted toys. This specialty contributes to our business
growth and achieve higher profit margin. On the other hand, we do have great feedback
from our customers in terms of quality and good value of money. Our knitted toys can
used as desktop, furnishings, home, room decoration, also a good gift for kids and
friends.

1.2.2 Weaknesses
i)Competitors can offer similar products quickly
Due to the competitive business environment, competitors could offer similar products in
order to capture the market needs. Due to their stronger financial position and capital,
most of the toys manufacturers can manufacture their products through advance office

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equipment or technology and gain financial advantages through economies of scale.

Hence, the high cost of doing business and limited cash flow are among common
financial weaknesses that would likely to face by our business team.

ii)Limited flexibility in pricing

The unit price of knitted toys quoted by the providers is considered moderate. However,
in consideration of limited market demand and higher administrative and transportation
cost, the selling price could not be set at higher price and the shipping fee shall be bear by
the purchasers.

1.2.3 Opportunities
i)Continue expansion for online sales
Aside from setting up the online sales at Shopee, there are few e-commerce platforms for
us to expand the business and consumers could easily approach to our products, for
instances, 11th street, Lazada, and etc.. By utilizing the online platform, consumers getting
known to our products easily and indirectly it save certain of overhead expenses.

ii)Development of distribution relationship and affiliate relations with related suppliers

We find development of distribution relationship is important when expanding the
business. We ensure to deliver high quality, good value of money and deliver the products
within the timeframe by having good relationship with the goods providers. On the other
hand, aside from handmade knitted products suppliers, we do approach and encourage
different goods and service providers to run the business at the same time.

1.2.4 Threats
i)Entering an overly saturated market
It’s a crowded marketplace out there and full of businesses vying for the attention of the
same consumers. We understand the necessary to distinguish our knitted toys from the
competitors, and this is essential for getting heard over all the other noise being made.
This is no easy feat, but factors such as developing a strong Unique Selling Point (USP)
or building an effective marketing strategy will have a real advantage over our

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competitors. Prior to online platform, we do have strong customer base and personalized
or customization of products and services to the customers.

ii) Intense competition from other toy stores

Kids and adults love toys. Toys are more than just fun and games for kids. Most toys
provide at least some opportunity for children to learn. The best toys engage a child’s
senses, spark their imaginations and encourage them to interact with others. There are lots
of toys that encourage this type of learning, from simple alphabet puzzles to high-tech
electronic gadgets. These can give themselves a head start by introducing the things he or
she will be learning in school. Kids who are in school can supplement their learning with
fun and educational toys. Our knitted toys, however is far from the educational purposes
since our customer base majority are adults, which is mainly for personal and collection
purposes.

2.0 Setting-up B2C E-Commerce

2.1 Selection of B2C Platform
After performing some research and considering some critical factors, our group has
decided to choose Shopee Malaysia (website shopee.com.my) as our B2C platform.

When selecting a suitable B2C e-commerce platform, there are three (3) general
considerations that our group take into account:

a) Make sure the platform contains the core set of features that drive a customer's online
experience, including search, personalization and promotions, and the analytics to tie
those three elements together. The ability to target content and products with consumer
incentives across the consumer's shopping journey is essential to giving the consumer a
differentiated shopping experience.
b) Make sure the platform is agile enough to give business users the tools they need to
rapidly change content. Business users need a 360-degree view of their customers, along
with a promotions and campaign engine they can control, so they can attract customers
and induce them to make purchases.

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c) Make sure the platform incorporates operational efficiencies that reduce costs and
provide an upgrade process that requires little regression testing and no recoding. As our
group is selling only one or two types of products, it is critical that the B2C platform
chosen imposes minimal operating costs for the seller.

In terms of marketing, our group has decided on geographic segmentation where we

target consumers in the Southeast Asia region. Our target customers are those that
primarily uses mobile applications and online shopping for purchases of required
products and/or services.

The estimated monthly traffic from the top 10 e-commerce websites demonstrates Shopee

and Lazada's  dominance over the Malaysian  market  with
approximately 20 million visitorseach month. The pack of supporters ranges from
400,000 to 4 million visitors per month. Based on data updated as at end of May 2019,
Lazada Malaysia has a monthly traffic estimate of 20,000,000 whereas Shopee Malaysia
has a higher traffic estimate of 20,900,000 (“Top 10 e-commerce sites in Malaysia 2019
- ASEAN UP,” n.d.).

The main attraction of Shopee Malaysia for new sellers like our group is that it is
commission free, unlike Lazada, where you pay a percentage for every sale. Apart from
that, it also provides free shipping for the first 5kg (“Compare eCommerce Marketplaces
- 11Street, Lazada, Lelong, Logon, Shoppu, Shopee, eBay - Malaysia Shopping Cart
& E-Commerce Solution,” n.d.). A big sigh of relief for us as new sellers. Also,
you might not get the exposure Lazada gives, but still it is a good platform to
showcase your products to the maximum customers as it offers uploading your
products with the help of a mobile app.

Furthermore, we can enjoy the below benefits by using Shopee Malaysia:

i) Shopee now overtakes Lazada as the top mobile shopping apps and e-commerce
in Malaysia when it rank as the best app on both Google Play and iOS App store.
Since its inception 2015, it has been a mobile first e-commerce portal which then

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launched its mobile application as a mobile C2C marketplace across Southeast

Asia.
ii) Interactive whereby customer can communicate directly with the seller via chat
service available. They’re also allowed to even make a bargain for their purchase
and for every transaction performed.
iii) Keyword Bid also has made Shopee’s diferent than Lazada which only had
keywords for premium seller but at Shopee, it is open for all sellers.
iv) Free custom handling fee. There will be no hidden or extra charges imposed.

2.2 Account Registration

Figure 1: Shopee Seller Account Registration

Signing up is quick and easy! We registered using a team member’s hand phone number.
We then verified the phone number before choosing a username and password.
We can then access our Shopee account using Shopee username and password. The
evidence of our registration is depicted in Figure 1 above.

2.3 Keyword Selection and Analysis

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When running an ecommerce website, our primary goal is to make more sales and this
is different from the goal we have on a ‘normal’ website, which is to get more traffic.
To make more sales, we need targeted traffic and above all, traffic that converts.
While there many ways to increase our website’s traffic and many reasons why this
is not happening yet, it all starts with good keyword research.

Keyword research is important because knowing what people are looking for can help
us provide the search engines with the right content and also give our customers
content using terms (terminology and context) they can understand.
These are the steps that our team has taken to select keywords:
Step 1: Amazon
Amazon is the biggest ecommerce store online and many studies have shown that
people looking to buy something, start their search with Amazon (and not Google or
any other search engine or platform). So, if this is what people are doing, we should
follow their path and start our keyword research with Amazon.
We visited Amazon website and start typing a keyword that describes our product.
Amazon suggest immediately provided us an overview of what people are searching
related to our keyword. Refer to Figure 2 below. At a glance, we can see the most
popular categories (miffy toys, miffy stuffed animals, miffy books and etc.).

Figure 2: Keyword selection and analysis

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We took it a step further and selected a category to view the results and look into the
left sidebar. We opened the product page and took a closer look at the product title
and description. We also took note of the keywords used in the title and description
i.e. Miffy, handmade, Amigurumi stuffed toy because these can be used later to find
long tail keywords related to the product.

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Step 2: Use Google Search

Now that we have a better idea on what people are searching on Amazon, it’s time to
look into Google and the best way to start our keyword research is by visiting
Google.com.

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We found that the term “Amigurumi” is a term related to “stuffed toy using Japanese
art of knitting or crocheting small, stuffed yarn miffy”. Thus, our group decided this
is a great keyword to describe our product.

Step 3: Use Google Keyword Planner

Next, we utilised Google Keyword Planner (GKP), which is a free keyword research tool
developed by Google. It was originally created to help Google Adwords users find high-
volume, low competition keywords to plan their pay-per-click (PPC) ad campaigns,
however, it also happens to be a good tool for judging keywords’ monthly search volume
and for finding closely related keywords.

Upon checking with “Google Keyword Planner”, we found out that competition is
“low” for keyword “amigurumi miffy”. “Low completion keywords” are those
keywords that have a good monthly search volume but relatively low competition. This is
great news for our group because our primary goal is to find and optimize our e-
commerce platform for ‘Low competition keywords’.

2.4 Product Information, Product Publishing and Display

After completing the keyword research, we developed our product description and
information on Shopee Seller e-commerce platform as shown in Figure 3 below. We have
decided to include descriptions of materials and dimensions of the product. A disclaimer

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“Please allow a little size error due to manual measurement” is included.

Figure 3: Product Description

Our product display is shown in Figure 4 below.

There are four (4) colour options available for the handknit miffy i.e. blue, orange,
yellow and green.

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In order to establish an effective e-commerce product page, we used the below

elements:
1) Eye-catching, engaging visuals
We ensured that our feature image are catchy and clear in order to force your visitors to
pay attention. We have also added whitespace as it helps the eye focus on what matters
the most. Basically, adding whitespace around our picture will help reduce noise and
increase clarity when it comes to showcasing our product. This is depicted in Figure 5:
Product picture below.

2) Use only HD definition

It goes without saying that high definition visuals are incredibly important. In order to
ensure that our potential customers are able to drool over our product on any screen
resolution, we gave them our best pictures!

3) A unique, awesome product description

A recent study led by Shotfarm showed that “detailed descriptions” ranked first in the top
3 factors that influence a customer’s decision to buy, higher than “reviews” (in 2nd
position) and “price” (in 3rd position). As we already know, an average visitor only
spends 15 seconds on your product page: so we decided it’s time to be impactful. As
part of our marketing strategy, we have decided to “sell benefits, not features,” which
means that we have to emphasize the result, not the product. Thus, we added the feature
“a perfect gift for all happy occasions” in our product description. The product is
made of 80% Cotton + 20% Milk Fiber so, safe for any age group.

4) Resourceful guidance and help

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Our e-commerce website displayed clear information about:

 Prices and any value-added tax;
 Shipping fees
 Refund policy
 Size guides

Additionally, our e-commerce website has a live chat feature so that online buyers are
able to get in touch or interact with us. By ensuring that online buyers are able to get in
touch, it will help to increase conversion rates and decrease abandon rates of buyers.

2.5 Pricing and cost strategies

According to Kotler and Armstrong (2012), in the literature on pricing, there are three
fundamental strategies one can use in the process of deciding the price. The origin of
their model on pricing strategies can be traced back to the first book published by Kotler
in 1967: ”Marketing Management: Analysis, Planning, and Control”. However, Cost-
based Pricing is from the corporation’s perspective and Customer Value-based and
Competition-based are from the customer’s and competition’s perspectives, respectively.
We have illustrated the difference in the processes of the three pricing strategies in
Figure 6.

1.Customer Value-based pricing - relies on the fact that, in the end, it is the customer who
chooses whether or not the price is right, not the business, and the price should reflect the
customers’ perceived value of the product or service

2.Competition-based pricing - relies on the assumption that the customer’s decision to

buy depends on the prices that competitors charge for similar products (Kotler and
Armstrong, 2012)

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3.Cost-based pricing - relies on the fact that the business’s total costs, which include, but
are not limited to, costs for producing, distributing and selling, need to be covered and on
the business’s desired profit margin on top of those costs.

Figure 6: Processes of the three pricing strategies

As for our product, we determine the price based on the competition-based pricing.
Where we made a survey through internet i.e instragram, lazada, shoppee and facebook
for the similar product. Then, we deduct the raw materials cost and decided the price for
the product.

Since the raw material is quiet cheap and the product itself is a handmade that require lots
of labor cost. We then decided to sell our product, Adorable Handknit Amigurumi Miffy
at RM10 per unit. We choose the sell it online via shopee, the most reliable online
shopping in Souteast Asia and Taiwan.

The details on we decide our price are as follows:

a. Market-Oriented Pricing

Comparative pricing refers to using competitor pricing data as a benchmark and

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consciously pricing our products below theirs.

Outpricing our competitors can influence price-conscious customers to purchase our

products over similar ones. However, this “race to the bottom” from a pricing perspective
isn’t always the best strategy for every business and product.

Here’s how we sum up the advantages and drawbacks:

 Pros: This strategy can be effective if you can negotiate with your suppliers to obtain
a lower cost per unit while cutting costs and actively promoting your special pricing.

 Cons: This can be difficult to sustain when you’re a smaller retailer. Lower prices
mean lower profit margins, and so you’ll have to sell higher volume than
competitors. And, depending on the products you’re selling, customers may not
always reach for the lowest-priced item on a shelf.

Based on our survey, most of the Miffy are made by factory which sell in a bulk and
cheapest price. For the handmade toys, the product is selling around RM15 – RM30
per item.
We sell our product below the competitor, to lure customers into our Shoppee page
over theirs.
b. Our Cost-Plus Pricing is as follows:

Cost Price (RM)

Material Cost 5
Labor Cost (no actual cost incurred) 5
Overhead Expenses – Shipping 6.90
Total 16.90

As we are new in the industry, we not markup the price and use our total cost as a selling
price. Since the item is a handmade, we take labor cost as our profit when we sell this our
product.

We also getting another profit from the shipping. As the net cost for shipping is only
RM6.90, we charge our customer for RM10. Where we will gain another RM3.10 profit.

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c. Profit and Loss

As to date, we manage to sell 3 Adorable Handknit Amigurumi Miffy. Our profit and loss
statement is as follows:

Adorable Handknit Amigurumi Miffy

Profit & Loss Statement
Account Name (RM) (RM)
Sales 30
Gain from shipping Cost 9.30
(3.1*3
Total Income 39.30

Expenses
Material Cost (5*3) 15
Labor Cost (5*3) -
Shipping cost (6.9*3) 20.70 35.70

Total Expenses

Profit 3.60

The total profit we made for selling the product is RM3.60. We not include the labor cost
since there is no actual cost incurred.

2.6 Logistics handling and customer services

Pos Malaysia has the widest reach in Malaysia, thanks to its status as the sole postal
service provider in Malaysia, an analyst points out. It also commands about 40% of the
courier market of about 30 competitors. It also has a strong brand name and possess 38%
market share as the leading domestic courier company in Malaysia.
Pos Laju a subsidiary of Pos Malaysia is the leading courier company in Malaysia,
connecting over 80% of populated areas across the country with its Next Day Delivery
and other services. Pos Laju has the widest network coverage and the largest courier fleet
in Malaysia. Pos Laju’s suite of products and services are available at more than 1,000
outlets comprising of 704 Pos Malaysia outlets, 264 Pos Mini outlets, 68 Pos Laju

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branches, 151 authorised agents, 24 Pos-On-Wheels, 6 Pos Laju kiosks, 13 Pos Laju
service centres and 4 Pos Laju Go2U mobile units.

With the widest delivery network coverage that reaches practically every geographic area
in Malaysia, as well as its presence in over 1,000 strategic locations across the country,
Pos Laju provides better convenience and accessibility to connect all of Malaysia and
beyond.

Pos Laju has also appointed over 100 authorised agents which enables customers to get
access to Pos Laju’s services at IKOBANA (44 outlets), Mail Boxes Etc. (MBE) (50
outlets), MPH Bookstore (15 outlets), PROTON Edar branches and dealers (21 outlets)
and individual agents (66 outlets). This not only extends the coverage of courier service
to areas where Pos Laju outlets are inaccessible, but also enables customers to reach these
services beyond normal working hours and during weekends.

For our product, we choose Pos Laju as our logistics to deliver the product to customers.
It is reliable and convenient and easy to track the packaging.

3.0 Digital Marketing Tools and Strategies

Digital Marketing Tools

Shopee is the leading e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia and Taiwan that provides
customers with an easy, secure and fast online shopping experiences through strong
payment and logistical support.

Back then, Shopee started to attack the market aggressively without charging the sellers
any commission fees (a percentage upon the sale of products). The commission fee is still
ZERO at the moment, except for Shopee Mall Seller as Shopee will start charging 3% to
5% (depending on the product category) starting from 1 May 2019 onwards.

Shopee is running the "Free 5kg Shipping Program" which offers advantages to both the
sellers and buyers. With this program, Shopee will subsidize up to 5kg for deliveries

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within West Malaysia and 1kg to East Malaysia per order via Pos Laju.

Shopee provide the real live chat with the potential customers to ask on the product. With
Shopee live chat, sellers can assist potential buyers in real time. Besides providing a good
shopping experience for Shopee customers, this also helps the sellers to increase the
conversion rate.

By providing good product quality and excellent customer service, this will encourage
buyers to leave a good rating and review at our online store. With higher shop's
reputation, we will gain higher trust from our potential new customers. When the store
and products are likely to rank higher it will gain more exposure and sales opportunities.

Strategies

In a world where word-of-mouth marketing continues to be the best way to earn the trust
of your target audience, Referral Marketing strategies are becoming increasingly popular.
After all, 92% of people say they’re more likely to trust recommendations coming from
people they know.
Modern customers have a louder voice than they had only a few decades ago. Once, if
your customers decided to share their thoughts about your brand with their friends and
family, those comments would only stay within that very tight circle of people. Now,
everything your clients say about you is available for the whole world to see.

Figure 7:Marketing Growth Strategy

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Our marketing strategy is start with selling in the Shopee and influence our family and
friend to buy the products. When the satisfied with the product the referral marketing will
begin where they also will promote the product to their other friend.

The second stage is to ensure our customer service is good and we can keep out loyal
customer together to add the new potential customers. The last stage, is to be competitive
in the market where we need to enhance our product and follow market demand.

4.0 Project outcome

Falk et al (2005) in their study about e-commerce noticed, that online buying behaviour
of majority of customers was affected by a mix of consumer shopping orientation and
perceived channel utilities. During the project, we learnt various new aspects of selling
and marketing along with troubleshooting which we may not have experienced otherwise.
The major outcomes from the project that we came across, include the following:

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a) Decision regarding the product to be sold: For this, all the group members
came up with different choices such as coffee, organic products etc. but as the
time period during which the product had to be obtained and sold was just around
2 months, we decided to go for something that was readymade, readily available
and easier to handle for the purpose of logistics. After some research &
deliberations, we decided to go ahead with Handknit Amigurumi Miffy. We did a
SWOT analysis for the same & compared it with other products.
b) Obtaining the raw material or the product that had to be sold: The product is
handknit and is made of yarn which is 80% cotton and 20% milk fibre. The
product was prepared by an acquaintance who had tried to sell the product earlier
on Etsy at a higher price range.
c) Deciding the online shopping or ecommerce website that “provides the best
advantage”: Ho and Wu (1999) discovered that there are positive relationships
between online shopping behavior and five categories of factors, which include e-
stores’ logistical support, product characteristics, websites’ technological
characteristics, information characteristics, and homepage presentation.
The reason for using Shopee as a preferred platform, have already been mentioned
in detail in earlier parts of assignment. Additionally, Shopee provides a layer of
protection to buyers by holding their money and only releasing it to the seller
once a product has been received, thus providing an extra trust element to both
sellers and buyers.
d) Deciding the price for the object: It is a well-known fact, that customers make
the decision of buying from either place based on factors like who is offering the
best value for the product (Keeney 1999). The price was discussed and decided
after researching for similar products across different websites, social media sites
and even the physical shops. During the process, we kept our supplier in loop for
her input regarding the costs that were incurred while making the Miffy & the
returns, she expects after selling those.
e) Setting up sellers account on Shopee and putting up the product for sale with all
the details and unique keywords. The photographs were clicked in HD and put up

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in the way where they appear attractive and personal. The relationship between
product quality and customer trust and purchase intention is positively correlated.
The more complete the attributes of product quality are described by seller and
more useful information is included, the greater the consumer's trust in goods is
and the stronger is their willingness to purchase. Xiu-ping, L., & Wan-teng, Z.
(2018, December) Also, the sellers account was set up and linked to a group
member’s bank account so as to make the transaction smoother and faster. Safe
and convenient payment methods are an important guarantee for online
consumers purchase.

f) Handling logistics and deciding on the delivery and handling charges:

Logistics & delivery handling is an extremely important part of online shopping.
Quick delivery and updating customers about their product processing/shipping
status makes them feel more comfortable and enables consumers to estimate
waiting time and plan ahead, thus mitigating the impact of uncertainty. Excellent
service quality also provides leverage for new retailers to overcome the negative
impact of low recognition. (Westbrook and Oliver 1991)

g) Working on the market strategies for the product: For this we mostly relied on
“Word of the mouth” strategy as well as putting the links of product on social
media platforms. The unprecedented growth in the number of online business
players has called for adoption of new marketing strategies, new media and out of
box thinking to influence the customer to visit the site and make purchases. Kaur,
H., & Kochar, R. (2018).

h) Sales: Online shopping decision-making includes information seeking,

comparison of alternatives, and choice making. The results bearing on this factor
directly influence consumers’ purchasing behavior. Li, N., & Zhang, P. (2002).

For this assignment, we managed to sell the 3 pieces of the Miffy and got 2
customers. Both orders were made almost after 10 days of putting up the object

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on sale and were placed almost 10 days apart. To give the best possible experience
of buying to these customers, we tried to process the transaction as quickly as
possible. Also, we updated the customers regarding their expected delivery times
so as to make it convenient for them to collect the delivery. We also encouraged
customers to ask or chat about any possible queries they might have, regarding the
product even after the sales and leave a feedback with pictures after they receive
the product which may help other customers to make a decision.
Satisfaction is generally believed to exert a dominant influence on key post-
purchase consumer attitudes and activities, such as complaints, word of mouth,
and repurchase behavior (Bettman, 1979). Keaveney and Parthasarathy (2001)
also recommend that managers target customer retention strategies at both pre-
and post-purchase stages of the consumer's decision process.

5.0 Issues Encountered & Recommendations

Kesh, Ramanujan and Nerur (2002) stated that in the success of e-commerce, one of the
most important factors is security. According to Pan and Zinkhan (2006), privacy issues
majorly affect the trust of the consumer towards the online retailer. As we were relatively
new sellers on the Shopee platform and we did not have any customer testimonials that
added to our authenticity as a seller, we mainly had to advertise through our
acquaintances & friends. For any new seller, it is understandable that customers will have
legitimate privacy concerns while making payments and providing personal information
etc., which thus prove to be obstacles in selling products. Over the time, with increasing
sales and customer feedback, these concerns can be minimized & converted to sales.

There were few technical issues that we faced regarding the Shopee website mainly with
updating the consignment numbers and thus there was a delay in Shopee releasing the
payment. Regarding this, our groupmate complained to Shopee and got it resolved. But
the same issue happened for the other orders as well which again, required intervention.
For any new seller, there are technical difficulties which need patient handling and proper
management.

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Also, we realized that instead of depending on one product for sales on Shopee, we
should have tried to procure more products and add to the variety instead of the quantity
of the same object. According to Haubl and Trifts (2000), potential consumers typically
screen a large set of products in order to identify a subset of promising alternatives that
appears to meet their needs. They then evaluate the subset in greater depth, performing
relative comparisons across products based on some desirable attributes and make a
purchase decision.

Apart from being consumers for online shopping sites, none of our group members had
any experience in marketing or online selling. So, doing this assignment also gave us an
insight into the world of sellers and the difficulties and challenges faced by them. The
free shipping promo by Shopee upto 5 kgs of the product is highly advertised but the
conditions to avail those are not very clear, due to which we had to ask our customers to
pay for delivery charges that accounted for almost half the cost of the product.

6.0 Key Learning Points

In summary, we find that we do need more sales and more customer feedbacks in order to
increase customer trusts and improve on our products. The top 5 important matters to
customers comprise of value for money, product price, product cost. Secondly, it comes
to the customer service and sees if we could provide satisfactory service to them. For eg.
Every customer does expect the seller could provide necessary information and instant
response to them while they are having queries or require for more clarification. Thirdly,
as a product seller, customers are expecting us to be reliable and keeping our promises to
deliver goods in timely manner. Fourthly, every customer is expecting the product quality
is within or above the market standard and it makes them feel good value for the money.
Last but not least, ease of doing business also the concern of customers. As mentioned
earlier, going for online shopping can save time for the consumers and seller, reducing
phone calls about availability, specifications, hours of operation and other information
could easily obtains from the product pages.

As time goes by, there is always a room to be a better business or a better entrepreneur,

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and there will always be new skills and abilities to acquire. Maintaining a course of
constant improvement will keep the business as long as possible. Also, as an
entrepreneur, we need to stay updated with the developments in e-commerce and keep up
with the business strategies in order to best determine the future direction of the business,
SWOT analysis helps to understand the position in the market. The analyses are the main
causes and are the key learning of all businesses can use to evolve. A critical assessment
of the current and historical performance of business and factors impacting it may assist
with gaining a better understanding and help shape direction and stay competitive and
gained competitive advantages in the market.

Appendix A

B2C Project Timeline

Date Activities Remarks

15/06/2019 Created and register seller account on Shopee
website.
Once registered, we posted the product

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description and published the product for sale

on Shopee e-commerce website.
20/06/2019 Received first order for 1 (one) miffy on
Shopee platform.
21/06/2019 Arranged shipment/deliver via poslaju. Shipment arranged on
Friday.
24/06/2019 Product received by first customer. Product received by buyer
on Monday.
25/06/2019 Shopee transferred payment by first customer
to seller’s e-wallet on Shopee’s website.
29/06/2019 Received order for 2 (two) miffy from second
customer on Shopee platform.
02/07/2019 Products received by second customer.
03/07/2019 Shopee transferred payment by second
customer to seller’s e-wallet on Shopee’s
website.
04/07/2019 Collected payment directly from first buyer Shopee system
via online payment because first order was automatically transferred
cancelled by Shopee due to technical glitch. payment back to buyer if
The seller could not key-in the consignment did not key-in
note number for tracking purposes. consignment note number.

Appendix B

Income or E-Wallet Statement from Shopee website

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