Over the past few years, we’ve seen companies and brands try to leverage the power of live streaming to rope in more user engagement and create more brand awareness to varying degrees of success. The model saw enough success in its infancy years and has been growing ever since. As per GWI Social Media Trends Report 2020, 1 in 5 people discover new products and brands through social media live streams, so this new model definitely has merit. The growing popularity of live streaming has ushered in Live Commerce, a new iteration of e-commerce sprinkled with live streaming elements.
E-commerce already set the precedent for this, by moving countless people away from physical stores and malls in favour of shopping in the digital world. Live commerce takes it a step further by fusing online shopping with live streaming. Customers can shop directly from live streams of launch events and this is starting to become a viable method for brands to market and sell their products. Enter Degpeg, a homegrown live commerce platform that is bringing in the “new era of e-commerce” to the Indian market as well. Degpeg allows for the selling or marketing of any product or service by live streaming on both web and mobile platforms. Let’s learn more about live commerce and the platform.
Live streaming has been gaining a lot of traction over the years. In China and few other countries, live commerce is already a pretty established model that e-commerce and retail companies have been leveraging. As teleshopping allowed consumers to watch a broadcast, get an idea of the product, and then buy by calling a number to place your order, live commerce allows consumers to watch a live broadcast of the product and then order from the live stream itself. All this without having to meander through the internet and look for the product like you would with typical e-commerce. It can be likened to the digitalisation of teleshopping. Additionally, with live commerce, a user can consume information about a product or service in real-time and buy it immediately if it appeals to them, which is entirely different from standard e-commerce.
Vipul Jain, Founder and CEO at Degpeg
We spoke to Vipul Jain, Founder and CEO at Degpeg, who shone some light on live commerce and its benefits. Jain said, “the infrastructure for live commerce to shine is pretty solid now. With 4G in place all over the country, people already watch live videos on the go. That’s the first thing that’s happening in this space. The second aspect is the major shift of customised or personalised content that is taking place. All the large media houses worldwide have already moved to OTT platforms, so video content is big and here to stay. Additionally, now the consumers are also inclined towards watching content in video format. So, social platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and others have seen live streaming on their platforms flourishing. So, you can say that the entire ecosystem is shifting towards it (video). That is the reason live content or dynamic video content is picking up at a rapid pace”.
While live commerce is still in its infancy stages, especially in India, it does come with a fair number of benefits. Jain stated, “The first benefit of live commerce is its scalability. You can scale a product from any geographical location to another one in itself. The scalability goes from the web to mobile, to social platforms. The second advantage is that it is very robust and it is extremely easy to use. The next advantage is that we have integrated web, mobile and social platforms. So, it is a very unified platform”.
Companies or influencers can leverage the power of live streaming to launch products, show product demos, conduct webinars, unbox newly-launched products, and even review products. All in real-time. Live commerce also increases customer engagement. In traditional e-commerce, there’s very little room for customer engagement, however, with live commerce brands can connect with customers on a more personal level. It allows them to connect directly with consumers that may have a high intent towards buying your products, allowing for better conversion rates.
Degpeg is a cloud-based B2B social commerce platform that can enable multi-streaming on various social platforms within itself and allow for online shopping from these live streams. Jain told us, “Degpeg is essentially like Shopify. It enables live multi-streaming from the brand’s own website to connected social platforms. Brands are looking for a platform where they can not only unveil or discuss their new products and launches but also one where the user can click and buy the product or service from the platform itself. That is what Degpeg is offering”. Degpeg offers a CTA (call to action) feature where you can not only watch live video content but also buy whatever product or service is being talked about right from the stream.
Jain also stated that they’ve ensured that Degpeg is very easy to use, even for those who aren’t very tech-savvy. Jain said, “All you need to do is log in to your admin account and you can immediately start broadcasting your live content or pre-recorded content with ease. Also, since Degpeg allows for multi-streaming to various social platforms, you don’t need to manage your live content, or even pre-recorded content, across multiple platforms. Using our platform, you can manage all platforms via our admin in one place”.
Some of the key features of Degpeg are the following: