Malaysian e-commerce sector starts 2019 on a high

• Cashback portal to give away more than RM350,000 in rewards for its birthday
• Over RM2 million cashback was given to ShopBack users during a CNY campaign

SHOPBACK Malaysia, a cashback portal revealed that the number of online orders made through its platform in January 2019 was equal to that of December 18, which is unusual as online purchases usually drop in January after a December filled with sales, festivals and back-to-school preparations.

“This is definitely encouraging. If we compare year-on-year with January 2018, the number of online orders made through ShopBack Malaysia in Janusary 2019 increased by more than 100%. It shows that online shopping has gained popularity over the past year and despite this being 1Q - supposedly a quieter quarter for e-commerce industry vs. 4Q - the purchasing trend is strong,” said ShopBack Malaysia country general manager Alvin Gill (pic).

“We wouldn’t be able to achieve this without strong support from our partners. We also unlocked another milestone last month. A new vertical, movies, is now available on ShopBack Malaysia. Users can get cashback when they purchase a movie ticket with mmCineplexes via our website and app,” he adds.

Alvin attributes the growth in January to the success of ShopBack Malaysia’s ‘9ood 9ood New Year’ campaign, a close to one-month Chinese New Year campaign where the company curated the best offers from over 40 partner stores such as Lazada, Shopee, 11street, Booking.com and Expedia with rewards of up to 30% cashback on top of the partner store’s discounts. More than RM2 million cashback was given to ShopBack users during this period, double last year’s Chinese New Year campaign.

According to company data, 11street, Agoda, Booking.com, Lazada and Shopee were the top five online stores last month.

In addition, ShopBack Malaysia saw a 40% increase in the percentage of orders made via its app in January 2019 as compared to January 2018.

“This is driven by our app integration with Grab, Lazada (app), and subsequently 11street, Shopee, AliExpress and Booking.com apps. The integration enables us to work directly with partners to give cashback for app purchases while motivating ShopBack users to try out our partners’ apps. ShopBack is a pioneer in app to app integration in the region and we target to onboard more popular apps this year.

“Many online shopping platforms have been creating mobile-app games to attract customers such as Shopee’s Shake and Lazada’s Slash It. It helped to cultivate open-app behaviour and more importantly, expand the user base and encourage purchases. Discounts (including price cut, coupon discount, cashback and free shipping) remain as the main reason for customers to make purchases online, followed by convenience,” says Alvin.

ShopBack Malaysia anticipates sales in 1Q to continue growing especially with its upcoming 4th birthday celebrations. Online shoppers can anticipate rewards in the form of lucky hour 100% cashback on selected items, special upsized cashback and exclusive promo codes offered by partner stores, as well as a RM30,000 Shopping Spree Giveaway from Feb 20 to 22.

“One hundred percent cashback simply means that if users pay RM10 for an item, they will get back RM10 cashback from us. The highlight would be our signature Birthday Shopping Spree Giveaway where we are going to reward three winners with a RM10,000 shopping spree each. Every user who goes through ShopBack to shop with any of our partners participating in ShopBack Turns 4! Campaign from Feb 20 to 22 will automatically enter this giveaway. The total reward during this period is amounts to over RM350,000,” Alvin explains.