E-commerce-the Writing on the Wall

E-commerce-the Writing on the Wall

No words of praise would be enough to laud the resilience of the Indian IT channel community. The general market slowdown, negative cash flows, credit crunches, stifling tax and duty regimes, vendors changing distribution policies overnight-nothing seem to faze them for long.

One or more of these would put them at discomfiture for some time, but be rest assured they will find some way or mechanism to not just wriggle out of the situation but even carry on their businesses normally. However, the same cannot be said about the channel community's receptiveness to new things, either technology or strategy-wise.

In fact, there is a definite aversion towards adoption of any new form of technology, especially if it has to do with how they conduct their business. Quite an irony, considering that they being in the business of technology are not keen to use it. Nothing illustrates this better than the channel community's general antipathy till now towards using the online medium actively to conduct their businesses.

While the channel partners especially those in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities are complaining that the likes of Flipkart and Snapdeal are destroying their businesses, I see a strange reticence amongst most of them to read the writings on the wall. Not everything the e-commerce sites are doing today to generate businesses might be ethically correct, the fact of the matter is they define the future trends that the distribution business is going to take in the future.

So while coaxing the vendors today to come out with a definitive policy towards e-commerce sites, the traditional channel partners need to look at doing business in future when a Flipkart or a Snapdeal will be legitimate channel competitor. And to do that successfully, the need of the hour is not just to crib, but effectively groom themselves to join the bandwagon.

However, not too many partners have till now conducted any serious amount of business online, neither have they used their websites to undertake any concerted marketing exercise till date. In fact, many of them have them perfunctory websites, which forget being equipped to handle online transactions (e-commerce), do not even have basic information uploaded regularly.

They have been quite brazen about it till now-and the pretext is simple, there is not enough business generated online, so it does not make business sense for them to focus energies on online as a medium. If that remains the attitude, then it is a fait accompli that soon they will get wiped out by the e-commerce sites. Even vendors supporting the traditional channel partners today might not continue that for long if they generate substantial business from the online sites.

(rajneeshd@cybermedia.co.in)