Could your abandoned cart recovery rate jump from 5% to 20%? Abhishek Chandra from GoKwik reveals how WhatsApp commerce is revolutionising e-commerce, with UK brands already seeing 15-20X ROI from this untapped channel.

Episode Summary

In this eye-opening episode, we explore how Asian e-commerce markets are leading the way with WhatsApp commerce, generating billions in additional revenue through conversational selling. Abhishek Chandra, co-founder of GoKwik (and the man who helped kick PayPal out of India), shares fascinating insights from sending over 2 billion WhatsApp messages that resulted in £2 billion worth of sales. We discuss why 80% of business communication in Asia happens through WhatsApp while UK brands are missing this massive opportunity, the ENGAGE framework for WhatsApp success, and practical strategies for implementing conversational commerce without abandoning your existing channels.

Key Learning Points

The 90% Open Rate Advantage (31:12)

WhatsApp messages achieve a staggering 90% open rate within five minutes, compared to email's declining performance. As Abhishek explains, "When you trigger a message to a customer, it can be any message. It can be a promotional message, an abandoned cart message, an upsell message. You know the chances of customer reading that message is very high."

This isn't just about better metrics – it's about catching customers while their purchase intent is still hot. UK brands using GoKwik's WhatsApp solutions are seeing 20% abandoned cart recovery rates, four times higher than the 5% email average.

The Conversational Commerce Revolution (32:12)

Unlike static emails or SMS, WhatsApp enables true two-way conversations. Abhishek shares a brilliant example: "If you send, let's say if I launch this T-shirt to the customer, hey, we have launched these new set of T-shirts... there will be CTA buttons. These CTA buttons can be, do you have more sizes? Once you click there, automatically more sizes will be shown there."

This dynamic interaction transforms how customers engage with brands, allowing real-time problem-solving and personalised recommendations within the same chat window.

The ENGAGE Framework for Success (29:47)

GoKwik's systematic approach has powered over 12,000 stores globally. The framework starts with trust-building through transactional messages, never bombarding customers with marketing in the first 30 days. As Abhishek emphasises, "We have to ensure that we take enough approvals, basically enough consents before sending the messages. The messages should be like where every customer should have an option to stop the message whenever they want."

The beauty lies in gradual expansion – from abandoned cart recovery to post-purchase sequences, then loyalty programmes and marketing campaigns.

First-Mover Advantage in the UK (45:56)

Perhaps the most compelling insight is the massive opportunity for UK brands. "Meta never promoted it here. No one in the UK knew that these are things which are possible," Abhishek reveals. During Black Friday 2023, one UK brand achieved £1 million in a single day using WhatsApp while competitors fought for attention in crowded email inboxes.

His parting advice is crystal clear: "You should immediately sign up for WhatsApp because you will get the first mover advantage. When everyone is sending communication on email, at least for the next one year, you will have the first mover advantage."

Resources

Guest & Company

• Abhishek's LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhichandra2011/
• GoKiwki - https://www.gokwik.co/

eCommerce Podcast Ecosystem

• eCommerce Cohort signup (free monthly calls for eCommerce entrepreneurs) - https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/cohort
• Matt's LinkedIn Profile - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattedmundson/
• The eCommerce Podcast Newsletter for show notes and extra insights - https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/subscribe

Well, hello and welcome to the e-Commerce podcast.

My name is Matt Edmundson and it's great to be with you on what can only

be described as a sunny day here in the UK, uh, at the time of recording.

So an unusual occurrence to be sure.

Now, I have been, uh, an e-commerce since 2002, and these days I get

to partner with e-commerce brands to help them grow, scale and exit.

And if you'd like to know more about how that.

Work, uh, just on whether we could work together.

Just head over to the website, ecommerce-podcast.net.

You'll also find on that website all of our past episodes with the show notes and

all of that sort of good stuff, as well as a little link, a little link that allows

you to sign up to the eCommerce newsletter and make sure you do that as well.

Uh, and you'll get some great tips and tricks.

Um, I've been saying for the last few weeks actually,

we're doing a big overhaul.

Uh, on the newsletter and we are, we're almost where we want to be with it.

So, uh, yes, it's taken a long time.

Yes.

Thank you for bearing with us.

And yes, it is coming out very, very soon.

I'll let you know more on the podcast.

In fact, by the time you've heard this, it's probably gonna be working hunky dory.

Uh, anyway, all of that said ecommerce-podcast.net.

So let's talk about today's guest, Abhishek Chandra from GoKwik.

Now let's, we're gonna talk about GoKwik.

We're gonna talk about.

What these guys are doing and why?

Why they've decided actually.

The UK market, the US market, we all need a little bit of help.

We can all learn something from the e-commerce market in India, and I'm

inclined to agree, uh, having seen their products and a little bit of a demo.

So I'm curious to find out what's going on in India, what we can learn as e-commerce

entrepreneurs here in the uk because, uh, Abhishek, it's fair to say India

is a fairly sizable e-commerce market.

It's not insignificant.

Is it really?

No, no, no, it's, it's more than one $50 billion.

Dollars or already, and it is growing at the CAGR of 20%.

So in the next five years, it'll cross to more than two 50 billion.

That's incredible, isn't it?

I was, I, I posted on LinkedIn, and by the way, dear listener, if you are, if

you're not following me on LinkedIn, why not come connect with me on LinkedIn?

Anyway, that aside, um, I posted on LinkedIn yesterday, um, uh,

a stat which I saw that the.

Where the e-commerce market is predicted to go by 2032.

And it's a massive number.

Ab I mean, it's, it is an insane, you kind of go, woo-hoo.

You know, it's, it's a massive number and I get to have share of that, which

is wonderful, but actually when you analyze it, it's only 8% growth and you

kind of go, well, isn't that interesting?

And obviously it's focused very much on.

Um, the uk, the u, what I would call the big five.

You know, the uk, the us, Canada, Australia, New Zealand.

What it isn't really accounting for are emerging markets.

And, um, Tony Con, who's been on the show from Brave Agency, he posted on that.

He said, it's really, 'cause I'm like, does that mean we'd

have to go and steal all of the.

All of the traffic from our competitors, do we have to get

a little bit more competitive?

And he's like, actually I think it means that we need to think about

these markets, these international markets and emerging markets.

And I think of places like India, South Africa, um, South Africa, sorry,

south America, um, Africa itself, you know, these sort of emerging, um,

e-com markets, which are actually, but they're not really emerging anymore.

They're sort of fully there, aren't they?

Just absolutely killing it.

Are you quite buoyant about the, the e-commerce market in, in India?

Do you think it's gonna sort of stay around?

Do you think it's, it's all doing pretty well?

Yeah, absolutely.

Uh, see, uh, the e-commerce boom started a little late in India.

like like the western markets like US and uk, but the speed at which it is growing,

it's, it's tremendous because India was little lagging in terms of, let's say the

internet penetration and also the internet revolution in India came back around,

uh, maybe 10, 12 years back where when a billion Indians start suddenly start

got, got internet at a very low price.

So people in very remote parts of India, uh, they got access to internet.

So, so they say, so say that.

Firstly, it started with very basic things like browsing or YouTube and all.

Then people started getting started understanding that there are opportunities

available even if they don't have access to resources, but they can, they can,

uh, with, with internet in their hands.

They, they started doing different things.

In fact, in last five, six years, I have seen good.

Di uh, di uh, direct to consumer brands emerging from very small parts of India

and selling very niche products, which, which let's say cater to that region,

or let's say just India as a market.

Alright, so, uh, though it's, it came a little late, but the way is

growing, uh, the growth is tremendous.

In fact, during our discussion, I, I would love to deep dive there.

Yeah, no, I, I'm, I'm intrigued by it because we had a, a, a, a, a

guest on the show a few weeks ago and we were talking about China.

And China is, does e-commerce quite differently to how we do e-commerce in

the uk and it fascinated me and I think about, um, places like India where.

Yes, they were a little bit later getting into the internet, but by

the, when you guys started, the technology had evolved so much.

You didn't have all that early baggage that we had in the uk.

You could innovate with a billion people pretty much almost

instantly and and rethink things just like they've done in China.

And I think I'm intrigued by it because you can, you've built like

GoKwik and these sort of platforms.

Without that baggage, just based on, on what you can do with the technology now,

which has enabled you to think outside the box to think about things differently,

and I, I am fascinated by that.

And I, I'd, I'd love to dig into sort of some of the things

that you guys have learned.

I mean, I, you know, a 10, 12-year-old market is not exactly.

Brand new.

Is it, I mean, I suppose in digital terms it's, it's almost like dinosaur, but,

but you, you go, quick's been around since what, 2020 and you've got this

fast growing e-com market in India.

What, what are some of the things that you guys have learned that

maybe we haven't yet learned in the uk or maybe that would help us to

understand sort of a bit more fully.

Absolutely.

So I would like to take you a little back, uh, before even we, we, we,

we thought of starting GoKwik.

So 12, 13 years back, um, we, we, we saw in India, uh, that.

FinTech.

See, banks always had these legacy systems.

The payments used to be slow.

Online payments were, uh, were not that, uh, were not that what you can say.

Uh, the success rates were low.

And also during my university days, I, I was, I was doing my engineering.

12, 13 years back.

And what I thought was in India, it needs a FinTech revolution that

we need to have indigenous products which cater to the Indian market.

So during that time, I, I met a person who, uh, who just came back from the

US and he had an idea that why don't we have a product like a PayPal in India?

Why don't we build it?

Alright, so, which sound.

During 12, 13, back years back, it sounded difficult, but at least we

had the engineering talent in India.

So we started working on that.

And uh, just to ensure that these e-commerce companies doesn't face

challenges like payments drops and all, which, because most of

the payment solutions were, uh.

Um, American companies who, who have little offices in India and,

and they were not that focused.

India was just a large market for them.

So they, so they used to have these solutions there.

So we started building this company.

The company was called Moby Quick, and we were amongst the first to

build a digital wallet in India and in just five, six years, uh.

Just like us, there was another company called pt, and we started building this

wallet, which can empower, let's say a few million Indians who can keep money

in their wallet, spend it wherever they want, whether it's a small store to a

large, uh, retailer, like an Amazon.

So we started building that and in six years, if we reach the point where PayPal

had to live India, because we became,

Fantastic.

I mean, that's well done.

yeah.

done.

Yeah.

So, uh, and both, now, both these companies, both Mobi Quick and Paton,

which were, uh, homegrown companies.

Now these are public listed multi-billion dollar

Mm-hmm.

So, which gave us enough confidence that yes, we can, we can build a

world-class product because most of the good talent from India used

to go to us, to Silicon Valley

to build large organization.

But because we didn't have those infra in India, so.

People were not staying back.

But now I can proudly say that, uh, when we were building GoKwik, we

had no problem getting the great greatest of the greatest talent.

Uh,

GoKwik.

When we were starting our, the main core focus was data science.

So we wanted data science code, data scientists, and to our surprise,

many people from Silicon Valley working in companies like Amazon,

us, um, LinkedIn, Facebook, uh, uh.

Uh, Microsoft, they joined us.

They came back to India and it, and they joined GoKwik in the, in the early days.

So, uh, so I have seen that shift in the last 10 years that how

things are changing in India.

And, uh, and also with GoKwik, we, uh.

The only problem statement why we started, uh, GoKwik was that even 10, 12 years

back, these small direct to consumer brands used to, uh, used to start on

Shopify because it is easier for anyone to build a website, but every four or five

years, what was happening was, uh, that larger marketplaces like Amazon or let's

say Flipkart in India, they used to just.

Come and acquire them, or let's say build a competing product in their

marketplace just to kill that business.

Small business.

Alright, so suddenly, seven, eight years back, we saw that all the small direct

to consumer brand wrapped up because they were not able to compete with

the likes of Amazon or the other large marketplaces, which, which is a very

bad thing because if they, if they keep selling their products on, on an Amazon.

They have to keep shelling out 30%, 40% of their margins, which, which

in long run is non-sustainable.

And the only reason why, uh, they, they were failing was because Amazon

or any other large marketplace, these are tech companies who sells product.

That is why you have the best in class customer experience on the

website from, from just landing on the website to actual transacting.

So the journey is very seamless there, which a regular Shopify

website can't have because these are regular people who knows a certain

product which they can sell, procure.

Manufacture and sell, but they don't know how to create the world, world

class experience on their website.

So we thought of starting a company, uh, which can create multiple products,

which can be fitted to different parts of an e-commerce journey so

that a customer can get an Amazon kind of experience on non-Amazon

world, which, which was the DTC world.

And, uh, in just four or five years now, we power more than 12,000 stores globally.

Where we started fixing various challenges.

The first challenge, which we fixed was, uh, a, a fast checkout on Shopify because

we relied on Shopify, the pa, the the pa. The checkout page was very long.

Customers used to so much time in filling their details, and they used to drop off.

Most of the customers were dropping off, so we created a one click fast

checkout, which reduced that journey from 20 seconds to just three seconds.

So.

So the conversion rate shot up and within few months that

product became very popular.

So we, we started getting so many inbound queries that we want to

implement it, we want to implement it.

So we had to quit.

was this a, sorry, was this a plugin for a Shopify site?

So, so do in the early days it was, it was a private app on Shopify because

Shopify was not allowing it to publish.

Alright.

So, so we had to integrate, um, on each and every individual website

on, we have to hire a big team of people to just integrate it.

And Shopify was not very happy in the initial days, but, uh, two

years back what happened was, uh.

Uh, shop Shopify was losing their enterprise brands to other platforms

like, uh, Salesforce Commerce Cloud and let's say Magento.

Because once the companies were becoming too big, they

were facing these challenges.

And so, so the larger platforms were getting them.

So we, we talked to, uh, Shopify, we told them.

If we, if you keep this checkout, um, if we work closely, we'll ensure that the

larger brands don't move out of Shopify,

and we proved that.

So eventually, uh, Shopify released their global APIs just to accommodate us.

So we were the first checkout, which was, uh, which, uh, which

was recognized by Shopify.

And now we are a public app.

Uh, we, we launched the public app two years back on, on Shopify app.

So this is, so the GoKwik checkout, it's called Quick Checkout Now.

It is the largest checkout globally,

and, and it's in, in just four years.

So, so.

That's quite impressive.

And, and what, I mean, I, I'm obviously very familiar with the, the, the

Shopify checkout and I'm, I'm, I'm familiar with your products as well now.

Um, but I'm kind of curious

who decided, um, I suppose who looked at it and went, oh, we can, we can

just do that so much better here.

Let's just do that and, um, and let's have a go and see what happens.

Um, I love that mindset.

Uh, whose, whose idea was it?

So I think the initial two, three people, um, so we came from different backgrounds.

So one of my co-founder, uh.

Uh, was, uh, was uh, in a management team of A DTC brand.

I came from a FinTech background.

One of our co-founder was what?

A data was a data scientist.

So when, when we, uh, when we used to, uh, chat in the initial days,

we used to discuss different problem statements because we came from

all different backgrounds from.

From FinTech to to DT, C, to to standard data science and Technology.

Alright, so we thought that what, what is the first problem

statement that we can solve?

And checkout was one thing which was broken.

So we thought of fixing it.

And also see checkouts are very, uh, localized also depending on the regions.

So for example, in India, the most preferred option still to pay on any

e-commerce website is cash on delivery.

Oh wow.

Really?

So you won't believe still 50% of orders happens via cash on

Oh my goodness.

Okay.

I, I, I, I dunno why I'm surprised.

I suppose if I'd have thought about it, it would, it may make sense.

But of course in the uk I, I, I can't remember the last time

anything was COD maybe 20 years ago.

I don't, I

genuinely don't know.

Absolutely.

So, so that is why whenever a global company try to enter the market,

they have the, their standard SOPs and they try to replicate

that, but it, it doesn't work like

doesn't work.

Yeah, yeah.

It doesn't work like that.

So, so that is why, uh, local, you have to localize the product.

So we localize the product so that cash on delivery can work

in a much more proper way.

There are no frauds happening on cash, on delivery.

There was a problem of R-T-O-R-T-O is written to origin because see, people

have nothing to lose on cash, on delivery.

So they used to take delivery in a very casual way that when a delivery guy comes,

they used to say, no, I'm not at home.

Take it away.

I take it back because they knew the brand will re attempt the delivery,

but they didn't know that the brand has to pay for two and fro.

Uh, so, uh, so we, we built data science layer, which we, which used to

predict that this customer will do RTO.

So before even he's placing the order.

So, um, so during that journey we, we used to trigger many things that a partial.

Uh, uh, partial, uh, uh, prepaid payment, or we implemented many things

which reduce COD in India because it was, was because e-commerce brands were

losing billions of dollars in RTO fraud.

So we built a good data science layer to, to remove those frauds and just to ensure

that because people love to pay via COD, so they, they can continue to pay via COT.

But slowly and stately, we also moved in that direction

where we can reduce EOD also.

We can, we encourage people to use, uh, prepaid more so our first.

Success as a company came from that checkout, and still the

checkout is our biggest problem.

Then after two years, we, we started working on different problem statements.

Uh, another problem statement was that emails and SMSs were

not giving results to, to brands.

When people were communicating to their customers on email and SMSs, they

were not opening the email and sms.

So, and because most of the people are on WhatsApp, so we

thought, why don't we create a WhatsApp commerce solution, which.

Where brands can market their product, they can do abandoned card emails there,

they can do cross-sell upsells on, on, on, on, um, on, on, on, on WhatsApp.

So we started working very closely with Meta because during that time, meta

didn't start to monetize, uh, WhatsApp.

So we, we, we talked to them and we, we said, see, you can't charge the

customers directly, but why don't we.

Create a B2B solution around it.

Alright, so we were amongst the first people to build a

a WhatsApp commerce solution.

And again, because we had the distribution, people trusted us with

our solu, uh, with our offerings.

So within no time even on that product, that product is what,

two and a half, three years old and more than 5,000 brands use it.

Uh, uh, use it, uh, to communicate with their, with their customers tailgate.

We, we, we never work with a large marketplace.

Our thesis are still there, that we are there to serve the D two

C ecosystem, though we get calls from all large food delivery apps.

All right, we are all large marketplaces because see, these, these solutions are

replicable everywhere, but we say no, we are there to, so that these small

businesses can survive and thrive.

Yeah.

Their, their, uh, because see, with these omnichannel experiences, now people who

used to run retail stores and all, now they have digital footprint where they

launch their own website, all right?

So at least they can, they can manage it in a much efficient way that

whether the customer is a walk-in customer or they use their website,

at least these product of ours, they stitch the journey together so that.

They can, they can have, uh, they, they can run their

business much more efficiently.

We help them improve their bottom line in a sense, because

bottom line is very important.

Everyone has a limited marketing budget to spend.

So

Yeah,

absolutely.

Well, it sounds like, I mean, fascinated and I, I'm you.

I suppose as I'm listening to you talk, I'm thinking of a, you've done

what every entrepreneur has done in the past however many thousand years.

You've seen a problem, you've solved the problem, and people are willing

to pay you money because you've solved their problem and you've done it in

a way that's, that is replicable.

Um, and I.

I love the fact you kicked PayPal out India.

That's just brilliant.

Um, I, I, I, so where, where's it?

I mean, you are, I mean, it's fair to say, um, you are actually in London right now.

Um, just down the road.

Well, I say just down the road, three hours down the road, but,

you know, just down the road.

Cool.

Um, GoKwiker.

Obviously you are, you are.

Thinking a about global expansion.

You are in the uk, you have UK customers.

You've told me earlier that you've, uh, got 4,000 US customers.

You've acquired a brand over there, so you're going into the states.

So you're now xb, you know, why settle in India?

Just, you know, go and conquer the world.

It's brilliant.

Love it.

It's, um, it's the way it should be.

Um.

How, how, how are, I mean, you've got these different products,

um, but is there more to GoKwik than just the checkout process?

Um, or is it a case of we're gonna go take the checkout to these international

markets and see what happens?

'cause we think we can help you guys so much more.

So, um, in fact we, uh, we didn't have any plan to, uh, to come into the u

uh, to into any international market because when we were growing, see India,

uh, in the last four, five years, see, India is a big enough market for us.

I was gonna say, there's a lot,

Yeah.

And.

a billion people.

Why?

Why would you not, you know?

Yeah, so it was growing very fast.

All our, so during our journey, uh, we were backed by all large

global VCs like Sequoia, capital RTP, global Think Investment.

So all large global VCs invested in us.

So we were very well capitalized and we wanted to.

Serve the Indian market and we can come, uh, come.

Currently also, we believe in the Indian market and most of our

efforts goes into building different products to cater to Indian market.

But 10 minute, 10 months back said, um, uh, one interesting

thing happened with us that, um.

Uh, be because we already had two products, which, which were

catering to different problem statements in e-commerce journey.

We wanted to build a product which solves the returns and exchange part

of e-commerce or like that, how the, we wanted to, uh, have a company there.

So we came across this company, return Prime.

Uh, they were the third largest returns app on Shopify App Store.

They, they were doing tremendously well.

Um, um, in.

In fact in globally, because they were the third largest app.

So we thought that it, it's a very good fit, um, in our entire Goku ecosystem.

So we acquired that company.

So after the acquisition, we, we realized that this company, most of

their, most of their brands either were in US or in UK or in Europe.

So we thought, why don't we, uh, why don't we double down?

At least in these markets where we already have certain presence.

Alright, so 10 months back, I, but after the us, uh, UK was the biggest market.

So I just came here just to experiment that if, let's say, if I start

staying here long, if I start going to these e-commerce events, can,

can I, can I make our presence much more, uh, stronger in this market?

Uh, so in my initial days I used to meet many agencies, many brand

founders, and during my conversation up.

Uh, so once, let's say after a meeting, we used to connect on phone and most

of them used to message me on WhatsApp.

Alright?

So one day I asked few agencies, Hey, everyone is chatting to their friends

and family in UK on WhatsApp, but I don't see any businesses, uh uh, basically

messaging their customers on WhatsApp.

So they said, yeah, we don't do that.

So.

On the other hand, I told them, see, in Asian market, 80% of all

communication happens on WhatsApp.

And the, the, the and email and SMS have now just reduced to 20% already.

But why?

Because, see, most of the customers are on WhatsApp.

Email is something which was very prominent 10 years back.

But we have to understand that people like you, me, we are, we are business folks,

so we have to keep checking our emails.

Every time we, we have it on mobile, but there are many, many customers who

are regular people who, who maybe check their emails once in once in a day or

once in two days or once in a week, so many time even when their favorite

brands reach them, the communication.

Reaches to them, or let's say they read that communication very late

when maybe that offer is over, or let's say it's not relevant.

So I thought that it's a clear problem statement that, or let's say

there's a clear wide market, which is available in the, in UK where we

can already, uh, try our product we engage, which was WhatsApp and um.

So, uh, so I, uh, so in fact, and in fact I, I, I started sharing some numbers

with people last year just on WhatsApp.

We sent 2 billion messages on WhatsApp for our D two C, for our D two C partners.

Okay.

And, and which resulted around 2 billion pounds worth of additional sales.

So

I started speaking to brands and agency here, so they, they got very excited.

So I thought, let's, it's a, it's a, it's an open market and it's a,

it's a problem that, that can, that's needs to be solved because see, Matt,

the, the thing is in every market you go to, uh, the cost of acquisition.

The customer

Oh, it's crazy.

going off the roof, on off the roof, and the robots are going down.

Alright?

So as a brand, you have limited budget.

You can't keep acquiring customers, so you have to ensure that you are getting

more and more repeat customers and what we have seen in other geographies.

WhatsApp plays an amazing role in that.

Firstly, because WhatsApp has a 90% plus open rate in the first

five minutes, which means when the customer is actually active.

Alright, so when you trigger a message to a customer, it can be a, it can be any

message, it can be a promotional message, it can be um, it can be an abandoned card

message, it can be an upsell message.

You know, the chances of customer reading that message is very high.

Alright, so, so, uh, so we started implementing it in the u in the UK

market, eight, nine months back.

And in just eight months now, more than a hundred brands are using our

product for WhatsApp and the kind of numbers they are seeing now.

Now interestingly, they have started seeing a 15 to 20 XROI.

So now this product is.

Growing so far in the UK market that the product for which I came to promote, which

was written Prime, I stopped doing that.

I said, anyway, on Shopify app store, lemme focus on creating awareness of

WhatsApp in the, in the UK market.

So sometime funnily, I talk to the meta people, uh, uh, the meta people

in India, that I'm doing what you are supposed to do in, in that.

I I'm creating awareness about your product, but with, with, with companies

like Meta, uh, they, their main focus is to, uh, go into market where,

where the population is too big.

So that is why the two focused market for them is India and Brazil.

Hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah,

that's really interesting, really interesting.

I, I'm, and, and this whole thing, I suppose I, I'm inclined to agree

with you that, you know, in the UK.

We adopted email pretty quick in the early days of e-comm,

because that's what we had.

And I think we've kind of, and e and don't get me wrong, email is still

amazing for our company and, um, I, I think it's still foundational.

And then we tried to introduce SMS and then of course it got complicated

with the European Union and, and, and all the, sort of the weird

rules that we started to in inject.

And with SMS, you could only send text for a little while and then mobile apps

came along and we could do notifications.

And then you've got things like WhatsApp and Telegram, which I think is also an

interesting platform, uh, which people aren't really talking about as much at

the moment, but I think maybe they will be, uh, maybe you've got some thoughts

on this, but the fact that I can send images, links, video with WhatsApp.

Everybody has WhatsApp on their phone, whether you are Android or Apple.

It just.

It's a universal communication system and I'm, I'm intrigued.

Maybe you've, maybe you've thought this through, maybe you've got an answer as

to why perhaps we've been quite slow to.

Um, take up WhatsApp.

Is it because of legislation?

Is it because we just don't know we can use it?

And so it's a lack of education.

Um, is it because we're just too set in our ways where email is concerned?

I'm, I'm curious as to, to why you think it is.

So to be very honest, it, it is of no no one's fault.

Um, it's only when, when the company which owns the product,

they have to promote it in a market.

Meta never promoted it.

No one in the UK knew that this, these are things which are possible even possible.

Hmm.

Then if, if, if the, if the branch not even know that these are something

which is possible on WhatsApp, why will anyone try even try it?

Alright.

Because, and still it's a new product in the Asian market also.

It, it's three, 4-year-old or like WhatsApp for business.

It's called WhatsApp for Business.

Um, so, uh, so, uh, it's, it's, it's new there, but, uh, but yeah, but

as I was telling earlier, the focus of meta was not in this geography.

So that is why, uh, it didn't pick up here.

So, uh, so that is why when we came here, the kind of response we started getting

from both agencies and, uh, brands were, were, were very encouraging, alright?

Because they, they were, firstly, it's a, uh, they, they don't have to stop.

So when we came here, we never asked people to stop sending emails or sms.

We said, why don't you try it?

If you, if you get good results, then you can always keep adding to it.

And it's a, and it's a new market, so you can't just bombard

people with WhatsApp message.

We have to ensure that we take, uh, um, enough approvals, be basically enough

consents before sending the messages,

or like the messages should be like where, um, every customer should an option to

stop the message whenever they want.

So, so, so we have to design it in such a way, firstly, when it is GDPR

compliant also, and it, it doesn't feel very intrusive for, for a customer.

So that is why, uh, when we, when we start working with a brand, also, we never ask

them to do marketing in the first 30 days.

So we implement very basic use cases like abandoned card recoveries and

all, and abandoned card recovery.

You, you'll be very surprised on WhatsApp, you can, so the, the

abandoned card recovery is close to 20%.

So, uh, which, which is never heard of, which means the same marketing

budget with same number of customers coming to your platform, you have

a 20% higher revenue realization.

So, which, which for adds so much credibility in the eyes of the

brands that now just by using WhatsApp as a channel, they are

able to save 20% of their revenue.

Hmm.

So then, then once the audience is, audience is warmed up, then slowly and

suddenly you push other use cases also.

But at least the revenue leakages firstly needs to be fixed, which which can be

easily done by via channels like WhatsApp.

And one more very inter uh, important thing which I want to

highlight here, is that WhatsApp is conversational commerce, which means.

Email and SMS, even if you send any, any kind of communication to the

customer, what best a customer can do is click on a link and land on a page.

On the other hand, WhatsApp looks like a conversation.

So for example, even if you send, uh, let's say if, if I launched

this t-shirt I sent to the customer, hey, we have launched

these new set of t-shirts, alright?

Uh, so it, it'll show a very beautiful, uh, image.

Then there will be text with all emojis and all, but then

there will be CT of buttons.

Those CTF buttons are very interesting.

These CT F buttons can be, do you have more sizes?

Once you click there automatically, more sizes will be shown there.

Right.

Yep.

Right, and or what goes well with it.

So automatically it'll pull a trouser, which goes well with this

t-shirt trouser or an necessary.

So all these conversation keep happening in the same WhatsApp

window, and these flows are automated.

And once, let's say customer makes up their mind to actually buy the

product, they just click on shop now button and it'll directly take the

customer to add to cart and not to sum again to a product discovery.

yeah.

Yeah.

So this conversational commerce is only limited to WhatsApp right now.

Alright, so which is, which is not even possible on an email or SMS.

So that is why, uh, once you start, once brands starts using it, they'll

see a drastic difference in, in how they engage with their customers.

In fact, I have some, some, um, some funny anecdotes and all also.

So, uh, uh, few, few of the beauty brands that work in the UK market with us.

So let's say if you, if you order a mascara.

Alright, so you get um, uh, order, you get a order confirmation message on

WhatsApp that's saying, Hey, thanks for placing the order and with a video.

This is how you apply this mascara as a post purchase

Yeah.

And, and see for a beauty brand, it can be how to apply this.

There are many products which needs installation also.

So on WhatsApp on the same message you get, this is how you install it.

We work with a, with a, with a toy, toy brand or like, and

every toy needs an installation.

So when, when, when the parents used to get these videos on how to install this.

Uh, install this, uh, toy.

So they used to show the video to the, to the, to the child.

And the, and the children were very fascinated to build it on their own

because they had a video to refer to.

Right?

So, so these are things which, which keeps, uh, the customers very close

to a brand because why we, why we actually, uh, uh, because, see, you

can also buy the same product from an Amazon, but why people stick with a

particular DTC brand is when they, when they connect to the story of the brand.

Yeah, that's really interesting, isn't it?

My mind is racing Abhishek with, with all kinds of possibilities, um, around this.

Like, I'm, I I'm wondering whether, for example, with subscription commerce.

Whether, um, I send a WhatsApp message saying, your subscription's due to go out.

Um, if you wanna snooze your subscription, just click here on WhatsApp and it

will, and it'll just snooze it for you.

Or, um, this is your order that's going out.

You, if you, you've got an hour, if you want to add to the order, let me

know and I can all, you know, I can put it in and, and it will go through

and it, do you know what I mean?

It'll do all the episode type things.

I I am a big fan of conversational commerce.

I think it's one of these things, which is, is I think it's gonna become

more and more important, uh, over

the next few years, especially with ai.

Um, and because this is how I think you'll interact with ai, you'll start

to ask AI or what will go with this t-shirt and ai, you know, so if you are

doing that before AI can do it, people kind of get used to it, don't you?

Um, and I love the fact you're doing this on the WhatsApp platform.

Um, I'm, I mean, I'm not, you know, it's not that I'm pro WhatsApp,

but I get why you would do it on that platform, because that's the

platform that makes sense for this.

Where do you see it going?

Well, I'm curious, over the next few years, the whole WhatsApp

thing, where do you see it going?

So I think it'll, uh, you will have the same numbers.

Like, like in the Asian market, it'll cross 70 to 80% of all communications

because, because of the flexibility in terms of technology, that what are the

different things you can do on WhatsApp as rightly, as rightly highlighted

by you that on the, on the flow, you.

Orders on WhatsApp, you can start a subscription.

You can stop a subscription.

Alright, on the flow, when, let's say a product is already a, an

order is already placed sim and the possibilities are so high.

For example, on, uh, yesterday I was talking at an event, uh,

and we was, we were, we were the topic of the discussion work.

NPS scores.

Alright, so, uh, on email and SMS, the, the collection rate of NPS is

just five to 15%, but on a WhatsApp it is as high as 40 to 60% because you

know the customer will open it because he's expecting a message from someone.

He opens it.

And if you, and also you can gamify the entire experience.

It should not look, it should not look like a bland corporate feedback form.

You can gamify the entire experience that when someone clicks on, on, on an answer,

it should show a live graph of that.

How other people have responded, responded to it.

Alright?

In fact, uh, uh, other things which can be done on WhatsApp is, uh, running a poll.

Alright.

Or a contest.

So let's say during any part of the month, alright, when you don't have any new thing

to send to your customer that you don't have any launch, you don't have any offer,

but how to engage with your customer.

You can, like, you know, in UK you have, um, premier, um, um, you, you have

football matches throughout the year.

So a simple message can go to a customer, Hey, who do you

think will win today's match?

Chelsea or Liverpool.

When someone clicks on, let's say Chelsea.

Liverpool

Yeah, you do.

When someone clicks Chelsea Abhishek, you send 'em a message

back going, you are clearly wrong.

pool so they can see a live graph that what other people have voted and, and

a brand can say, if your team wins today, you'll get additional 10% off

yeah, yeah, yeah.

again.

Again, you can trigger these thing and you can gamify the entire

experience so that it doesn't look like a very promotional thing.

Mm-hmm.

And also in, and also the same time during a month again, you have uh, uh,

uh, basically reco created a recall in, in the mind of the customer.

So, so, so see, the thing is, it's, the reason why WhatsApp

will grow is because of these opportunities which are also available

from a tech point of view, which are not available on, on a static

platform, like an email or an sms.

Alright?

And also because it is open.

As it is owned by Meta, so there is a very good connect between Instagram and

WhatsApp or, or Facebook and WhatsApp.

In fact, all these automation can also be done on, on, uh, Instagram chats also.

So let's say if you run an ad of a, of a particular product as a

brand, in the comment section, if anyone writes price, please.

Other things the bots can answer on the, on the chats also.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So the connection is there.

In fact, uh, in, in Asian market, uh, the, the primary key on, uh, or the

primary login is the mobile number.

So

whenever anyone clicks on an ad on, on, uh, on Instagram, it can directly take

two of WhatsApp channel also of the brand.

Yeah.

That's interesting you make that comment.

The primary login is the phone number.

So.

It's, it's interesting when I, whenever I travel to the states.

Um, one of the things that I notice actually, that they've done over

there is, like in supermarkets, you know, you get your, um, uh, I dunno

if you've come across these yet in Tesco, you can get your, like,

your club card voucher or you get different pricing and things like that.

In the States, it's, it's not you, you go to the checkout and you

just putting your phone number, there's, there's a little box.

Um, you're putting your phone number in it and it knows all your accounts.

And that's, that's how they've done it.

They've done it on the phone number so then they can text you.

Obviously now WhatsApp you as well because it seems to be a more

effective method of communication.

Absolutely.

I don't know of any e-commerce store I have shopped at that has done checking on

the basis of a phone number over an email.

Um, but I'm curious.

I mean, if, if this is what they're doing in Asia, it's you,

I almost wonder what would happen if we offered it as an option.

Do you know what I mean?

And, and just to check it and see what, so you do get the, the numbers from people.

I'm, I'm curious.

You got me thinking now, but.

Yeah, so, so let's take an example of Shopify also.

Shopify is a global company, but they realize that in, in, in

the Asian market, the primary.

Login for a customer cannot be emailed.

So a few years back they, they, they even change it to mobile number.

Now that is why, because we used to run the checkout.

So if anyone enters their mobile number and their password automatically, we

used to pull all their last purchase.

Uh, so let's say all their preferred payment options on, on the checkout

page, if they have, let's say five loyalty points coming from five

different channels, whether it's a card loyalty point or some inter

miles or something, we used to show that, okay, you can burn these.

Uh, 10,000 points in this transaction itself.

So, because mobile number was a primary key, suddenly we, we, we used to get all

these data collated in one checkout, which made the life easy of for the customer.

So.

So maybe slowly and, and, and it started from India, but slowly and steadily, it

goes, it, it went to other markets, uh, in Asia and similarly in Middle East also.

So maybe slowly and steadily, mobile number will become optional

in, in many places so that all these things can be accessed.

And in fact, I'll tell you one, uh, one very interesting thing,

which, which I encountered two, three months back here in uk.

Uh.

Few of our brands was selling their products in, in US also these,

these people who are using our quick Engage product, WhatsApp, and they

said, can I send messages in us?

Uh, so I said, but people don't use WhatsApp in us.

So, uh, so interestingly that founder told me that, you know, 20 to 20% of

the customers in the US have started using WhatsApp and that 20 to 30%

population is comparable to uk.

I want to send, can you support it?

I said, yes.

It's a global platform.

The message can be sent to any

Any

Any number.

Yeah.

Yeah, so, so we enabled it from them and, and they are sending messages to the

customers on WhatsApp in us also, though, we don't go out and promote it, but slowly

and sadly now at least we have good six, seven brands, uh, in the UK who have

customers in us, and they interact with them on WhatsApp through this channel.

That's awesome.

That's awesome.

I'm, I'm loving this.

I'm curious, do how quick engage is a platform that you use?

Is this a Shopify plugin?

Is this an API that we can use?

How does, how do you guys connect with us?

So, so it's a Shopify app, so it's a public app on Shopify and, uh, any

if I don't have a Shopify store, I can't use it.

At the moment you can't, but we are trying to build a solution.

It's, it's, uh, it's in our roadmap.

I think in next six months it'll be available for other platforms like

Magento or, or other platforms.

fantastic.

Yeah.

Abhishek.

Listen, I'm aware of time, man, and it's, it's quickly departing from me.

Um, but I found this fascinating and I think I've really enjoyed the challenge

of thinking differently about e-commerce.

Even just simple things like logging in with an email and just thinking about it

differently I think is super powerful.

Um, so how do people.

Reach you?

How do they connect with you if they want to do that?

Um, if they want to find out more about GoKwik, about GoKwik,

engage and all that sort of stuff, what's the best way to do it?

Absolutely, I think they can.

They can reach out to me on LinkedIn.

I'm happy to share my LinkedIn profile with you and also if

people can remember, my email is.

abhishek@gokwik.co.

And, uh, so they can always, I'm happy to interact with, with, with clients

one-on-one because I've, uh, because it's a, it's a new, uh, geography for us

and the best way to build a product is.

Through, through right.

Customer feedback.

So we don't want to build the product in silo and, and just send it in the market.

We want to, I, I really love to interact with more customers and agencies so

that we can, we can alter the product according to what, what, what really

the, their, their requirement is.

Fantastic.

Fantastic.

Well, Abhishek, we will of course put all of those links in the show notes, which

you can get along, uh, with a transcript for free at ecommercepodcast.net.

Of course, it will be come into your inbox with the newsletter.

All the links and stuff will be in there as well if you're

subscribed to the newsletter.

And of course, if you're on the, uh.

On the old mobile phone, you can just scroll down and you're

your app and your podcast app and it'll all be there as well.

Um, Abhishek, listen, I, I, I should have done this before,

but I com I'm so engrossed.

Um, question for Matt.

Let's do that.

What's your question?

For me, this is where I ask, I like to ask my guests for a question.

I take the question and then I'll go and answer it on social media.

I'm really, really curious.

What's your question for me?

So.

I think I, I have a very, uh, so I want to understand, uh, so, you know,

uh, you, you, you have heard that what, what different products we have.

Do you think, uh, it's the right time to enter into US?

Okay, I will answer that question over on social media.

If you wanna know what I think about GoKwik, going into the states.

Go quickly over to LinkedIn.

Uh, find me on LinkedIn, Matt Edmundson.

I will be on that, answering that question.

Um, but Abhishek, listen man, I've really, really enjoyed the conversation.

Really intrigued by what you guys are doing.

Um, and I will definitely be following your journey.

Now we've got to the end of the show.

We've got to that part where I do the saving, the best tool.

Last question.

Uh, and so this is where, for the listeners that have made it this far.

I mean, we're sneakily trying to get people to listen to

more and more of the show.

Obviously, um, it's is, is not rocket science what we're doing, but for those

that have stayed, Abhishek we, we like to do the saving the best or less.

What's your best tip for those that have stayed the longest?

What, what?

What's your value bomb?

So one, uh, at least for the, for the customers from the UK

market, I think you should.

Immediately sign up for WhatsApp because you'll get the first movers

advantage every, when everyone is sending communication on email, at

least for the next one year, you will have the first movers advantage.

None of your competitors are doing it on the same channel,

so it's kind of a cheat sheet.

Uh, an example of that, one of a brand who does 12 million pounds in

a year during the Black Friday sale last year, they'd sent all their

marketing on WhatsApp and they ended up doing 1 million pound in a day.

And.

So

all doing.

Hmm.

Do your Black Friday promos on WhatsApp.

You hit it here first, ladies and gentlemen.

And that's a good idea because everybody's inbox is just full of junk.

So, um, I love that.

Can we implement it quick enough, uh, at the time of recording?

Uh, we've got a couple months, so maybe, uh, Abhishek listen, thanks man.

Thanks for coming on the show.

Really, really appreciate it.

And, um, it's been an absolute storm.

I loved it, loved every second of it.

Uh, so thank you for joining me.

Thank you very much.

It was a pleasure.

The, the conversation was great.

I, I hope to follow you.

I, I, I will follow your journey and, uh, listen to your

other, other podcast as well.

Fantastic.

Well, that's what we like, another listener.

Why not?

Uh, that's it from me.

That's it from Abhishek.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Have a fantastic week wherever you are in the world.

I will see you next time.

Bye for now.