Year end quotes from real estate, dynamic pricing, healthcare -; ecommerce sector

3 Jan 2022 , 10:20 AM

Rana Biswas Vice President-insurance & Wealth Solutions | APAC & ANZ Equisoft

While insurance portals have become a popular way to acquire customers and provide digital touch points, much of the sales process is still mired in old school processes: it is tedious, paper-based, and frustrating enough that clients abandon the process before completion. As the industry has invested heavily in digital transformation, streamlining sales and improving consumer experience requires advisors and agents to be available during the digital sales process.

Indeed, hybrid digital and advisor sales processes can reduce frustration and dramatically increase policy application completion rates. To make that happen, mining books of business, enabling more client needs to be met and increasing engagement is the answer. Automating routine client service tasks can free up advisor time for more profitable activities, like relationship management and cross-selling. Because cultivating existing relationships is key: while advisors have a 15% chance of selling a product to a new prospect, that probability more than triples with existing clients, climbing to 50%. 

That’s where modern digital tools make a difference, with the likes of  e-Applications and client portals enabling all industry stakeholders to stay connected. Customers will receive the accelerated, highly personal care they desire. Advisors will be able to meet with prospects and clients either in person or at a distance. These integrated systems will go a long way towards a seamless customer experience and also enhancing the efficiency and productivity of the frontline sales team.

While allowing advisors and agents to help. Answer questions. Build trust. And have a relationship.

Dynamic Pricing

Ms. Vijeta Soni, Co- Founder & CEO, Sciative
“2021 has been a year of learning as it exposed businesses to unexpected situations with global markets opening, shutting and then re-opening again. What emerged as the only tool to cope up is – Technology. Businesses have fast adopted the use of technology from their production units to supply-chain systems, from marketing to customer loyalty systems. In midst of all this, smart businesses have also accepted the importance of RIGHT PRICE! Technology has also played a key role in price determination of products and services across sectors at massive scales and high velocities. As pricing majorly contributes towards the growth and success of any company, technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are starting to effectively decide the pricing of products and services. With the advent of speculations around the new Covid variant, technology is bound to be at the forefront in 2022 too. Reliability on intelligent technologies for decisions related to sensitive areas like pricing will increase because manual errors or any incorrect pricing decisions shall prove to be fatal for businesses in the tech-enabled consumer world. Keeping the current situation in view, companies across retail, travel, entertainment and many more are further going to adopt and evolve technologies that can help in real-time pricing acknowledging the dynamic market conditions and consumer sentiments.”

Healthcare

Mr. Dheeraj Jain, Founder, Crysta IVF

“With the beginning of the second wave of the pandemic during April-June, the IVF industry slowed down. The unprecedented COVID-19 crisis has presented a significant challenge for couples seeking IVF treatment in India. According to medical experts, 30 lakh people in India seek infertility treatment each year, but only 5 lakh undergo the IVF/Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) procedure. As majority of couples had to postpone their plans to start a family owing to the health crisis, those who were undergoing the procedure were unable to complete their treatment. The later part of the year saw large concentration towards digital customer acquisitions. In 2022, the IVF market will grow at a rapid rate, as many couples have been waiting for two years to initiate treatment. AI will also play a bigger role in the coming year, especially when it comes to embryo transfer. Genetic testing will also be performed at various stages of the treatment.”

Mr. Dheeraj Jain, Founder, Redcliffe Labs,

“The diagnostics industry has witnessed tremendous growth in 2021 owing to the massive mindshift towards preventive healthcare led by the pandemic. Many large corporations as well as start-ups have entered the space recognizing the immediate but suddenly a very large opportunity present here. The awareness among the masses for diagnostic tests and personal health monitoring considering the importance of maintaining good health to decrease the risk of Comorbidity. The coming years would see further surge in demand for home collection services due to the eminent desire among people to avoid waiting in queues at collection centers and quality oriented labs to ensure accuracy and dependability of test results. Localisation of lab networks will be undertaken to cater to the large consumer base. Furthermore, the diagnostics sector is set to employ tech to a massive extent with the rapid adoption of AI especially at clinical reporting.”

Real Estate

Anilcy Verghese, AVP Sales & Marketing, Karle Infra pvt
Outlook for 2022 Real Estate Trends
1.       Focus on Customer Experience (CX): Earlier, the focus was on customer service which is very reactive and focuses on assistance that a company provides to its customers when asked. Now, however, the shift has been towards customer experience which takes into account every single touch point in the entire interaction of the customer with the company which today includes both online and offline touch points. Moreover, Customer Experience Management (CEM) follows CRM, attracting and retaining customers by providing a great experience.
2.       Secondary market revitalization: Urbanization and increased standards of living are now reaching secondary markets and beyond. Thus, it provides ample opportunities for developers to take them up, providing redevelopment support and new assets.
3.       Rise of Community Living: We at Karle Infra Pvt. Ltd. have started seeing a trend in the younger generation, especially in Bengaluru, to move into a community that has good amenities. This ongoing quarter has seen considerable growth in sales – 3 times as much as compared to last year. Moreover, customers during this season are confident, displaying genuine interest in buying/investing in the property, resulting in stronger numbers for genuine inquiries. The overall site visits have also doubled since last year. This surge in numbers is not limited just to our domestic market, as there’s been a 2x rise in sales for the same project in the NRI market compared to the last festive season. These numbers are a clear indication of what the future holds for gated communities. This will be an ongoing trend in 2022 as well
4.       Conversational AI: Ensuring a better CEM, these allow 24*7 contact channels with quick response times and minimal error rates. According to Deloitte, “these assistants would be built for purpose, have a rich set of capabilities, and be integrated into the end-to-end process landscape of the enterprise.”

Mr. Punit Gupta, Founder & CEO, EasyEcom,

, “The pandemic has proved to be a source of immense learning for every business, especially for the ecommerce space. The year 2021 witnessed the emergence of digital as a preferred medium for businesses that led to increased adoption of digital for reaching out to customers. The e-commerce industry due to its highly volatile nature has been one of the earliest to recognize the urgency of adopting the ‘new normal.’ The necessity of employing omni-channel for ensuring sales across channels has paved the way of employing an e-commerce enabler that streamlines all processes such as stock management, warehousing, payment reconciliation and order management. The year ahead will see digital transformation being recognized as an indispensable element in the ecommerce industry to drive operations, fulfil customer demands and ensure customer retention. Many support functions that drive ecommerce operations will come to the forefront too.”
Consumer Electronics

Mr. Vipin Agarwal, Co-Founder, Candes

“This year, 2021 has turned out to be an amazing year, Candes is now recognised by various market analyst as one of the top D2C Indian brands in home and kitchen appliances space. We grew 300% to 2020 and now in top 3 in several categories on online marketplaces. As larger focus on energy saving and building comfort around smart appliances, we launched IoT to most of our products. In addition to this, we launched a new range of Washing Machines and Smart TV and extended our product range to Kitchen appliances as well, including Gas Stoves, Mixer Grinder, Blenders, and Choppers this year. In 2022, we plan to enter refrigerator and AC segment and build supply chain towards these heavy good. We are bullish to a 500 cr revenue year in 2022 and outperform most established with digital only brand in Home appliance space”

Mr. Mandeep Arora, MD, UBON

“The year 2021 has been phenomenal. Despite the pandemic, we did well though not expected. Covid 19 brought along new opportunities and challenges. We explored and conquered it while launching new, innovative products in order to complement the hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision of “Make in India ”.

Mr. Lalit Arora, Co – Founder, VingaJoy

“2021 has been a Ringa Ringa Joy year for us. We worked around coming with a brand new vision, a new perspective. We took feedback of our end consumers into consideration, came out with new new products having absolutely new features while keeping the price line unchanged.

Mr. Vipin Agarwal, Co-Founder, Candes

“This year, 2021 has turned out to be an amazing year, Candes is now recognised by various market analyst as one of the top D2C Indian brands in home and kitchen appliances space. We grew 300% to 2020 and now in top 3 in several categories on online marketplaces. As larger focus on energy saving and building comfort around smart appliances, we launched IoT to most of our products. In addition to this, we launched a new range of Washing Machines and Smart TV and extended our product range to Kitchen appliances as well, including Gas Stoves, Mixer Grinder, Blenders, and Choppers this year. In 2022, we plan to enter refrigerator and AC segment and build supply chain towards these heavy good. We are bullish to a 500 cr revenue year in 2022 and outperform most established with digital only brand in Home appliance space”

Ecommerce & Logistics

Mr. Harsh Vaidya, Founder & Ceo, WareIQ.

“COVID 19 has accelerated numerous traditional retail businesses to shift towards online operations in a grand manner. Since eCommerce force chains are erected to be further tech-ferocious to offer speed than the traditional retail force chains, the companies have been proactive for the shift. The rapid-fire pace of digital metamorphosis is being reconsidered in Indian logistics. Robotization, artificial intelligence, machine literacy, data analytics, and the Internet of Effects (IoT) are significantly contributing to adding functional effectiveness.
Volumes will surge online, and they will come from various channels – Traditional marketplaces, D2C, Vertical marketplaces, Live/Social & Q-commerce. This will be an exciting year for modern brands to build scale as barriers to entry & scale are lower than it’s even been. Digital-first brands will expand offline, and offline majors will go online, and omnichannel commerce will see a big push. As a supply-chain enabler to this modern commerce, WareIQ is excited to seize the opportunity”

The views and opinions expressed are not of IIFL Capital Services, indiainfoline.com