Redseer survey: Flipkart and Amazon are going neck-to-neck

Though Flipkart pocketed in a whopping investment from Tencent, eBay and Microsoft and is also displaying improved performance over the past six months, it is yet to defeat arch-rival Amazon India.

According to a survey published by research firm RedSeer Management Consulting Pvt. Ltd, Amazon India has caught up with Flipkart in terms of popularity and brand recall among consumers.

In the latest edition of the RedSeer E-tailing Leadership Index (ELI), Flipkart and Amazon were both locked at the top of the rankings with a score of 95. Apparently, while Flipkart still tops the popularity charts among consumers, it yielded ground to Amazon on the main metrics such as overall brand performance during the January-March quarter. The US-etailer also covered significant ground in areas such as customer satisfaction, as metrics such as net promoter score (NPS) show.

RedSeer surveyed some 9,000 online shoppers in 30 cities, tracking prices of various items across India’s top five e-commerce companies, which include Paytm and ShopClues.

Other online retailers such as Paytm and Snapdeal saw a dip in rankings. Snapdeal scored 80, while Paytm scored 79. ShopClues and eBay India that was recently acquired by Flipkart stood with scores of 70 and 68 respectively.

The survey considered three broad metrics: trust in a brand; product assortment and prices; and the overall buying experience in terms of ease of using the e-commerce platform, delivery speed/consistency of orders and ease of product returns or cancellations.

The ELI survey also noted that overall customer satisfaction for e-commerce had crawled upwards since the festive season sale. RedSeer said, “The overall industry NPS has moved upwards, as a cyclic consequence of improved business delivery in the post-festive season sale lull. Historically, NPS moves inversely to GMV as companies find it operationally easier to service the customer demand.”

Under new CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy's leadership, Flipkart is showing recovery signs. However, it remains to be seen whether this turnaround is sustainable.