Digital marketplaces are here to stay and with the heightening customer expectations of the online shopping experience, live commerce enabler Upmesh is powering a shift towards live selling among merchants in the region. Its end-to-end solutions span the entire customer journey, from the initial livestream to order fulfilment.
In a retail landscape rewritten by the pandemic and shifting consumer behaviour, digital marketplaces have emerged as the medium of choice for almost 90% of Malaysian consumers and businesses. Chief among these marketplaces are e-commerce platforms with Malaysia experiencing a 23.1% increase of e-commerce revenue year on year. Merchants are thus facing a new challenge as they bring their businesses online: balancing the convenience of digital purchases with the human element of in-person shopping.
Live selling — where retailers showcase their products via social media livestreams and allow customers to buy products in real-time — bridges this gap between the virtual and physical. Wong Zi Yang, co-founder and CEO of Upmesh, believes that the unique format of live commerce keeps customers engaged even through a screen, which can be instrumental in helping businesses maintain strong customer relationships and grow at scale.
“Live selling is a very unique, hybrid distribution channel for businesses. It recreates the interaction and excitement that shoppers would usually experience in-store, while also helping retailers to build a strong sense of community among fellow customers viewing the streams. The free-to-use nature of social media democratises this whole experience, making these live selling sessions accessible to just about anyone, even smaller or home-based businesses,” shares Wong.
To better empower Malaysian businesses to tap into the full potential of live commerce, Upmesh provides an end-to-end solution for live selling merchants that allows them to engage with their live audience through rewards and lucky draws, and assist them through the fulfilment process of every order made live. This comprehensive approach empowers merchants who are struggling to adapt to the challenges of this hybrid selling approach with effective yet easy-to-utilise tools.
The platform’s services include an order management system that automatically captures sales via comments, a real-time inventory tracker dashboard, secure payment collection via a dedicated payment gateway, and last-mile delivery. Upmesh also offers merchants fully customisable livestreams and is the world’s first live selling system to support both Facebook Live and Instagram Live simultaneously.
Beyond automating processes for live sellers, Upmesh has a special focus on nurturing brand and customer communities. The platform is the first in Malaysia to incorporate a buyer loyalty programme into its services, in order to reward repeat engagement and grow audiences for every live session. Upmesh also injects fun into livestreams with integrated gamification features such as quizzes, lucky draws, and promotional codes.
“A big part of the excitement of live selling is the spirit of healthy competition — sometimes it comes down to a battle of fast fingers and the thrill of having beaten another person to the same item! The team at Upmesh have always been passionate about making online shopping fun and engaging again, rather than a solitary experience,” Wong adds. “Our results speak for the effectiveness of this approach: all our merchants have enjoyed an average increase of 250% in monthly sales over a 6-month period.”
Founded in 2019, Upmesh has an established brand presence in four regional markets: Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and the Philippines. The platform currently has more than 400 merchants onboarded from various industries spanning lifestyle, business, and tech. Within the past year, Upmesh successfully raised US$7.5 million in an investor funding round led by Monk’s Hill Ventures, which will facilitate further market expansion and better incorporate automation into their solutions.
To know more about Upmesh and the services it offers, please visit their website where merchants can also request free trials and demonstrations.
