IRONY OF INDONESIAN INTERNET SHOPPING BEHAVIOUR AND WHAT E-COMMERCE SHOULD PURSUE IT

Abstract

Current research from Hootsuite & We Are Social (2018) showed that Indonesia is one of the countries with the highest number of internet users in the world. However, only 21% are making purchase through e-commerce. It leaves 79% of potential consumers to be acquired. Such a big business potential stimulate a question, how can this be? And further question, how e-commerce marketer can tap in this big untouched opportunity? The study will try to list on the factors affecting purchase decision through online platform and the online consumer behaviour. Then, study the market through Yasa Singgih’s, the owner of Men’s Republic (an Indonesian fashion e-commerce founded in 2014), Instagram followers about their preferences, expectation, and holdbacks to do online purchase and to get deeper understanding by interviewing ten people from survey population. The result shows that some of them are already purchasing things from e-commerce however system adoption and trust issues are still the main holdbacks. Finally, the paper conclude that there are five things can be done to tap-in the potential market: to focus marketing on the most digital literate customers (millennials and Gen-Z), to use social media as marketing and communication channel (both before and after sales), provide better back-end (database and preferences) and front-end security (product quality and delivery time), and last but not least to urge government and telecommunication companies to enhance connectivity quality (speed and coverage).