Amazon bets big on tier 2 and tier 3 Indian cities driving its growth

"85 per cent of the company's new customers, including Amazon prime members, make up its tier 2 market," said Subbu Palaniappan, Director of Prime, Amazon India.

The deliberation by Amazon officials happened during the recent Amazon Round Table Conference 2021 where the fact that continuous investment in India is a sign of how much India is valued as a business venue was shared.

On the company's initiatives front, Amazon has focused on input metrics, infrastructure, voice-enabled services and video narratives for aiding its market in tier 2 and tier 3 cities

With an expectation of a slump in smartphone prices that can lead to an increase in affordability, Amazon Prime India predicts a major push to further digitalisation, the official said.

The amazon top dog in India microed in on the West Bengal market saying, "Apart from Kolkata, members in smaller towns such as Durgapur, Howrah, Hooghly, Kharagpur and Siliguri among others, are enjoying shopping and entertainment benefits with Amazon Prime. Popular product categories for Amazon Prime members in the region include apparel, beauty, home & kitchen products, wireless accessories, books and grocery products, to name a few."

But when comparing the overall dynamics and outlook of Indian to American customer habits, he said that Indians on buying the Amazon bundle of services might come for one of its services like the OTT platform but end up utilizing all the other services as well. The same trend is not witnessed in U.S citizens, who usually use Amazon's shipping and shopping facilities.

Adding to Amazon's interest in the East India market, it claimed to have set up a 32,000 sellers network from West Bengal, including 6 fulfilment centres, with more than 3,500,000 cubic feet of storage space, and the presence of two sort centres in the state with close to 1,25,000 square feet of processing space.

Recently, the company's attention has diverged to their Amazon Music platform, where the US major is said to have shown interest in independent music, though the global angle is still amplifying its focus to podcasts.

To highlight Amazon India's learnings, Subbu said, "As we navigate through these challenging times, over the last year we have learnt the impact that an offering like Amazon Prime can have on everyday lives of members by bringing them ease and convenience as they continue to stay safe at home. Keeping in line with the changing customer habits, we will continue to make Prime more accessible to our customers so they can discover and enjoy Prime’s many entertainment and shopping benefits."