In a first of its kind initiative, Essar group company Aegis BPO is foraying into the retail domain — virtually.
MUMBAI; In a first of its kind initiative, Essar group company Aegis BPO is foraying into the retail domain — virtually.
And what does the outsourcing major propose to do? Use its database and manpower to generate sales for other companies, many of whom are its existing clients.
Aparup Sengupta, MD & CEO of Aegis BPO, said the company has completed a pilot run of the new business under its retail division, Aegis Direct, over the last 12 months.
The company sold insurance policies, banking products, and high-end white goods such as plasma TV and laptops in the pilot run, earning over Rs 2 crore per month, generating revenues of Rs 25 crore in the process.
The pilot run was conducted in Delhi, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Kolkata. Sengupta declined to share investment details but conceded that there was significant support from the Ruias, the Essar group promoters.
The move stems from the company’s telesales and call centre businesses, which threw up information on customer buying behaviour over the years.
“As part of customer lifecycle management processes we generate a lot of data that we thought could provide a lot of opportunity for many of our clients in insurance, banking and other businesses. We thought to carve this out as a business in itself,” said Sengupta.
The company has already deployed 700 people for the retail business. Their mandate is to take calls, generate leads or preference on specific products or bundles of products, visit the customer physically to close the sale and inform the concerned vendor (mostly Aegis BPO’s existing clients) to deliver.
To begin with, Aegis Direct will avoid brick-and-mortar retail outlets and use a combination of channels such as telephone, internet and physical interaction to gain customer loyalty.
Appointment of franchisees for delivery and collection in the non-metros would only happen in the second phase.
The company is currently working on various go-to-market schemes and bundling offers, etc.
Sengupta said, “We’ll sell products that have some time lag between order and delivery. Initially, we will stick to products and services that fetch higher margins.”
Aegis Direct is now looking to tap customers in the 1,700 oasis regions (non-metros) in the country and also plans to replicate the business in other geographies, such as the US and Europe.
Aegis BPO had earlier acquired a call centre, Orion Dialog, to access the north India market.
India accounts for over $200 million out of Aegis BPO’s $330 million annual revenues, 80% of which is from voice-based outsourced business processes. The company’s people strength has reached 32,000 following the recent merger of US-based PeopleSupport Inc with subsidiary Essar Services (Mauritius).
t_amit@dnaindia.net
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