Bulbul is India’s first video commerce platform, launched in late 2018 to revolutionize the way people shop. While researching ecommerce trends, the team realized that people in smaller cities weren’t able to adapt to traditional methods of ecommerce, since text-heavy product pages and customer reviews can be a little intimidating.
Bulbul’s solution is to create live, engaging, and interactive experiences for both buyers and sellers using product videos created by local influencers in a variety of languages. Initially, they launched a prototype of the platform by sharing product videos and picking up orders on WhatsApp groups. The warm reception of the prototype inspired the founders to release the app in March 2019.
People don’t shop every single day on an ecommerce platform. To keep users returning to the app even when they don’t have a specific purchase in mind, Bulbul was built as a discovery-based platform. Factoring in freshness and variety was important for Bulbul because they wanted to stand out from the crowd of ecommerce apps.
To increase app engagement, the team needed to understand what users were doing after launching the app: what product pages they were viewing, how long they were watching videos, and which user actions correlated with a purchase.
The two key metrics for Bulbul are retention and revenue. By incorporating social actions like sharing videos and connecting with influencers, the app keeps users engaged. They also use gamification to get users earning discounts, and to encourage repeat purchases and long-term loyalty.Using CleverTap, the team was able to gain a better understanding of both user behavior and marketing campaign results, providing them with valuable insights that could boost engagement, retain users, and increase revenue.
Using RFM, the Bulbul team was able to measure the health of their user base. This tool helped them uncover more insights about their champion users and also plan campaigns to re-engage inactive users.
Bulbul targets users who have watched a certain kind of product video in the past 2-3 days with intuitive, relevant, and personalized video recommendations.
Funnel analysis helps the team identify where customers drop off in the conversion process. They conduct a deep-dive analysis using Flows to see how users navigate the app and take the guesswork out of understanding the customer journey. With Trends, they can look for anomalies in the view-to-purchase rate and other metrics.
The way ahead for Bulbul is social. Amping up initiatives that drive connection between users and influencers as well as fostering the community spirit is key for the platform. Using gamification to improve the user experience and increase stickiness is another priority, and we are excited to continue our partnership with Bulbul as they leap into a new phase of growth.