Singapore e-commerce is expected to be worth S$7.64 billion (US$5.4 billion) by 2025, according to data gathered between April and July by Malaysian online shopping aggregator iPrice Group.
Singapore also has one of the highest internet penetration rates in the region at 82 per cent.
Amazon’s arrival into Southeast Asia, starting with Singapore last month, was met with overwhelming demand for its Prime Now service, while CapitaLand last month announced a strategic alliance with China’s Alibaba to manage its Shanghai headquarters and launch an online mall on Lazada Singapore. At the same time, iPrice released its first interactive e-commerce study, comparing 31 e-commerce websites in Singapore, reports E27.
There were four key findings in the study…
1. Qoo10 rules Singapore e-commerce traffic
Qoo10 has an average 8.4 million monthly visits, according to SimilarWeb. The Giosis-owned e-commerce site recorded nearly double the traffic of Alibaba-backed Lazada, perhaps because it established itself in Singapore earlier than Lazada.
While Qoo10 reigns supreme in the traffic arena, other e-commerce merchants dominate for other parameters: blogshop turned fashion retailer Love, Bonito has the highest number of Instagram followers (122,000), while Lazada has the highest number of Facebook followers (18.1 million).
Singapore is Qoo10’s second-largest market in terms of users and sales performance after Japan. Qoo10 is the rebranded version of Gmarket from South Korea, and is also active in China, Hong Kong, Indonesia and Malaysia. An estimated 75 per cent of Qoo10’s users are female, with an average age of 27 years.
2. Local players dominate the local scene
Out of the top 10 e-commerce companies in Singapore, seven are local players – Lazada, EZBuy, Zalora, Shopee, Reebonz, Love, Bonito and Forty Two.
Lazada leads with 4.3 million average monthly visits, according to SimilarWeb. While it is second to Qoo10 in Singapore, it is the leader of e-commerce in Southeast Asia, namely Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia.
EZBuy, formerly 65daigou, trails at third place with 2.2 million average monthly visits. Acting as a middleman, its website allows users to shop for items in overseas online stores.
Fashion heavyweight Zalora comes at fifth place with 1.2 million average monthly visits. Following the sale of its Thailand and Vietnam businesses, it has concentrated on high-potential, high-growth markets like Indonesia and Singapore.
3. The top 10 most-visited sites are general and fashion e-tailers.
Based on traffic, the top 10 websites in Singapore are general purpose and fashion. General sites such as Qoo10 and Lazada are also a mainstay across all other Southeast Asian countries. However, the data shows that Singaporean shoppers prefer to go to fashion-specific sites when shopping for clothes. Zalora is the most-visited fashion portal in Singapore and ranks in fifth place with 1.2 million average monthly visits.
Luxury e-tailer Reebonz comes in at No. 7 with 588,000 average monthly visits, while Love, Bonito ranks at No. 9 with 296,000 average monthly visits.
4. Local fashion brands dominate Instagram
Love, Bonito leads the pack with 122,000 followers. Founded by Viola Tan, Rachel Lim and Velda Tan, it was one of the early blogshops in Singapore, winning Best Blog Shop at the Asia-Pacific Blog Awards in 2009.
Second is MDS Collections with 71,000 followers, followed by MGP The Label with 44,000 followers.
