Mahindra & Mahindra take tech companies’ help to revamp its digital platform

MUMBAI: With one in every two car buyers surfing online to decide their brand purchase, Mahindra & Mahindra, India's largest utility vehicle maker has decided to revamp it's digital platform by engaging with experts BCG, Microsoft and Dassualt to engage with prospective buyers right through their purchasing cycle.

Being the first to sell vehicles through e-commerce platform, Mahindra today gets 6% of its sales lead from online platform, by revamping the digital platform, Mahindra's intent is to bring the showroom home of the buyers through a mix of physical and virtual experience to keep its prospective buyers hooked to its brand at a time when the buyers are spoilt with choice.

The company expects about 15% of its retail sales to be generated through online platform in FY-19 from current 7-8%.

Veejay Ram Nakra, Chief Sales and Marketing, Automotive Division, M& M Ltd said over the last 12-18 months, Mahindra has re-imagined the customer purchase experience by engaging with experts and has aimed to redefine the purchase experience in the automotive retail space.

"In India, buying a vehicle is a family decision, so the best way of retaining him is you give him an experience at home. You give you a test drive at home, offer virtual reality box to decide their own car, chose their own accessories and close the deal with them," added Nakra.

The company has started the concept of "taking showroom at home" on a pilot basis at one of its dealership in Mumbai and the company claims it is doing well and very soon it will roll it out to the other parts of the country.

The new digital platform was put in place after looking at more than two lakh internal customer feedback or complaints and at the same time engaged BCG to define the digital strategy, which conducted its own research by interacting with new age buyers and understanding their needs and demands.

The company has worked with Microsoft Consulting to envisage the pre-sales strategy. M&M created SyouV Platform along with Microsoft, Dassault Systemes & Hard n Soft Technologies. For the post purchase platform Mahindra With You Hamesha, the company had engaged with Extentia Technologies and BCG helped the company " Bring The Showroom Home" initiative for which application has been developed by Artificial Reality.

The new digital strategy takes into account the experience a prospective buyer may have pre-purchase during purchase and post purchase and the idea is to offer transparency, convenience and personalisation option.

During the pre-purchase phase, Mahindra has created a portal Mahindra SyouV.com, which will offer transparency, convenience and personalisation option for consumer to shortlist from claims the company and customer can book a test ride anytime anywhere, do a video call with experts, locate the dealership where the vehicle of their choice is available along with a waiting period.

For the post purchase experience, Mahindra's With you Hamesha App, allows a buyer to book service online, track service history, interact with service executive through a chat and track the entire vehicle right from pick up to drop during the service process. M&M has an SOS service incase of a breakdown, the customer care contacts the customer quickly in case of an emergency.

With rising role of digital platforms, the company's marketing spend on digital platform has more than doubled in the last three years. Digital spends already account for 15% of Mahindra's advertising spends today.

Nakra says the role of digital platforms plays an integral part in influencing pre-purchase and purchase journey of the ever evolving consumer.

"The combined role of our SyouV platform in the pre-purchase phase along with our tie-ups with key Auto Portals will help us not only increase the size of the funnel but also drive higher conversions. Our aim is to double the retail contribution from digital platforms in FY19 for our key products from the current levels of 7-8%," added Nakra.