With almost all the world's leading Internet platforms now in the stock era, India and Southeast Asia have undoubtedly become another battlefield to expand new users. In the face of the dual dividends of the Internet and population, major video streaming and e-commerce platforms are trying to deploy in such emerging markets to compete for market share.
A few days ago, it was reported that Amazon may have tested the new Prime membership subscription service "Prime Lite" in the Indian market to provide users with related services at a lower price. Prime Lite Beta is priced at Rs 999/year ($12) as a cost-effective alternative to Prime members, which costs Rs 1499/year ($18).
In terms of user rights, Prime Lite users can enjoy free two-day delivery and can watch all Prime Video content for free, but the resolution is only high-definition, with ads included, and the number of login devices is limited. In contrast, Prime members can enjoy free one-day or same-day delivery, and Prime Video has more options, in addition to Amazon Music, Amazon games, eBooks, free EMI and many more related benefits.
However, since Amazon has not yet responded to the matter, it is not possible to confirm whether or when it will officially launch this new subscription service.
Earlier this month, Amazon India said its goal for 2023 was to increase the total number of Prime members, while Manish Tiwary, country manager of Amazon's consumer business in India, pointed out that "the three important indicators of Amazon's long-term growth are more customers, more Prime subscribers and more sellers."
It is not difficult to find that Prime Lite is very similar to Netflix's low-cost subscription service Basic With Ads, which is also to broaden the user base by limiting rights, increasing advertising, and using lower prices.
Previously, in December 2021, in order to compete with Amazon and Disney for market share in India, Netflix has significantly reduced the cost of subscription services in the local area, of which the largest price reduction is the entry package, which is directly reduced from 499 rupees / month to 199 rupees / month, a reduction of 60%. Monika Shergill, Netflix India's vice president of content at the time, said that "the new membership price will make streaming services more accessible to Indian viewers." ”
However, compared to Amazon Prime Video's 179 rupees per month and Disney+ Hotstar's 1499 rupees per month (average 124 rupees per month), Netflix prices are still the highest.
In fact, the price of these video streaming platforms in the Indian market is much lower than in other regions, so it is enough to show that they have become a must for major platforms today. Occupying the market first through low prices, and then gradually cultivating users' payment habits, has long been a tried-and-true way for Internet companies.
Furthermore, Bain & Company predicts that the Indian market is in a high-speed development stage, and its e-commerce revenue will double in 2022 compared to 2020. At the same time, according to the relevant data released by Statista, the number of Internet users in India is also showing a growth trend, the number of Internet users in 2021 is 741.9 million, it is expected to reach 1.1 billion in 2025, and the size of India's e-commerce market may reach 200 billion US dollars in 2027.
In the face of such a huge potential market, it is naturally impossible for major Internet manufacturers to let go. Among them, Amazon was almost surrounded by bad news throughout 2022, and even fell out of the "trillion dollar club" in December 2022, becoming the world's first listed company with a market value of more than $1 trillion.
In terms of performance, after Amazon's adjusted net profit fell by 50% year-on-year in the third quarter of 2021, it began to fatigue in terms of performance. For example, in the first quarter of 2022, Amazon recorded its lowest revenue growth since 2001, up only 7% year-over-year, while also reporting its first quarterly loss since 2015.
However, at the beginning of the new year, Amazon seems to have not been able to "transfer", but announced a few days ago that it will cut more than 18,000 employees, higher than the previous plan, and this is also the largest layoff in Amazon's history.
According to a statement previously released by Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, the layoffs involve Amazon stores and personnel, experience and technology departments, of which physical stores and human resources sectors such as "Amazon Fresh" and "Amazon Unmanned Supermarket" have been the most affected. Amazon will also lay off about 1,000 employees in India as part of the global layoffs.
The disappointment in performance and capital market may also accelerate Amazon's "cost reduction and efficiency increase". In addition to targeted cost cutting and abandoning many experimental projects, "opening up new users" has naturally become a necessary means to improve revenue and profit margins.
In fact, whether Amazon, Netflix launched low-cost subscription services, or domestic Internet companies bet on the "Extreme Version" a few years ago, the essence of what they want to get is the same, that is, "new users".
At that time, whether it was Kuaishou and Douyin in the short video field, Tencent Video and iQiyi in the long video track, or Toutiao and Tencent News in the information field, they all launched the extreme version of the application one after another, and almost all tried to attract users with the function of "watching videos/watching information to earn money". Such a cash incentive strategy is undoubtedly an important tool for acquiring new users, especially in areas where price-sensitive users gather.
Now even Netflix has compromised with the advertising model, Amazon has also launched a price subscription service, perhaps in the future in these new incremental markets, these overseas platforms may also learn from domestic Internet companies and launch the game of "brushing applications to earn gold coins".
[The picture in this article comes from the Internet]