At the recent 7th Singapore Intercomm Technology Federation (SiTF) Awards 2015, the fairly young e-commerce start-up, ShopBack, bagged not only the Silver award in the Best Innovative Infocomm Products (Consumers) category, but also the coveted Gold award in the Best Start Up (Growth) category. ShopBack offers online consumers a new way to enjoy discounts and savings on their purchases, by providing cashback on over 500 regional and international merchants. ShopBack has been causing quiet murmurs in the start-up scene since its inception only a year ago, but its road to the SiTF Awards has been nothing less than tumultuous. On top of a lack of initial start-up funds, the uncertainty of newly innovated technology, and the general unfamiliarity of the ShopBack brand name, the new start-up also faced the problem of introducing the cashback mechanism – a concept foreign to the mostly sceptical and frugal Southeast Asian market.
The early days of ShopBack
The early days of any start-up are never easy – it was “win or die trying” for Henry Chan, one of the six Co-Founders of ShopBack, who had cleaned out his savings account to and dived into the depths of the unknown. Keeping his financial situation from his family, Henry had little choice but to make it work from the very start.
However, being one of the first companies to bring the cashback concept to the Southeast Asian market, ShopBack had to develop their very own in-house core technology – technology that the team was not even sure was workable. Joel Leong, another Co-Founder of ShopBack, recalls that when ShopBack made the pitch to its seed investors; their program had only been coded the previous night, and only some parts were working. The experience was nerve-wrecking as the ShopBack team had to ensure that their potential investors only tried out parts that they knew worked for sure.
In fact, the team was not even sure if the whole business idea would come through or if ShopBack would just be another idea swept under the rug.
The ShopBack met with many roadblocks along the way, that put the team in constant doubt. There was a time when many of ShopBack’s partners and merchants were still not confirmed, a week before ShopBack’s first campaign. With postponement of the campaign becoming a real possibility, morale was low amongst the team. But with their continual efforts, and perhaps a stroke of luck, ShopBack’s largest partner came on board the campaign, and “everything else fell into place”, says Joel. There was even a time when the ShopBack team had to activate their friends and relatives to meet daily their daily KPIs whenever they fell short. Every transaction that did not originate from family or friends was considered a small and sweet victory for them.
Still, ShopBack persevered, and neigh everything paid off – the ShopBack team took the idea and ran with it, and has since received more than USD$ 1 million in seed funding from Accel-X and East Ventures, serving as validation for the business model and the company.
ShopBack Today
A year later, ShopBack now has over 500 regional and international merchants and 200,000 registered users. With businesses in Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, and most recently, Indonesia, ShopBack garners up to 1.3 million clicks in monthly regional web traffic.
However, ShopBack is far from perfect. Joel still checks through the barrage of customer service emails the first thing in the morning in order to get a sense of what still can be improved on. It is with that attitude that ShopBack operates, and supported by ”a super team made up of the most driven people who not only think big, but also make things happen”, as quipped by Shanru Lai, another Co-Founder of ShopBack.
The SiTF Awards 2015 and Beyond
Image credits: ShopBack Facebook
Attaining the Gold and Silver awards for the Best Start Up (Growth) and the Best Innovative Infocomm Products (Consumers) categories in the SiTF awards was an unexpected win for ShopBack, having celebrated its 1 Year Anniversary only last month in September. However, in spite of ShopBack’s success thus far, the whole experience has been humbling to the team and serves as a “strong testament to [their] business approach and direction.” With this affirmation, ShopBack is eager to move forward and overcome any future challenges they may face is “now even more motivated to localise the formula for more countries in the AsiaPacific region.”
With more awards translates into a higher standard for ShopBack to upkeep, and Joel credited the intrepid team at ShopBack as the main reason why ShopBack is able to constantly reach new heights – “We owe it all to our team. They are the ones who made ShopBack possible. We will continue to work hard and bring the brand further.”
In the future, ShopBack will continue to move towards their vision of providing the most innovative platform for online shopping and “insights for faster, smarter and cheaper shopping.” Shanru hopes that ShopBack can continue to provide its customers with “cashback on even more products you might not even imagine” and more tailoring and customisation to its customers needs.
“Dream big, then make those dreams a reality” – the ShopBack team understands the need for them to retain their competitive advantage by remaining adaptable in the current economic climate and the ever evolving industry of e-commerce. As ShopBack continues to expand into the rest of the region, ShopBack has to work doubly hard to continue to localise the cashback model regionally so that it “befits each market’s unique consumer needs”.
What ShopBack will roll out in the future, no one knows; but one thing is for sure, it would be exciting and interesting to see what actually does happen.
Featured Image credit: SiTF Facebook
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