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Close to six months since the launch of Tata Neu, the super application (app) from Tata Sons Group is all set for a revamp.
The highlights include a reimagined rewards programme or NeuPass, a more seamless user experience by increasing the digital maturity of brands, adding more brands to the platform, and hiring category leaders to drive the next phase of growth.
When it comes to brands, Titan will join Tata Neu by Diwali.
Tata Motors and Air India will be on board after the Festival of Lights.
The first emphasis of this reimagination will be on expanding the user base.
Pratik Pal, chief executive officer, Tata Digital, in a recent interview to the group’s in-house magazine Tata Review, said his aim was to touch 100-150 million users on the platform in the next two/three years.
Senior company executives said that number is not daunting.
“The total customer base of Tata Group companies is around 122-130 million.
"The current database that Tata Digital has is 83 million (excluding Titan and Tanishq).
"Tata Neu already has 27 million NeuPass members,” said a senior company executive.
To put things in perspective, Flipkart’s registered user base is around 200 million; Amazon’s over 100 million.
For customer acquisition, this 122-130-million base has been carved up into two segments: ‘active’ base has loyal shoppers who have been Tata brand adherents for the past five/six years, as opposed to the ‘not-so active’ base.
“The customer acquisition strategy is very scientific.
"For instance, regular BigBasket and 1mg customers will be targeted differently.
"This will be a very personalised proposition based on demography, shopping habits, etc,” said a senior executive.
The next big challenge that Tata Digital is working on is to make brands as seamless as possible on the Tata Neu platform.
According to sources, the company is working with each and every brand to uplift their digital journey by bringing them to Tata Neu’s level of maturity.
Much like what consumers are used to after using platforms like Amazon and Flipkart.
“BigBasket is high in digital maturity, so it seamlessly works with Tata Neu. Croma will also be online.
"Westside’s digital journey is also being reimagined. Since each Tata company is a well-known brand and has its own set of loyal customers, Tata Digital cannot simply take over the digital part and make it native to Tata Neu.
"If we want users to stick around, a seamless experience is crucial,” said a group executive.
Brands already on Tata Neu have seen early benefits, with Indian Hotels Company seeing 18 per cent rise in its NeuPass user base.
Similarly, 70 per cent of traffic on Croma is from Tata Neu.
“This is the power of the Tata Neu platform, which is also exciting to brands.
"Although the group has an overall customer base of 122-130 million, brands can access only 4 million.
"If Tata Neu can activate these 120 million users, the brands will see a reason for better integration with the app,” said an executive.
According to a source in the company, in the recently concluded pre-festival sale, Tata Neu had managed to meet all the internal targets, including gross merchandise value.
The other thought process within the company while it tries to bring seamlessness to the platform is how native the apps ought to be on the platform.
The other big focus, where Pal is spending considerable time on, is hiring.
Tata Digital has been investing a lot of effort into hiring category business heads.
There are four parts to the hiring process.
One, get the product or core heads in place.
Two, focus on marketing and branding teams. Three, the category of business people. Four, the horizontal functions.
“Almost 90 per cent of all the hiring the company is doing now is to hire category leaders for grocery, fashion, health, electronics, etc. They will work closely with the brands,” said the executive.
The total employee base at Tata Digital is 800-900.
