e-commerce
Amazon beats others in mega pre-festive online sales: Ugam
MUMBAI: In an earlier feature done by Indiantelevision.com, we saw creative and ad gurus giving their opinion on the fiercely competitive campaigns that e-commerce brands launched, with Amazon, Flipkart and Snapdeal leading the pack.
Be it their display ad wars, or their strategically placed jacket advertisements on newspapers, their digs at each other not only grabbed the consumers’ eyeballs, but have also created a stir within the ecosystem.
The season was ushered in by two of the top e-commerce players conducting three mega sales in two weeks. Flipkart kick-started the celebrations with its second edition of the Big Billion Days sale, followed by Amazon’s Great Indian Festive sale, and most recently Amazon’s Great Indian Diwali Sale from 26 to 28 October.
Now that we have Diwali is knocking at our doorsteps, an analysis by global analytics manager Ugam has put a perspective on the entire scenario.
Ugam recorded Amazon’s pricing and assortment for likely bestsellers in three key product categories – Laptops, Home Appliances and Books – and compared it to Flipkart and Snapdeal to learn which retailer actually had the best offers for the likely best sellers.
As per their survey, Amazon.in led the sale period, by offering lowers prices in two out of the three categories, namely home appliances and books.
While that puts Amazon in the lead, it failed to spoil its consumers for choices. The e-commerce brand didn’t have a larger assortment of products when it came to home appliances and books, though it still led the books inventory.
Snapdeal dominated the laptop category with 2026 Stock Keeping Units (SKU), and missed the top position in the home appliances category by a small margin, putting Flipkart on the top with 5319 SKUs in their inventory.
Amazon made up for its lack of variety, by staying better stocked throughout the sale.
If one were to go by prices, Amazon had a better score as per the data shared by Ugam. While Flipkart had lower prices for their Big Billion Day sales for likely best sellers in the laptop category, Amazon kept their prices low for home appliances and books sections.
While the survey is inconclusive in revealing the revenue each player made throughout the sale, by tallying the pricing behaviour of the ecommerce players with consumer behaviour one can form an idea on who scored the most in the season of sales.
MUMBAI: From flights to tracks, Cleartrip is now trying to keep every journey on the same ticket. Cleartrip, part of Flipkart, has launched train ticket bookings through a partnership with Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation, marking its entry into India’s vast rail travel ecosystem.
The integration allows users to search, book and manage train journeys directly within the app, as the company pushes towards becoming a unified, multi-modal travel platform. The move plugs Cleartrip into one of the world’s largest transportation networks, where over 800 million reserved passengers travel annually, alongside a daily footfall of around 23 million across Indian Railways.
The offering includes bookings across routes nationwide, covering General and Tatkal quotas as per Ministry of Railways guidelines. Users can also access real-time seat availability, fare insights, PNR status tracking, berth preferences and digital payment options within a single interface.
The expansion reflects a broader shift in travel platforms from specialising in a single mode to stitching together end-to-end journeys. For Cleartrip, the bet is not just on scale, but on simplifying a system often seen as complex and fragmented.
Company executives said the focus is on embedding predictive intelligence and personalisation into the booking journey, aiming to make everything from discovery to post-booking support faster and more intuitive.
The train booking feature is currently live on the app, with plans to extend it to the web platform soon, signalling a push towards a seamless cross-platform experience.
In a country where railways move billions each year, the next battleground for travel apps may well be decided not in the skies, but on the tracks.
