Snapdeal buys TargetingMantra to help its lofty goal of 20m daily users

Photo credit: Eran Sandler.

Snapdeal today said it has bought tech marketing company TargetingMantra, in a move that is likely to give India’s third largest ecommerce firm better access to customer needs and desires – the mainstay of ecommerce marketing these days.

It will also help the company get closer to its lofty aim of getting 20 million daily active users on its ecosystem.

Started by former Amazon employees, TargetingMantra has a tech tool that figures out what online shoppers are looking for, and delivers personalized choices to them via email. It was a part of the 500 Startups accelerator program in Mountain View, California.

See: TargetingMantra launches a new product to make marketing emails more effective

Founded by Saurabh Nangia and Rahul Singh in March 2013, TargetingMantra has offices in Palo Alto and Gurgaon. The company builds products that smoothen out shoppers’ purchase experiences by predicting their needs and targeting customers accordingly.

Snapdeal is aiming for 20 million users to transact on its ecosystem daily by 2020

“When we say ‘customer experience,’ we don’t just mean the widget that shows you our ad. We think of the entire experience of how they interact with us, what they want to buy and their entire journey with the company. This [acquisition] will help with that,” said Rajiv Mangla, chief technology officer at Snapdeal.

For example, take a shopper who checks her emails at 9 am. She was browsing through shoes the last time she was online and typically makes her purchases in the first week of each month. TargetingMantra can make it possible for Snapdeal to send her shoe recommendations at 9 am during the first week of the month, when it is more likely she will hit “add to cart.”

In other words, instead of flooding everyone on the mailing list with generic emails that no one reads, consumers will only get those that are relevant and at a time when they will be opened.

In turn, that increases conversion rates for the company. That’s a boon to ecommerce firms which are usually known for burning money on customer acquisition. Snapdeal said the company will start implementing TargetingMantra’s technology in a few weeks. Financial details of the deal weren’t disclosed.

In January, Snapdeal reported losses of over US$119.7 million. for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2015, as the company spent heavily to maintain its market share alongside competition from Amazon and Flipkart. In 2014, losses were were for US$39.8 million.

Softbank-backed Snapdeal has otherwise been working towards improving its customer experience, adding and retaining high-quality users, and is aiming for 20 million users to transact on its ecosystem daily by 2020, said Rajiv. Currently, that number is at one million.

Currency converted from Indian Rupees. 1 USD = 66.5 INR.