Days after social media giant Facebook and Reliance Jio signed a $5.7 billion deal, JioMart has gone live on WhatsApp. The services have gone live in some areas of Mumbai including Navi Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan. It will be rolled out in several other cities shortly.
Reliance has roped in lakhs of small scale businesses and Kirana stores for the services and it will allow the customers to place an order for essential stuff through WhatsApp. India currently has as much as 400 million WhatsApp users in India.
Currently, in its pilot phase, the service is live only in some areas of Mumbai including Navi Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan. The company plans to roll out the service in other parts of the country soon.
For the new initiative, Reliance has roped in several small scale businesses and Kirana stores. Users will be allowed to place an order for essential stuff through JioMart’s WhatsApp Business account. India has about 400mn active users in India and the Mukesh Ambani-led company plans to leverage its strong Jio network and the user base for the new initiative.
In order to place an order, consumers have to text “Hi” to 8850008000, which prompts a link that opens a mini-store on the browser, allowing them to pick a range of grocery products including toothpaste, snacks, tea and occasional, rice, and vegetable oil.
Once an order has been placed, which currently doesn’t include how to pay digitally, JioMart automatically assigns an area store to them and sends an invoice through WhatsApp.
JioMart, a venture between Reliance Retail, India’s largest chain, and Reliance Jio Platform, the most important telecom network in India with over 385 million subscribers, is ensuring “hygiene and safety of staff,” “fair prices”, round-the-clock operational warehouses, and “daily supplies to the shop .”
The major business deal between the two giants is expected to disrupt the Indian business ecosystem in many ways. While the JioMart initiative is a potential Amazon rival, Facebook is eyeing on the launch of WhatsApp Pay in India for quite some time now.
WhatsApp has yet to receive approval from New Delhi for a nationwide rollout of Pay in India. Media reports claimed earlier this year that WhatsApp had begun to expand Pay’s reach within the country in various phases.
According to media reports, JioMart is currently available within the suburban Mumbai areas of Navi Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan currently. However, the service is predicted to be unrolled in the remainder of the country soon.
To order from JioMart, one simply got to add JioMart’s WhatsApp number 88500 08000 on their phones, then JioMart will send a link to the user’s Whatsapp chat window which is valid for 30 minutes.
By clicking on the link, the user is going to be directed to a replacement page where he/she has got to fill his address and telephone number.
After filling out the required information, JioMart would show the customer a listing of all the available items.
Once placed, the order is going to be relayed to the local Kirana store, alongside the small print of the customer.
The customer on the opposite end would receive the name of the Kirana store to which the order has been dispatched, receiving the notification with the order and therefore the Kirana/JioMart store details on his number.
