18 January 2021, Shah Alam – The Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Mega Sales Campaign, held from October 26 to December 15 2020 has proven to be a tremendous success, recording a whopping RM1.04 billion in ripple effect to the economy which includes RM32.06 million in direct sales.
The Selangor government had channeled RM2 million in the form of vouchers for the Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Campaign that onboarded 26,744 new e-merchants, benefiting a total of 73,791 e-merchants.
This is a 267% increase from the initial target of 10,000 new e-merchants which were expected to be onboarded, demonstrating that more SMEs have benefitted from the campaign.
The latest results also show a huge spike of 274% increase in direct sales and a 307% increase in ripple effect to the Selangor economy, compared with the Selangor E-Bazar Raya Campaign held from May 4 to July 4 2020.
The previous eight-week E-Bazar Raya campaign saw RM11.7 million in direct sales collected and RM341.5 million in ripple effect to the Selangor economy.
The one and a half-month Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Campaign actually spread across both the 11.11 and 12.12 sales campaign. The campaign kicked off on October 26 and was supposed to end on November 26 but it was extended to December 15 to cater to the enthusiastic reaction from merchants.
The top four most popular sales categories for the campaign were mobile phones and accessories, home appliances, home and living as well as health and beauty.
The campaign was jointly coordinated by Invest Selangor and the Selangor Information Technology and E-Commerce Council (SITEC) in collaboration with Shopee and Lazada – two of the most popular online sales platforms in Malaysia.
Direct sales are defined by the sales directly generated from the Selangor government’s vouchers. Ripple effect is the total purchased from a particular basket of sales which includes other non-voucher subsidised items – a spillover effect driven by the Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Campaign.
Given that both Shopee and Lazada have seen a record-breaking performance during the November 11 campaign in 2020 with Malaysia becoming the fourth largest spender globally through the 11.11 online shopping campaign, according to Alibaba Group’s news hub – Alizila, the Selangor E-Bazar campaign’s significant achievement is in tandem with current global trends and stands out as it promotes local SMEs.
In total, from the two rounds of the Selangor E-Bazar campaigns, SMEs successfully generated a total of RM1.39 billion in ripple effect to the economy through direct sales worth RM43.76 million from the total of RM3 million in vouchers channeled by the Selangor state government.
Selangor Menteri Besar Dato’ Seri Amirudin Shari said Selangor was the first state to embrace digital platforms when the first Movement Control Order (MCO) was announced last year.
Under the Selangor Economic Recovery Plan 2020 which aims to assist SMEs weathering the Covid-19 storm, the Selangor government has launched various digital initiatives: RM600,000 was allocated for the Selangor E-Kitchen programme, RM1 million for the Selangor E-Bazar Raya Campaign, RM2 million for the Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Campaign and an additional RM2 million for the “Nak Bercuti? Pusing Selangor Dulu” Campaign to revive tourism in the state.
“We want to create an accommodative symbiotic ecosystem to cater to all Selangorians. Based on the principle of ‘No one will be left behind’, digitalisation is not exclusive to the middle and upper classes only, but to all Selangorians.
“To make the Premier Smart State and Selangor Digitalisation Agenda a success, the state government and relevant agencies have allocated RM369 million in the state budget of 2021,” said Amirudin.
Meanwhile, Selangor executive councillor for Industry and Trade Dato’ Teng Chang Khim said the E-Bazar campaign has helped SMEs and micro SMEs affected by the Covid-19 pandemic to attain new sources of income. Some have even gained much higher sales during the MCO.
“We have seen traditional brick and mortar companies going online and successfully generating income to weather the storm during the MCO.
“More importantly, online grocery shopping has become a booming business. It provides sales for merchants, jobs for e-hailing deliveryman and convenience for customers, creating a win-win situation.”
Teng also noted how certain shopping categories such as mobile and accessories, home appliances, home and living as well as health and beauty have been particularly popular among consumers. As a result, Teng said these items were having an issue of short supply as the merchants could not meet the overwhelming demand.
Ian Ho, Regional Managing Director of Shopee said, “The campaign has empowered tens of thousands of Selangor sellers with added incentives specially for those new to e-commerce.
“The participating Selangor sellers on Shopee leveraged our marketing assets for maximum exposure and were able to enjoy high customer traffic during our 11.11 shopping festival.
“The success of the Selangor E-Bazar 11.11 Campaign is testament to our efforts in not only contributing to the revitalisation of the state’s economy, but also helping sellers embrace digitalisation and showing that e-commerce is accessible, inclusive and beneficial for everyone.”
Lazada’s Chief Business Officer, Sherry Tan said that the leading e-commerce platform is proud to support the Selangor state government in their efforts to help local businesses benefit from Malaysia’s accelerated digital economic growth.
“Merchants that went ‘digital’ as part of the campaign have seen positive results, collectively selling more than 1 million products.
“This emphasises the distinct advantage of digitalisation and the continuous rising trend of e-commerce as Malaysians spend more time shopping online to get their essential needs.”
From SITEC to SIDEC
Established under the secretariat of Invest Selangor by the Selangor State Government, the Selangor Information Technology and E-Commerce Council (SITEC) is chaired by the Selangor executive councillor for Industry and Trade YB Dato’ Teng Chang Khim. SITEC aims to develop Selangor as the regional trading hub for e-commerce and to uplift the startup ecosystem within the state.
Since 2015, SITEC has successfully onboarded 650 e-commerce merchants and trained more than 9,000 SMEs and individuals who wish to make sales online through its E-Commerce Class, Master Class, Online 100 and Brands 100 programmes.
SITEC has also nurtured 90 startups from the three cohorts of the Selangor Accelerator Programme (SAP) and organised 3 Pitch@Selangor sessions, as well as making pitching and industrial visits to the Silicon Valley. SITEC also reached out to more than 600 Micro-SMEs from municipals in Selangor through the popular Jelajah Usahawan Digital.
Five years since its inception, SITEC has generated a Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) of RM334.81 million through its various high-impact programmes.
In improving the management of SITEC programmes, the Selangor state government has thus decided to set up SIDEC Sdn Bhd as a full-fledged government-linked company and a subsidiary under Invest Selangor Berhad
SIDEC Sdn Bhd aims to lead the digital transformation of Selangor as ASEAN’s digital hub through these objectives:
- Nurturing Selangor digital talents, narrowing the digital divide
- Accelerating Selangor startups to become regional tech icons
- Empowering Selangor businesses and SME digitalisation
- Encouraging Selangor digital investment and emerging technologies