[Brand of India] Bzaar’s Nishant Verman shares a 7-step process to make a winning D2C brand

The important drivers of D2C acceleration are the buying preferences of customers and their specific needs and behaviours, which has enabled D2C brands to target these niches and serve them, says Nishant Verman, Co-founder and CEO, Bzaar, a Bengaluru-based online B2B cross-border marketplace for multi-category products, at the recently concluded YourStory’s Brands of India event on Friday.

According to Nishant, the primary reason to become a D2C brand is that "today's customers prefer buying directly from you. They want to have a relationship with the seller and know what's the brand/product story."

“Over the next five years, D2C brands present at least a $100 billion opportunity, and 600+ brands have raised over $1.5 billion in the past two years,” he says.

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Here is a 7-step process by Nishant on how to make a winning D2C brand.

Identify your customer: Who and what's the size of your target customer segment, what’s the accessibility of this customer segment, how to reach them, and is it easily accessible or not.

'Today, women consumers make up 40 percent of the online shoppers, and this is an amazing segment to chase. Also, rural and international markets have become more accessible for D2C brands to target,” Nishant adds.

Select the market gap to target: It’s really important to understand if you are solving a problem your customer cares about. Talk to your customer or potential buyers, and be as much in-depth as possible you can.

Building a wow product: After identifying your customers, their needs, and the market gap, now comes the opportunity to build a product that fulfils your customers' demand. Create the right product to fulfil the needs of your target customers.

“Also, spend a lot of time thinking about the different things you can do to design the best product,” Nishant says.

Spread the word: After creating a product, brands must think of positioning it in the market, messaging and marketing channels you can use to spread the word, including social media, content, influencer marketing, paid or digital advertising, etc. 

How to sell: Think about the ways to sell the product, including your website or third-party marketplaces. What is the right platform for the business and to engage with customers?

Customer delight: The best D2C brands truly shine with customer delight, Nishant believes.

“As a D2C brand builder, you should think of how to better engage with customers and how to wow them with a good experience. Think about how you can give your customer a phenomenal experience, not just in terms of the product, buying, or post buying.”

Rinse and repeat: In the end, it’s about being sure that you truly know your customer, providing them with new, better products repeatedly. Fulfil the promise of being a true D2C brand, owning and building on the top of your customer base.

“I feel this is just the beginning. The acceleration of D2C brands is just getting started and is going to be 10X with a $500 billion value creation going forward. It’s a great time to be building a D2C brand because the ecosystem is really starting to come up. We can do an amazing job of building a D2C brand both for India and for the world,” Nishant says.

Brands of India is a YourStory initiative to catalyse the growth of India's D2C economy. The initiative will bring together D2C ecosystem stakeholders, including brand builders, D2C startups, investors, corporates, and policymakers, to discover, build and help daring entrepreneurs create an additional 500 Brands of India in the next three years.

To know more about this initiative and the D2C ecosystem, visit brandsofindia.yourstory.com