The document summarizes Flipkart's "Big Billion Day" sales event in October 2014. Some key points: - Flipkart reported Rs 600 crore in sales but faced major issues with website outages, fluctuating prices, and cancelled orders that damaged its credibility. - Problems included the sale starting early without stock, misleading ads, crashed servers, and "out of stock" errors despite confirmed orders being cancelled later. - While the sale drove huge traffic that Flipkart didn't predict, the order cancellations and misleading discounts will be hardest to forgive. The fiasco may have benefited competitors Amazon and Snapdeal.

1. A CASE STUDY
THE BIG BILLION DAY
PRESENTED BY
BRIJESH KUMAR AWASTHI (IMP2014002)

2. INTRODUCTION…..
 October 6, 2014 saw Flipkart make Rs 600 crore as a
result of its “Big Billion Sale”.
 The brand also made news for a lot of wrong reasons –
amplified disastrously on social media.
 Price fluctuations and jacked up pre-discount costs.
 Flipkart’s proposed 24 hour sale sold out in a mere 10
hours even as the website gave out and orders got
cancelled
 One tweeter summed up customer sentiment aptly,
stating “among the billion things #Flipkart sold that day,
one was its credibility.”

3. FLIPKART’S MISTAKES AND PROPOSE
IMPROVEMENTS.
 Record sales and an apology – too little too late?
 The sale kicked off before the announced time – stocks
were out even when people logged in at 8am.
 Discounts offered on newspaper ads proved misleading.
 Servers crashed, HTTP 404 abounded.
 Worse, prices fluctuated between MRP, discounted price,
and jacked up pre-discount rates.
 “Out of stock” and “Sold out” were the highlights of the
day.
 Confirmed orders got cancelled in hours.
 Flipkart ended up doing Amazon and Snapdeal a great
favor.

4.  Did Flipkart’s apology salve its reputation or
appease consumers?
 Did the 7 year old e-commerce company believe
excuses and explanations would help?

5. WHAT FLIPKART COULD HAVE DONE RIGHT
 Without doubt, Flipkart underestimated the
traffic the Big Billion Sale would drive by a
HUGE margin.
 Digital and traditional marketing.
 Bad job predicting sales.
 While Indians are no stranger to infrastructure
failures.
 The hardest thing to forgive will be the order
cancellations and disillusionment from
misleading discounts.

6. WHAT WERE FLIPKART’S SPECIFIC
MISTAKES?
 Advertizing the sale everywhere like crazy .
 Not preparing for an unprecedented high in traffic .
 Started small .
 Not touted unrealistic discounts .
 Warranty hassles.
 Extended the sale window.
 Prevented insider hoarding .
 Learned from earlier mistakes.

7. REDEMPTION FOR FLIPKART?
 Flipkart may have received a billion hits on its
website on October 6.
 As Amazon and Snapdeal! Snapdeal reportedly
made $600 crore the same day.
 Let’s say Flipkart wins back its loyalists. How
about first time visitors?
 Samsung, LG and Sony “predatory pricing.”

8. OUR TAKE – WE, THE CONSUMERS
 Better traffic management:
 Greater inventory control:
 Managed sneak attempts amazon
“bigbillionday.com.”
Intriguing questions also came up:
 Was the fiasco over-publicised?
 Was the goal increasing Gross Merchandise Value
(GMV)?
 Could the sale have been a deliberate blooper?
 Invite government vigil?
 . Was Flipkart trying to spread attention to
competitors before their Diwali sales rolled out?

9. THANK YOU
PRESENTED BY
BRIJESH KUMAR AWASTHI(IMP2014002)