Anchanto, a Singapore-based B2B SaaS (software as a service) company, is now playing a crucial role for businesses — traditional and online — who are shifting their focus to or strengthening their digital presence. The current situation of lockdowns and movement restrictions put a huge dent in the world economy but continued cash flow is necessary in order to halt any financial collapse.

While some businesses were forced to shut down operations completely, the others shifted their focus by going digital and offering services using apps, social media, and online stores.

“eCommerce is shifting toward supporting the recent demand for essential products such as groceries has gone up, other categories are experiencing a sharp decline in the volume,” said Abhimanyu Kashikar, co-founder and country head of Anchanto Philippines. “The suddenly elevated demand requires modifications in the way orders are fulfilled so that buyers can receive products in time and in a consumable form.”

Businesses are now faced with abrupt changes in their planning and strategies especially now that a highly contagious virus is said to live on surfaces for hours or even days.

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Kashikar said the logistics sector has also been strongly impacted. With overall volumes going down for eCommerce businesses in the Philippines, logistics players are struggling to run their operations and operate efficiently. Checkpoints delay deliveries of essential goods and the supply chain is disrupted significantly.

Consumer behavior

Consumer behavior also experienced changes, according to Kashikar. He noted the exceptional growth in demand for essential goods and even home gym equipment. Luxury goods such as travel and outdoor equipment recorded a sharp decline.

With fears of contracting the virus if they go out for the supply run, consumers move toward eCommerce.

“While moving to eCommerce quickly will be a priority for traditional businesses, the existing ones will be looking to include essential products in their offerings and eventually expand their reach to more customers,” said Kashikar.

Anchanto

Before the unprecedented global health crisis, Anchanto has been offering services that would push eCommerce into the forefront of the retail industry. The company designed platforms and integrations that would allow businesses to expand quickly across multiple channels and gain visibility and traction to reach more customers.

“These businesses can leverage our platform to start managing their operations such as inventory, orders, pricing, promotions, listings, reports, and much more, on multiple sales channels from a centralized platform,” Kashikar explained. “As our platform cuts down on repeat actions required, this helps them curb their costs as well.”

The company can also help enterprise brands to implement successful direct-to-consumer (D2C) strategies so that they can own their customer experience, have complete control and visibility over their operations and boost topline.

Business efficiency

“At a time, when businesses are already incurring high costs to operate, achieving efficiency and productivity becomes more important than ever,” Kashikar said. Any errors or cancellations or returns during such times inflict extra penalties for businesses.”

Anchanto’s platforms can help businesses achieve error-free operations and ensure maximum efficiency through automated eCommerce management. This can not only help businesses save money but also prepare to cope up faster or the time when restrictions are lifted.

Businesses suddenly found themselves adapting to digitalization.

“We understand that we can help businesses achieve digitization faster,” Kashikar said. “Hence, we are working to offer group buying benefits on our platform. This will help us extend more discounts for the businesses planning to shift to a new model or mold their existing business models. Our objective here is to help the business community as much as we can and charge only to cover our costs while not making any profits in this current scenario.”