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By Ariba Shahid
he Daraz mobile app was terrible. Customer reviews were bad, it had a low rating on different app stores, and even though it should be easier to shop through a mobile app than through a website a vast majority of Daraz sales continued to come through people logging in on their computers. This was a problem for Daraz, and while they have not been open about the exact numbers, it was enough of a problem that Daraz was seriously workshopping and troubleshooting their app. Much has been said about Pakistan’s eCommerce potential and shopping online has increased since the pandemic. In FebruaryPakistan’s e-commerce market size posted a growth of over 35 per cent in the first quarter of the fiscal year 2021 to Rs96 billion compared to Rs71bn over the corresponding period of last year. This is only a fraction of the projected potential that the eCommerce industry might have in Pakistan. And Daraz, from the very beginning, has both been a frontrunner and a gamechanger for eCommerce in Pakistan. In 2018, when Chinese eCommerce giant Alibaba acquired the Daraz Group for an estimated $150 to $200 million, it became clear that this was a game where big money was involved. Which is why it was natural for Daraz to want a better mobile app. What did they do? They used the ICC T20 World Cup as a crutch and it worked out brilliantly for them. You see Daraz had a serious problem with customer acquisition for their app. People simply had no incentive to download the app. Which is why Daraz decided that even though it had nothing to do with their product or with being an online eCommerce platform, it would add an option on their app to live stream the matches of the cricket world cup. This was a smart move. Pakistan’s first match in the world cup was against India, a competition that is famous for being the most watched sporting event in the world. While rumours have circled in the past that 1 billion people tune in to watch the matches,
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