Sunday, April 8, 2012

Bollywood and E-Commerce - A Perfect tie-up !


no mistake, nothing new
If one follows the Bollywood stars about investments, one can certainly make a fortune. They used to invest heavily in real-estate and gold. With growth in financial markets, they must have made good bounty in stock markets. They certainly made their active presence felt in all forms of media and especially digital media. This must have convinced them about the power of digital world and prompted them to invest in e-commerce.

Here are a few e-commerce ventures in which bollywood stars have invested:

Yatra.com : This is a travel portal, which allows booking of flights, hotels, holidays and train tickets. Salman Khan has picked up stake in this venture and started endorsing the site through TV commercials. This Dabaang star can certainly make a dent in competitors market share.

Babyoye.com : This is one of the first and popular online store selling baby products. Karishma Kapoor has not only invested but also acting as brand ambassador in this venture. I am sure her 'karishma' must be making a difference to sales of this fast-growing company.

Celebwears.com : Did you ever come out of a movie and felt that you should own one of those apparel or accessories worn by the stars? Check out celebwears.com. Vatsal Seth & Sohail Khan started this venture to satiate the needs / desire of all the Bollywood fans across the globe. The number of movies getting released does not seem to match what is offered through this site.

Herstyle.in : An online e-tailing store selling apparel, accessories and lingerie. Neha Dhupia has invested in this venture and endorsing the site. I guess this adventure of hers would not go down like her movies.

Ticketplease.com : This site sells movie tickets online. An attempt is made to engage the viewers with contests, loyalty and news but the currency is not maintained. Ajay Devgan and Sanjay Dutt, who invested in this venture must have considered it as a non-performing asset.

Grouphomebuyers.com : An initiative to allow groupbuying of houses as the name suggests. Shilpa Shetty has a stake in this venture and talks about sales of 3-digit crore rupees. I have my own doubts about these numbers after looking at what is offered on the site.

I am sure the movie stars of tollywood, kollywood, sandalwood and others must be following a similar trend in their regions. With the stars bringing their personal image and following to the table, e-commerce and Bollywood would form a perfect blend to make a far-and-wide impact.

Apparently, this trend of investing in e-commerce ventures is going to be followed by cricketers and politicians :-)  

What do you think?

3 comments:

  1. Amazing details. How did you manage to find out? BTW I used think Bollywoood stars are just duds. Looks like they are investment gurus.

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  2. Thanks Valady. I have been following this domain for quite some time. Yes - they are investment gurus. It would be nice if the money comes out in white supporting innovation and entrepreneurship.

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  3. Add one more to your list : http://www.yapaa.com

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