TechCrunch
November 09, 2015
Ecommerce is a gold rush. Insider wants to make sure you don’t lose out
The global business-to-consumer ecommerce market is projected to reach a staggering US$2 trillion in 2016, according to a report by eMarketer. Consumers in the Asia-Pacific region now account for more revenue than their North American counterparts, with China accounting for the bulk of growth. And this trend shows no signs of slowing down; companies like Alibaba and Flipkart are already considered as some of the world’s leading startup unicorns.
The space is competitive and teems with opportunity, so it’s no surprise companies are doubling down on their digital marketing strategy. Traditional retail is stagnant; the real challenge is for companies to understand what drives digital consumer behavior and how best to capitalize on it. That’s the opportunity Insider targets. The Turkish startup describes itself as a “predictive marketing technology company,” and offers a SaaS product helping businesses increase sales conversion and revenue.
“We got our inspiration from the gold rush of the 1800s,” says Hande Cilingir, CEO of Insider. “In California the richest people were the first comers, the gold finders and the merchants who sold digging tools to gold miners. We adapted this story to ecommerce and decided to be a merchant.”
Since its launch Insider has scaled rapidly. It now has offices in London, Warsaw, Milan, Dubai, and Istanbul. Its services are used by over 200 paying enterprise clients, including the likes of MasterCard, Ebay, and AVIS. Hande claims their clients in Europe have, on average, witnessed a 16.7 percent increase in conversion, and 27.3 percent in sales revenue.
Hande says one of the reasons behind Insiders’ success is the wide product range it offers. The startup works with clients in all aspects of digital marketing, including growth hacking, user experience, and systems engineering, to create segmentation. It’s able to predict online consumer behavior to deliver different landing pages, messages, and product offers depending on the segment which they belong to. Along with Insider’s proprietary technology that is built to make integration with clients’ web and mobile applications as simple as possible, Hande says it offers a “4 man dream team” that assist clients with the segmentation and personalization on their site.
Each client is charged a monthly fee which varies according to their average page views. Other than ecommerce firms, Insider has also worked with financial institutions and publishers. The startup’s revenue has grown by 180 percent this year, and Hande says they’re targeting 200 percent growth in 2016. Insider has, to date, raised a total of US$1.5 million in investment spread across two rounds.
Expansion into Asia is a priority. Hande says potential in the continent is “very high” and the region is earmarked for 2016, along with Brazil and further consolidation in Europe.
