OLX vehicle category gets 850 million page views a month (as of January 2015) on Ads listed. Its auto-category gets 45 million visits a month. There are half-a-million ‘Individual Sellers’ posting Ads for used vehicles every month on OLX.. A seller receives about 14 responses within two days of posting an Ad (with pictures) for a vehicle. OLX auto brand-awareness is about five times that of other used cars classifieds ( Source: Google Trends).
Amarjit Singh Batra, CEO, OLX India says the company is a leader in used cars and used two-wheeler category. OLX has kept the platform primarily consumer-to-consumer (C2C) focused, with 90 pct used vehicle sellers being individuals rather than business sellers. By and large, used cars market in India in classifieds and offline has mostly been B2C. OLX auto has created a market for car owners to directly deal with buyers. Morgan Stanley’s report published on February 5th, 2015 says the company is a market leader within C2C eCommerce by a wide margin, and a majority of users have had an excellent user experience. Another Morgan Stanley report says it is rapidly gaining undisputed leadership in its target segments.
Word-of-mouth has been one of OLX auto biggest growth drivers. Superior user experience, and high liquidity is a constant focus area offering sellers and buyers of used cars the benefit of conducting reliable and responsible transactions by tying up with Mahindra First Choice Wheels Ltd. Sellers can now get their cars inspected by Mahindra First Choice Wheels Ltd. while posting an Ad.
Buyers can request an inspection for a car they want to buy. OLX auto has tested the feature in a few cities, and it will be made live on the platform soon. Nagendra Palle, CEO, MFCWL says the partnership brings both market leaders together. OLX and Mahindra First Choice Wheels can together help individual sellers and buyers.
As the used car market gains traction, Ratan Tata in his personal capacity has invested in auto classifieds portal CarDekho. The investment amount is not disclosed. Apart from his minority stake in the company, Ratan Tata will advise the company as and when required. CarDekho acquired Gaadi in 2014. Carwal and CarTrade are competitors.
