Konga shines, Yudala steps up and Nigerians shop!

folarin okunola

November 30, 2015 2:32 PM

Leading ecommerce sites like Konga and Jumia offered as much as 90% discount on certain products as consumers joined the worldwide frenzy.

Millions of people across the world would be participating on the Black Friday sale.

Black Friday came and now it is gone. For some it was a day of delightful shopping on the virtual shelves filled with seemingly endless discounted items. For others, it was not just a let-down, it was a total disappointment.

While most of the ecommerce platforms promised huge discounts and gave said discounts, others resorted to underhanded tactics in conducting their black Friday business.

Leading ecommerce sites like Konga and Jumia offered as much as 90% discount on certain products as consumers joined the worldwide frenzy.

Several videos showed up on the Internet showing numerous lines, bickering and even fights as shoppers across the world took to the stores to lay their hands on every price-slashed item they could find. There is no denying that Black Friday is a global phenomenon.

Here in Nigeria, the story was not too different. ‘Black Friday’ trended on Google search results all day from about 1am and is still trending today even though the event itself ended two days ago.

READ: Konga hits N1 billion worth of transactions with 6 hours to go

Popular OEM Infinix Mobility also launched its brand new 6-inch Hot 2 device to much aplomb. The device is already on sale.

Surprisingly (or not too surprisingly), there were no crashes on any of the websites holding Black Friday sales, unlike last year when various sites went down for long periods of time.

Composite retail chain Yudala, broke boundaries by delivering with a drone – the first time this has ever been done in Nigeria - as well as holding Black Friday sales in its offline stores while social media was aflame with Black Friday bants.

I was most impressed with Konga, though. The site operated smoothly and the ecommerce site held its Yakata sales for two days! More than any other ecommerce site. In addition to that, orders were processed promptly, tracking orders was easy as pie, and customers reported receiving delivery of their orders as early as the next day. To top it all off, the company recorded about N1 billion worth of transactions with six hours left to go on the day! Nice!

All in all, Black Friday was mostly what I expected it to be.

folarin okunola