PURCHASING AND E-COMMERCE MANAGER
E-commerce is now one of the most important building blocks of the modern commercial world. The high internet penetration and the high rate of online shopping among users also allows e-commerce to further grow each and every day. According to We Are Social 2019 data, 4.388 billion (57%) of the world’s 7.676 billion population use internet. When compared to 2018 data, there was a 13% increase in the number of internet users in 2019. Ozdisan Elektronik, the leading electronic components supplier in Türkiye, transformed its official website ozdisan.com to an e-commerce site in 2015, in an attempt to adapt to today’s commercial world. Achieving a first in Türkiye with its search and smart filtering function, ozdisan.com offers its users B2C and B2B shopping opportunities. We talked about e-commerce and ozdisan.com with Ozdisan Elektronik Purchasing and E-commerce Manager Alper Ertorun, who emphasized that Ozdisan.com serves as a library for both industry professionals and students.
Alper, can we get to know you closely? How long have you been at Ozdisan Elektronik?
I was born in Eskisehir in 1982. After completing my primary and secondary education in Uskudar, where I spent my childhood, I studied Public Relations and Publicity Department at Anadolu University, Faculty of Open Education. I entered commercial life at a very young age. While also attending secondary school in 1995, I worked with my brother for about 10 years in our family companies operating in the automotive, service and food & beverage sectors. Our paths with Ozdisan Elektronik family first crossed in 1996 through our cleaning company operating in the services sector. After completing my military service in 2004, I started working at Ozdisan and have been a part of this big family for almost 15 years.
Can you tell us about your activities under your job definition? What are your main business processes?
In 2004, I first started working in the warehouse and logistics department, which we can call the “kitchen of the business”. Thanks to this, I had the opportunity to learn about the sector and have much basic knowledge. After two years in the sales and marketing department, I was employed as an active sales staff. After working there for a long time, I took over the responsibility of the purchasing and inventory management department of our company. Ozdisan Elektronik is the strongest company in the sector in terms of stock and product diversity in our close geography. In addition to the dynamism of this power of ours, our “instant delivery from stocks” that we offer to our customers must also be sustainable, and the most important condition for this is qualified stock tracking. Aware of our responsibility and with the support of our IT team, we have developed integrated software for our ERP program and made our business models more efficient and compatible with digital. In 2014, I managed the transformation process of ozdisan.com from an official corporate website to an e-commerce portal. I have been continuing my job as Purchasing – Stock Management and E-commerce Manager for the last four years.
Can you tell us about the establishment process of Ozdisan.com and your company’s efforts towards digitalization?
Ozdisan’s digitalization process was actually first started in 1999 with the establishment of ozdisan.com as an official corporate website. In those years, we used to offer our customers the opportunity to access our product inventory via internet in addition to having a corporate website. By making serious investments in infrastructure and software of ozdisan.com in 2015, we have transformed it into the most comprehensive e-commerce site in the sector in our close geography. We believe that we have closed an important gap in the sector ozdisan.com. Within the scope of our infrastructure works, we, with our team of 30 people from several departments in our company, showed great efforts and devotion and ensured that the data of datasheets, pictures and technical specifications of all products in our inventory were entered into the system and transferred to the digital environment. In addition, we have integrated our company into the e-commerce ecosystem by working in coordination with all departments at Ozdisan. Today, we sell our products through two separate portals as B2B and B2C. With this online shopping portal, we have made all our business models compatible with digital in such a way that they communicate with each other. At this point today, our sales staff can convert customer requests into orders within a few seconds on mobile, wherever they are and without having to be at the office. Also, during this digitalization process, we developed modules for our customers in order to receive online offers via our website in line with their needs regarding PCB and Aluminum Cooler products, to ensure the digitalization of this business model.
To whom does Ozdisan.com appeal?
In addition to being an online shopping portal, Ozdisan.com also acts as a digital library in the sector with its wide content. The technical specifications, datasheet and visuals of the products are followed by many users.
“In addition to being a source of inspiration for businesses in the electronic components ecosystem in Türkiye, ozdisan.com also serves as a library for both industry professionals and students.”
Everyone who “touches” the electronics sector is among our target audience. We have a wide portfolio of users ranging from users engaged in hobby electronics to industry professionals and students. In accordance with our corporate culture, we approach anyone equally and care about customer satisfaction. We are aware that businesses that do not turn their faces to the customers cannot grow. As a result of this, we receive positive comments in interactive dictionaries, social media and feedback from our customers. I also think that we are a source of inspiration for businesses in the electronic components ecosystem in Türkiye, which makes us happy in terms of the development of the sector.
What kind of benefits does Ozdisan.com provide to its users?
More than 150,000 products from over 1000 brands can be purchased at Ozdisan.com. We attach particular importance to the fact that all product groups in our inventory can be easily and quickly viewed by users. For this purpose, we have developed an intelligent search and filtering function, which is a first in Türkiye. On Ozdisan.com, the users can identify a product with product detail pages, images and datasheets, and can also easily access similar product and stock information while they are searching for the products they want. Since all the data are combined together, the users save time not only during product search but also during purchasing process. To give an example about the advantage that Ozdisan offers to its users, one of our customers chose about 400 different products at one time thanks to the intelligent filtering function of our website and purchased them easily. If this customer had purchased these products through a conventional sales channel, they would most probably have faced a serious loss of time, considering the dialogs, product selection and approval processes between them and the sales representative. With Ozdisan.com, our customers can benefit from a 24/7 system and easily purchase the products they need. Our customers who work at R&D departments prefer to design in quiet environments, and working overtime until late at night is quite common among our customers as well. I can say that the traffic on our website during night hours is also quite busy. Our website also makes a positive impact on the design processes, as our engineers are able to quickly provide the materials they need during their R&D studies.
Do you think that the shopping habits of Turkish SMEs from global markets has decreased with ozdisan.com?
The main factor that Turkish SMEs and other users in Türkiye preferred global sites was that these platforms offered technical details, datasheet, stock and price information about the products. By establishing Ozdisan.com as an online shopping website, we have started to offer more qualified, low cost and faster services to all our customers by reducing the external dependence of the sector to a minimum. By doing this, we also remove the installation costs, which are actually the biggest expense item for our customers. Considering the feedbacks we have received from our customers on this subject and the actual tenfold increase in the number of our members in the last 3 years, I can easily claim that the share of global companies in product purchases is decreasing daily.
How is the global interest for ozdisan.com? How many countries have you received orders from so far?
Ozdisan Elektronik was one of the few companies exporting electronic components in Türkiye before 2015. With Ozdisan.com, there has been a significant increase in our export and e-export performance. 20% of our members are foreign users. Users from over 165 countries have visited our website so far, and we have delivered many products to more than 80 countries without any problems. We offer our products to all global users, with several advantages such as same-day shipping, instant discount in the basket etc. At the same time, we respond to the demands of our foreign users instantly with the integrations we have made with our export unit.
“By establishing Ozdisan.com as an online shopping website, we have started to offer more qualified, low cost and faster services to all our customers by reducing the external dependence of the sector to a minimum. By doing this, we also remove the installation costs, which are actually the biggest expense item for our customers.”
Can you tell us about the campaigns you have implemented on Ozdisan.com?
We offer important privileges to our customers for both B2C and B2B shopping. Our B2C customers can take advantage of our “instant discount in the basket” campaigns, which range from 5% to 30% when they reach a specified shopping amount they make at one time. In addition, we have a ”Discount Fixing” campaign. If the shopping threshold that we impose is exceeded within 365 days, the customer gains a right for a fix discount rate for the next one year. In addition, internet-specific discounts are applied in some of our product groups and our current discounted products can be accessed from the “Campaigns” tab on our main page. Shipping is free for purchases over 200 TRY. We ship the orders placed before 15.00 on the same day. We also offer the possibility of 3, 6 and 9 monthly installments for credit cards.
We know that you will start a Money Points application. Can we also get some details about this?
Money Points is an extra discount option that we will activate in the coming days. Our customers will not only get instant discounts in their shopping cart but also earn Money Points from the purchases they make. The customers can spend the Money Points they earn, as an additional discount on their next purchase.
What would you like to say about the development of e-commerce in Türkiye?
With the increase in internet usage all over the world after 1995, consumers started looking for solutions to their needs in the fastest way. E-commerce, which is the greatest convenience of the digital environment, is growing rapidly every day in our country too, as is the case in other countries. According to We Are Social 2019 data, 4.388 billion (57%) of the world’s 7.676 billion population use internet. When compared to 2018 data, there was a 13% increase in the number of internet users in 2019. On the Türkiye chart of the report, 59 million of 82 million population use the internet. Compared to last year, there was an increase of about 5% in the number of internet users, while the mobile internet connection rate was 73% in 2018, which also increased to 93% as of 2019. Companies have now started to evolve to digital. People spend an average of 7 hours a day on the internet. They can easily reach to any point of the world via internet. In this context, I think that the volume of e-commerce operations in Türkiye will further increase in the coming years.
Can you tell us about your goals?
DMY Elektronik Yatırımlar Grubu çatısı altında bir şirket olarak öncelikli hedefimiz tüm dünyadaki sektör kullanıcılarına penetrasyonumuzu artırmak ve şirketimizin marka bilinirliğini global oyuncular arasında üst seviyelere taşımaktır. Bu hedef doğrultusunda satın alma stok yönetimi ve e-ticaret ekibi olarak şirketimize katma değer sağlayacak inovatif As a company under the umbrella of DMY Electronic Investments Group, our primary goal is to increase our penetration to industrial users all over the world and to carry our company’s brand awareness to the highest levels among global players. In line with this goal, we, as the purchasing stock management and e-commerce team, will continue to make innovative moves that will provide added value to our company.
To give a few examples for this…
To provide access to more users by providing powerful and new resources to our distributorships,
To offer special benefits to our customers by reducing our purchase costs to minimum levels,
To make our workflow times more efficient by continuously improving our existing business models.
