Is Buying Branded Products directly from their Official Website, Cost-effective and Reliable?
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Is Buying Branded Products directly from their Official Website, Cost-effective and Reliable?
We will discuss Brand eCommerce sites vs online Marketplaces in this article. Get to know which is better for savings and great quality products.
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When you decide to shop online, a question may arise in your mind that should I buy from the official site or from online marketplace sites, for reasons like trustworthiness and savings. Well, if you want to buy branded products online, these are the possible two options:
- Buy from the brand’s official website.
- Buy from online marketplaces like Amazon, Flipkart, Tata Cliq, etc.
Firstly, compare the cost of the product on the official site and on marketplaces. Here, cost means after deducting all the discount and/or cashback amount i.e. finally how much you will pay after savings. If the cost on the official site is lower or fractionally higher then without any doubt, you should buy from there itself, but if vice-versa then you need to explore something more and go for marketplaces.
- Whether the product is taken care of by Amazon, Flipkart, etc or not?: On the product page if you find “Fulfilled by Amazon” means that the product is stored at Amazon’s warehouse and the entire shipping process will be carried out by Amazon. This means that the product has gone through Amazon’s quality checks so you are assured of a genuine and new product. Similarly, for Flipkart it is “Flipkart Assured”.
- Check the Users Ratings & Reviews: On the product page you will find ratings & reviews of people who have bought and used the product which you are willing to buy. They also post product images which help in checking the original look. If the average rating is above 4 star and user count is high, you can say that the seller is genuine and trustworthy. Flipkart, Amazon, etc does not allow fake/biased reviews and ratings so you don’t need to worry about that. Moreover, you can see “Verified Purchase” written beside the user’s name in Amazon which means that Amazon has done quality checks on this user.
- Check the Seller: You need to check the seller which can determine the quality of product that you will receive. If the seller is the brand or marketplace itself then no need to worry. For others, you need to check the seller ratings. If the seller is on the marketplace for a long time and has more than 3.5 stars of average rating from many users then it's safe. For instance, Cloudtail India is one of the best sellers on Amazon with over 1.8M+ user ratings.
- Other Advantages: When you buy a “Flipkart assured” or “fulfilled by Amazon” product, the return policy is good i.e. you will have enough days to return(if required), the delivery process is executed by Amazon itself so you get safe & faster shipping, and Amazon provides the complete customer support for the product.
- Authenticity: Brands will never want to let down their own name so will always deliver genuine and seal packed products.
- Reliability: If you find some issue with the product, you can directly contact the brand instead of going via 3rd parties.
- Promotional Offers: Brand sites provide great discounts and/or cashback since it helps in growing their own site and saves their money from commission to retailers.
- Exact Warranty: We found a branded product on Shopclues which gave 6 months warranty while on its official website it said 1 yr warranty.
- Shop More Save More: Brands have loyalty programs where they offer good discounts, freebies, giveaways, and gift cards frequently so that you don’t leave them.
- New User Coupons: Brands welcome their new customers with good discounts so getting a new user coupon from DesiDime is easy and gives you great rewards.
- Clearance Sale: Many brands have a store clearance sale where products are liquidated at better discounts. You can visit DesiDime for updates regarding this.
- New Products: You will find exclusive and new products at the brand's site. Also, if you are an existing customer of the brand you can save big on new products via the new user coupons.
It is possible that more people will shop from the brand’s official sites in the years to come, but it is a huge task for brands to satisfy their customers from all angles. The below table includes some brand sites and online marketplace sites which are competing in terms of offers, discounts, and quality.
Online Marketplaces |
Brands Official Sites |
Brand Factory, Club Factory, Shoppers Stop, Myntra, Amazon, Flipkart, Shopclues, Snapdeal, Tata Cliq, Paytm Mall, and more |
Bata, Adidas, Decathlon, Skullcandy, Samsung, Pantaloons, Biba, Puma, VIP, Levi’s, Fastrack, Philips, LG, and more |
You can try the Deal Alert feature of DesiDime to get your required fresh deal directly in your inbox from official stores as well as marketplaces. You need to input product keywords and the store names. Whenever your deal arrives, it is sent to you via email, sms, or app notification. For instance, if you want to buy a Boat bluetooth headset, you need to input keywords like boat bluetooth earphone, boat wireless earphone, boat bluetooth headset, etc. In store names, you need to select Boat(official website), Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra, etc. That’s it. Now, when a deal saying “Boat wireless bluetooth headphones at just 899” arrives, you can check the stores and grab the deal accordingly.
Buy directly from the brand's site or from marketplaces, DesiDime has deals and coupons for every source so that you keep saving every time. What do you prefer? Do share your views via the comments box below.
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Good post,Vu+Kg for the info and writing efforts 
thanks @Charan1122
Good information 
thanks @ravikumar.05042302
My decision to buy new mobile has now new angle to investigate
Bata site has no return option? That’s really a risky move
It depends on product site and offer some times amazon flipkart gives more flexibility than official product sites
Usually big marketplaces like Amazon, Flipkart are easier to deal with instead of a manufacturer with 15-20 service reps. This might not be true for all manufacturers though. While dealing with manufacturers, you are left at the mercy of the person dealing with it. Marketplaces don’t have anything to lose if a particular product is bad/substandard. Infact if they provide good customer service while dealing with such products, people are more likely to buy again although something different. Loss is borne by the seller. Marketplace just loses the commission that it is likely to get back at a later time. Whereas a manufacturer has a conflict of interest. Accepting that a product is bad harms their image, they lose money if a item is returned. If you have ever noticed, you are very unlikely to purchase an item from a particular brand if a previous product from the same brand did not turn out to be as good as you were expecting.
So a manufacturer has less chances of making the money back that it is about to lose. Hence they tend to be stubborn with returns/refunds. Hence they usually don’t provide a good customer service experience. Having said this, some manufacturers are better than marketplaces(usually luxury items) while some marketplaces (Paytm) are worse than manufacturers
Buying from brand websites always give genuine products but if their return policy is not very flexible, eg shoes not fitting, sound issue with headphone, etc
Agree! I just bought a Samsung split inverter AC on Flipkart. Went to Samsung website to register product for warranty. Found out the price on Samsung website to be 1000 rupees cheaper than Flipkart, even though I got 1500 discount on FK with HDFC card. For someone who can’t use the HDFC card offer, Samsung website would have been 2500 cheaper than Flipkart!
shopping in SHOPCLUES is like shopping in chor bazar
Stop looking things in binary.
I just look at company’s strategy for the market.
Decathlon : they have very strong offline business. People rather visit the store and buy.
Why? The sales men /women are accomplished sportsmen. Means if buying some camping the person there has spent 6 years in outdoor sports. Buying a cycle the fellow is a pro cyclist so buyer gets free expert guidance.
BATA : they have very strong dealer network. So customers buying from their website will get the same deal or worse than offline store. BUT the company has strict pricing policy so a dealer cannot undercut another dealer. So the website is only for online presence to show the share holders and online shop to cover part of the expenses to maintain a team.
No often they are at full mrp because e shops like Amazon order in bulk and get bull discount
I Would Recommend to Buy from Official website
New Collection and Discount will Also Be Available
LG : They are in bulk business. The more quanity better the prices. So a distributor would gef a product say 30% cheaper than MRP.
But then there are warehousing Manpower, Finance and entire supply chain cost which the company doesn’t bear.
So a distributor would offer a better deal or even Anazon could be classified in that same category. So cloudtail (not the marketplace) can offer a better price if placing bulk order to LG or Samsung.
Adidas /Puma : they are lifestyle stores so buying from the store makes sense. ₹2500 for a Ferrari print t-shirt only a upmarket shop would sell. So online or offline company direct is best. The perks of feel of the products on marketplace is just not there.
If I were to buy a ₹8000 shoes, I would visit the Adidas store for the brand experience. The staff would make me feel special and feel proud owning the brand. There is a disconnect in doing so from market place even if there is a saving of ₹500 on jabong. Most millanials miss this experience.
No,in case of electronics the price and offers are same in official website and amazon and Flipkart but some websites like OnePlus does not provide return option and their replacement option is impossible to use
Nice article.
Good information and good effort
Check price everywhere before buying.
That includes local shops, all online shopping sites, brand site, global shopping sites including shipping charges, use Google search, wholesale prices and check lowest price using price trackers like keepa, pricehistory etc.
Coupons on the brand’s website make the difference
Good post,Vu+Kg for the info and writing efforts
Usually big marketplaces like Amazon, Flipkart are easier to deal with instead of a manufacturer with 15-20 service reps. This might not be true for all manufacturers though. While dealing with manufacturers, you are left at the mercy of the person dealing with it. Marketplaces don’t have anything to lose if a particular product is bad/substandard. Infact if they provide good customer service while dealing with such products, people are more likely to buy again although something different. Loss is borne by the seller. Marketplace just loses the commission that it is likely to get back at a later time. Whereas a manufacturer has a conflict of interest. Accepting that a product is bad harms their image, they lose money if a item is returned. If you have ever noticed, you are very unlikely to purchase an item from a particular brand if a previous product from the same brand did not turn out to be as good as you were expecting.