Discount equity broker 5paisa.com is aiming to on-board three lakh new customers every month as it rides on a huge demand from millennials and young investors in tier 2 and tier 3 cities to open demat accounts and participate in equity markets, Prakarsh Gagdani, Wholetime Director & CEO, 5Paisa Capital, said.
This target is nearly double the company’s current customer acquisition run rate of about 1.25-1.5 lakh new customers, most of whom are coming through the mobile app route.
“Our focus now is to have customer acquisitions that are one of the largest in the broking industry, which is clearly moving towards discount broking. Given the demand that we see, it is not going to be difficult for us to reach the three-lakh level. Our first target is to cross that. It’s a matter of time. Already the top three in broking industry are each adding three lakh new customers every month,” Gagdani told
‘Top 3 club in next 12-18 months’
He highlighted that 5paisa.com had onboarded 3.4 lakh customers in the second quarter, which is the highest ever in a quarter.
The company, which is ranked sixth in the equity broking industry league, wants to enter into the top three club in next 12-18 months and is investing ₹15-20 crore to upgrade its entire infrastructure to ready for its next growth cycle, Gagdani said. “We are investing on servers, disaster recovery and IT infrastructure besides upping the spends on IT team,” he added.
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As on date, 5paisa.com has about two million customers with nearly 1.5 million active customers. There have been 10 million downloads of its mobile app.
“Nearly 80-85 per cent of our customer acquisition happens through our app. It is our bread and butter,” he said. Also, nearly 80 per cent of the company’s customer base is under 35 years age.
Analytics division
5paisa.com is also investing in creating an analytics division, Gagdani said. “It will be a pure data-driven and data science business. It will be more of an enabler. We are creating a layer of analytics and data so that we can give a great user experience,” he said. This data analytics division is being done to drive revenues for the company and not for providing any Management Information System (MIS) reporting.
Digital focus
5paisa.com will also, in the coming days, up its digital presence through more digital campaigns. “You now see us on television. Very soon you will see us everywhere digitally. This is our goal that we have to be there digitally where most of the people are. People are consuming content. We are targetting the younger population in the age bracket of 18-30 years — people who are spending good time on social media or consuming video content,” he said.