After Bollywood, the booming e-commerce industry is emerging as a big employment opportunity for creative professionals such as fashion designers, photographers, Photoshop experts, content writers, creative directors and even models.
On payroll basis This year, several portals such as Myntra, Fashionandyou, Jabong, Shopclues, Voylla, Fashionara, Snapdeal, Bluestone and food portals such as Tastykhana are looking at doubling their creative team.
Earlier, these professionals used to work part-time or as freelancers. However, with growing e-commerce in the country, these professionals are not only being hired on company payrolls but are also being offered employee stock options, with packages ranging from ₹3-7 lakh per annum for freshers from top institutes. Experienced photographers, designers and creative directors can earn between ₹50 lakh to ₹1 crore annually.
Vishwas Shringi, founder of Jaipur-based jewellery e-tailer Voylla, said: “We have created a separate placement agency that does creative hiring for other e-commerce firms. With companies such as Amazon and Flipkart coming out with thousands of products every day, the volume of photography and content is also going up.” The need for contract professionals such as models, makeup artists and stylists has also gone up, with players going for live online fashion shows and events, he added.
Praveen Sinha, co-founder of Jabong.com , said that soon, fashion as a category would witness stiff competition with every portal trying to rope in the best talent. “It will probably compete with Bollywood in providing full-time employment,” he said, adding that the fashion category will grow at 100 per cent rate annually over other categories.
The creative team is crucial as virtual e-tailing is all about cataloguing and display, requiring frequent updates with visually appealing pictures to attract shoppers to the site.
Udit Mittal, MD of recruitment agency Unison, said that hiring activity for creative professionals among online players has gone up by 70 per cent.
Increasing numbers A couple of players have a creative team headcount of about 400, which is what a small IT firm may have on its entire rolls.
According to Ahmed Aftab Naqvi, Co-founder and CEO at online marketing firm Gozoop, as big players launch their own private labels to leverage exclusivity, e-commerce players will require more creative talent to launch successful brands, he added.
“We change the look of the Website every fortnight,” said Arun Sirdeshmukh, CEO, Fashionara.com , which conducts about 100 shoots everyday.