Social commerce platform Coutloot on Tuesday launched a new feature that allows both buyers and sellers to bargain automatically.

The ‘Automatic Bargain’ feature will provide a pre-set bargain price to buyers within a chatbox. The buyer can then choose and quote a preferred price, which they think is fair for the product.

Founded by Jasmeet Thind and Mahima Kaul, the offline-to-online (O2O) social commerce platform allows buyers and sellers to bargain while shopping. It helps sellers list non-MRP, unbranded local market products across fashion, electronics, home decor, sports, and other boxed categories that makeup 75 per cent of India’s retail sector.

“India has always been an assisted shopping market where we shop via assistance through up-selling and getting the right price from the seller via bargaining,” said Jasmeet Thind, Founder, Coutloot in a statement.

“Coutloot has brought offline retail sellers and street vendors to sell online for the first time in their lives and made it possible for buyers to live-bargain with the seller without having to wait for the seller to be online. Our auto-bargain feature makes a deal quickly between the buyer-seller instantly,” Thind said.

Conversion rate

The platform expects to increase the conversion rate by 15 times with the Auto Bargain feature, thus growing the sales volume.

It provides an online space for over six lakh local sellers to sell their products across the country. Taking the Chat and Bargaining feature a step forward, it has also recently rolled out a chat feature in 12 different Indian languages.

“By analysing billions of data points on Coutloot, we realised that price and chatting with sellers drives intent and trust for the buyers, which helps sellers sell fast and close the deal at the right price. It is a win-win for both sellers and buyers,” Thind added.

Coutloot’s best-performing sellers come from towns such as Nagaon in Assam, Basai near Gurugram, Korba in Chhattisgarh, Surat in Gujarat, and Ludhiana Punjab. It has over 20 million listings on its app.

The company, growing at a CAGR of 300 per cent over the last three years, is looking to clock a platform GMV of ₹1,000 crore by 2022 on the back of rising demand coming from smaller towns.