▸ With the current crisis affecting traditional businesses BuyAnyInsurance.com was ahead of the COVID-19 curve
As malls open up to full capacity operations the risk of COVID-19 cases in the UAE is expected to rise. Yet, people are being generally cautious and observing social distancing measures on their own. Most retail businesses are unsure of the turnout. Essential businesses such as grocery stores and pharmacies have seen steady footfall during the lockdown, but whether customers will be willing to risk contamination for luxury goods is still to be seen. Many are wondering if COVID-19 is the end of traditional business.
Fortunately, there is an alternative. BuyAnyInsurance.com is a perfect example of businesses that are completely online. Yes, they have a traditional office space, but they are not dependent on a retail outlet to make sales. The internet is their shop floor, and their warehouse, where they meet up with their clients and help them buy great insurance policies. In fact, BuyAnyInsurance.com started out for the sole purpose of being an online business.
Mark Bachayani, co-founder of BuyAnyInsurance.com, shared the reasons he thinks online is the only place to be for the future of global business.
The Startup and Operational Costs
With an online business, the startup and operational costs are much lower than a traditional business. Not to say that they are negligible. No. Domain names, web hosting, servers, website developers, content writers, graphic designers, they all cost a lot of money. But comparatively, they cost less than traditional outlets and retail employees. This is one factor that makes online businesses so appealing. It allows entrepreneurs in the service industry to spend more on the service, marketing and customer retention.
Keeping the current pandemic in mind it also allows businesses to remain operational with minimum cost during lockdowns and quarantine. Many businesses with either most, or part of their operations online managed to sail through the pandemic without too much loss to the business.
More Women On Board and Flexible Employment
The Middle East and South Asia has come a long way in making space for women in the workplace. More women are becoming part of the workforce and contributing their ideas to build better businesses. Online spaces like BuyAnyInsurance.com provide spaces for women who can’t, for reasons of their own, join the traditional workspace. Working from home is a great option that allows them to have full-time employment, and a seat at the table to share new ideas. Working hours are flexible, with more emphasis on quality and efficiency of work rather than clocking in the hours of a workday at the office. BuyAnyInsurance.com currently has an entire department of remote female workers.
Working from home isn’t only a plus for women. Men can benefit from it too. The great thing is your business isn’t limited in employment choices. The whole world is your pool of potential talents. You can hire employees who are a perfect fit from any country in the world without having to move them to your location. This kind of online mobility allows a greater share of ideas, talents, and viewpoints, resulting in better business practices.
Operations Not Limited to One Emirate
Because BuyAnyInsurance.com is essentially a platform to compare insurance policies online it spends more funds on creating tools to make the online space user friendly and innovative in its efficiency. Being online allows you more control over the one space on the web you have. You can cover a wider geographical area of operations then it was possible to do so before.
Though it is based in Dubai, BuyAnyInsurance.com operates all over the UAE. It is now thinking of expanding over the entire Gulf and the Middle East. Another great advantage of being online.
Platforms like BuyAnyInsurance.com also allow traditional insurance providers with a wider market. Many insurance providers don’t have physical offices in other cities or Emirates. It limits them to the cities they are in where customers have to physically come to buy insurance policies. But a collaboration with BuyAnyInsurance.com allows them to sell the samne policies online to people across the UAE without the added expense of renting space, renovation, and employing staff to man the floor.
Rethinking Shipping and Logistics
With an online business your head office is virtually online. This helps you redesign how shipping and logistics would work for you. Because BuyAnyInsurance.com provides a service as opposed to tangible goods it’s fairly easy for them to email insurance policies online within 60 minutes of purchase.
For traditional businesses who have goods instead of services to sell the warehouse can easily deploy the goods. The structure of your online business will then be arranged in a way that your overhead costs are restricted to production cost, warehouse rent, employees, and delivery trucks. You can enlarge the delivery circle to miles around your perimeter, or to various cities depending on your budget. These might seem like a lot of costs, but you have to keep in mind that you’re cutting out costs of retail stores, designing them, hiring employees to man them, electric, and other overheads from the equation.
The current period is a struggle but things don’t look like they’re going to get better any time soon. Startups and businesses need to find solutions now for the immediate future. Businesses like BuyAnyInsurance.com have a lot to offer in regards to planning for uncertainties.
