Shopee, the Singapore-based e-commerce platform, is doubling down on operational and logistics investments in Malaysia as it maintains its #1 marketplace position by average monthly active users and total time spent in-app.

Shopee said in a statement on Wednesday that is commissioned study with Kantar revealed recently that 70 percent of the platform’s buyers across Southeast Asia are now 32 years old and below (Generation Z), spending an average of 30 minutes on its app daily.

It is noted that over 2023, Shopee enhanced fundamental capabilities to create seamless and safe experiences targeted to these digitally savvy buyers.

This included providing Malaysians with faster and more flexible delivery options, such as Next Day delivery, Instant Delivery, and increased Shopee collection points for self-collection.

Malaysian users shopping or selling on the app contacted Shopee’s customer service team 9.5 million times with questions in 2023 — these cases were resolved within 30 seconds 98 percent of the time with success — and with 80 percent customer service satisfaction rate, the highest across industries.

The first point of contact for most Malaysians has typically been with Shopee’s proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, affectionately named Sophie (after the company’s mascot).

Sophie’s neuro-linguistic programming was enhanced to help users along the way by recognizing relevant intents, anticipating queries based on users’ live interactions, and providing more granular solutions based on a localized management playbook.

In 2023, Sophie’s successful closure rate doubled, such that it resolved 80 percent of cases satisfactorily from 18 million chats handled before routing them to live customer service agents.

On this front, Shopee optimized the number of customer service agents available, and boosted their processes, training, and incentives so that even with the volume of questions throughout peak e-commerce shopping periods, end-to-end resolutions across cases of various complexities took less than a day to resolve and abandonment rate (dropped calls) were nearly zero at the end of 2023.

In fact, Shopee’s customer service agents received one of the best in market monthly incentives for good performance.

They were also equipped with SOP Assistant Tool that empowered front line agents to solve more cases based on internal information and turned them into decision making experts using first-party CRM data across the platform.

In 2024, Shopee continues to enhance the capabilities of its logistics ecosystem to support faster shipping to buyers.

Shopee’s logistics partner SPX has expanded warehouse facilities and will operate seven days a week. Shopee is also working closely with brands, sellers, and partners to aim for 95% of orders to be shipped out in the same day.

Moreover, Shopee has spearheaded a comprehensive and fuss-free returns policy to give millions of Malaysians confidence when looking to check out their desired products, including high-value goods, that they cannot touch or feel when shopping online.

First, by enhancing the Return Refunds process so that it is much easier and shorter, completing in only two and a half days (compared to the retail industry sector benchmark of seven days), with two times more drop-off points and doorstep pick-up option.

Second, by expanding its Change of Mind free returns, no questions asked policy from 19 March 2024 for more products and items, providing additional flexibility throughout the shopping journey during the 15-day Shopee Guarantee period.

A #ShopSafeWithShopee survey of 1,000 Malaysian shoppers aged 18 and above also found that nine out of ten utilize platform features like Shopee Live demos, seller chat, Shopee Mall’s Authentic Deals circle, and Shopee Guarantee to ensure safe online shopping transactions.

Shopee is the leading e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia & Taiwan. It is part of Sea Limited, a leading global consumer internet company.

Sea’s other core businesses are Garena and SeaMoney.

Shopee survey shows new generation of Malaysians shop value-based online