Picture: China takes centre stage at BRICS 2017 conference, Xiamen,
China, 4 September 20171
Background
China is,
arguably, the largest economy in the world, with many sources claiming that
China, has in fact, overtaken the United States, to claim this title. Whether
or not you agree with China being number 1 or number 2, you cannot question
China’s global importance, impressive growth, and staggering trade volume.
China’s rapid development has resulted in China becoming an appealing
destination for many businesses.
Evidently, China is a very large and important player in the
international market. Thus, in order to take your business to the next stage
and expand internationally, getting access to the Chinese market is clearly an
important consideration and would most certainly prove rewarding. The sheer
size of the market and vast population size allows firms to gain access to a
greater market and a large pool of consumers.
What makes China stand out?
Not only is
China one of the largest economies in the world, but it has connections with
countries all over the world. However, the interesting feature here, and the reason
that China is so different to any other country, is the fact it is so closed
off. This makes China a very difficult market to tap into and our future blogs
will provide useful tips and key considerations in doing so, particularly in
terms of the differences between Chinese and Western social media and marketing
platforms. Being able to tap into the large Chinese population, the growing
middle class and their rising western tastes is definitely an appealing
proposition. In order to get your brand out there you need to go beyond the
great firewall and the closed nature of China!
Considerations
In light of
all this positivity on expanding and marketing your brand in China, a crucial
question you need to ask is “will my brand will have an influence on Chinese
consumers?”. To ensure that it does, marketing must be effective and must
target the correct market in the correct way.
A perfect
example is the extent to which social media platforms differ in China. WeChat,
a multi-feature application, is used widely in China, with approximately 963m
active users2 who spend 40
minutes (on average) on the app per day3. Using WeChat is a great
tool to access the Chinese market and help grow your business. This is clearly
very different to the Western world and is one of the many modifications that
you will need to make in order to be successful. As a result, expanding into
China can be a difficult, but rewarding task and using WeChat to market your
company is one of the many ways to access millions of Chinese consumers.
Picture:
WeChat interface and QR code4
Another
example is WeChat pay. WeChat pay is a very popular payment
feature on
the WeChat application. The feature has over 200m users5, and is a
brilliant and convenient way to make payments. It means that China is rapidly moving
away from physical cash, and this sort of innovation is an important
consideration for any business expanding into China. Utilising this payment
system allows you to gain access to Chinese consumers easily. This is one of
the many ways you need to alter your marketing and payment landscape in order
to appeal to Chinese consumers. We will discuss this, and other, payment
features in future blogs, so stay tuned!
Picture:
The power of QR codes in China: Alipay (left) and WeChat (right) 7
Not only is
it critical to market yourself on the correct Chinese platforms, it is also
essential to ensure systems are compatible on Chinese phones and marketing is
available in the Chinese language. China has become the “undisputed leader in
mobile transactions”6 so don’t miss out on this trend! Making sure
your online services are compatible on Chinese smartphones and utilise Chinese
payment methods is a great way for your brand to leave an imprint in the
Chinese market!
References:
2 – Q2 2017 - https://www.statista.com/statistics/255778/number-of-active-wechat-messenger-accounts/
4–Peterson,
2015, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/wechat-better-than-any-social-mobile-app-comes-out-silicon-peterson/ and Werner,
2016, https://www.cultofmac.com/430119/wechat-is-more-than-a-messaging-app-it-might-be-a-mobile-os/
7 – Xiao,
2017, https://www.techinasia.com/fake-qr-code-scams-china and Benji,
2017, https://www.marketingtochina.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-qr-codes-in-china/
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