China is a $1.1 trillion eCommerce market, and offers lots of opportunities for online entrepreneurs. However, like all other lucrative markets, getting a piece of the pie in this market is not easy. You will be up against giant competitors such as Alibaba. As such, you need to come up with effective strategies before making a move into the Chinese eCommerce market. To help you out, here are 4 effective China eCommerce strategies to try out now.
1. Make use of big data
The Chinese eCommerce market is huge, but it is also diverse. As such, before you make your move, you need to have all the information about the specific market segment you are targeting. To get this information, you need to leverage the power of big data. A company like WPIC understands China e-commerce well, and has all the data analytics tools to help entrepreneurs enter the Chinese market. With their big data analytical tools, you can easily identify opportunities within industries, and better understand the most lucrative subsections of the market that would benefit most from your services.
2. Mirror your successful competitors
Unlike western eCommerce that is dominated by familiar names like Amazon, things are a little different in China. Due to the Chinese firewall, Chinese e-commerce is dominated by equally huge and successful companies. For you to succeed, you can adopt a strategy of following in their footsteps. Some of the companies that would be worth mirroring when crafting a China strategy are Tmall and Taobao. These two are owned by global e-commerce giant Alibaba, and one can use them to understand what ticks in Chinese eCommerce. Once you get the basics, you can use that as a basis to fine-tune your strategy to best capture your target market. Be sure to check out International PEO and other great options.
3. Leverage on social media
China is big on social media, and though they don’t use Facebook, Twitter, and other western social media sites, they have their own equally successful ones. Leverage on these to create brand awareness about your company and products. To achieve this, you need to come up with Chinese content that is in line with the social media trends in China. Trying to apply what has worked in other places, such as the U.S could fail. The culture is different and what might appeal to American netizens may repel Chinese ones. With a good Chinese social media content strategy, you should be able to make progress.
4. Go heavy on mobile
China is mainly a mobile-first/mobile-only market. As such, you need to craft your strategy around mobile. For more effective results, you can engage the services of marketing organizations that are highly experienced in the Chinese mobile market. You can also look into integrating Chinese mobile money services into your platform. The end goal should be to give Chinese consumers an easy way to access your products on their mobile phones. Success on this front would be a jackpot for your business, because it would be the starting point to growing market share in one of the world’s largest markets.